from their crimes, ye will know thee.

in a post called "best investment ever," xymphora points to my post on how cheap it is to buy the congresscritters, and he adds:

"So true. By far the single best investment you can make, the one with the largest rate of return, is to buy a politician. For literally a few thousand dollars, you can make hundreds of millions. At least when the devil buys your soul he has to give you something valuable. These guys can be bought for what amounts to the pocket change of the plutocrats. Israel has the best scam going of all. For a relatively small amount of the billions the United States sends to Israel each year, Israel can bribe the Congressmen to ensure that the money keeps on flowing. It's the perpetual motion machine of American political corruption."

and Digby makes a practical, related point:

"Since I see little hope that the system is going to be reformed, it occurs to me that we liberals should just hire ourselves some lobbyists. Really. We spend many, many millions on political campaigns that get us zilch. Nada. We should just raise funds to buy congressmen yachts or send them to Australia on vacation or hire their wives at 5 grand a month to survey what congressmen like for dinner. These guys go cheap when you really think about it. They'll do pretty much anything you want for a golfing trip. We'd actually save money just by buying them all French commodes. In exchange we get them to vote for national health care and legal gay marriage and a $15.00 minimum wage."

i was thinking about more about my original post overnight - the odd thing is that very few of these corrupt politicians actually enrich themselves (directly). duke cunningham is a curious exception - so far. so the odd thing is that its an all-too-human story that someone like the Duke would use his position of power to enrich himself - but he's the exception.

so if we accept my original premise that american politicians are really cheap to bribe, its even weirder to consider that most of them dont even personally, directly, financially benefit from the transaction.

i understand that running for office is expensive and that congresscritters need to raise money - but they are selling their souls (or getting a 5th mortgage) for small amounts of campaign money and a lot of shiny baubles.

i havent been through all the payments but a typical example in the newsmedia is 'person x's PAC got $5000 and $10k donated to the rnc in their name.' i dont know the campaign finance laws but i'm sure these donations are structured around the laws

apart from these direct payments, all of the other bribes are for shiny, baubly things like skyboxes, casino chips, or holidays - the same 'gifts' that anyone can get from a frequent flyer catalogue.

there are those who say 'yeah - thats just S.O.P. - lobbying is a part DC. getoverit' - but from all accounts, scanlon's plea agreement includes specific quid pro quos - and presumably those quid pro quo's have been endorsed by the congresscritter directly.

when you look at the 'typical' example i mentioned earlier, the specific negotiation appears to include something like 'you must donate $10k in my name to the RNC' - so it appears that the entire thing is basically a vanity project. it makes perfect sense in a repuglican world - the logic is 'i will sell my soul, disgrace my office, risk criminal prosecution, social disgrace and a lifetime in hell - and all it will cost me is the smug, phony satisfaction that some people, somewhere, will give me public accolades for appearing to have donated $10k to the cause'

isnt that a really weird thing to value? (ignoring campaign finance laws) the corrupt congresscritter certainly wouldnt commit the crime for the sole purpose of getting $10k to the national party - his/her only interest is having his/her name on the 'donation.' apparently the real currency in washington in the ability to raise cash for the rnc. thats certainly not a new observation but its quite profound in this context - if we accept that bribery is essentially stealing, then what we are curently witnessing in DC is a bunch of kleptocrats who love stealing money and then giving it away - with their name attached.

it reminded me of a simplistic version of soviet socialism described as 'people in the west get motivated by money but in the east they are given ribbons and medals' (or some such) - but here we are in the height of american repuglicanism and the result is that congressmen are selling legislation for the equivalent of a communist medal of achievement. a line item in the rnc's budget is apparently the new holy grail.

DeLay's crimes are in the same league - $190k distributed amongst 5 campaigns! from their crimes, ye will know thee.