Prostitutes in High Places

Who is the highest-priced prostitute in America today? At the moment, Barack Obama, but only because it's his turn to occupy the whore house at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Lesser whores, some five hundred plus of them, can be found at the other end of that same street at the Capitol.

These big-time courtesans don't sell sex. It might be better for all of us if they did. They sell our trust in them; they sell their power to make laws and policy; they sell the country right out from under us. The procurers on K street – they're known as lobbyists, though they're pimps, pure and simple – set up liaisons between corporations and the whores in the various houses who then put legislation together to raise corporations above the law, and make it easier for them to make money. The latest trick is to force people to give money to directly to corporations. That's what “mandated health care” is all about. Forcing us, not to give over money to the government in the form of taxes, but money directly to corporations, for the purposes of fattening executive salaries and shareholder profits. In the past, this was mostly done by Congress, through legislation which would transfer public funds to corporations. This is what the bank bailout is. Laws are also made to make it harder for the people to get the money back.

Now, these whores will doubtless tell you that they're motivated to seek public office by a profound sense of public service. In the past, I thought that they were at least motivated by a desire to keep a cushy job. Now, I know better. It is really to get on the high-priced Washington Stroll, first as a whore, and later as a pimp – I mean, lobbyist. If Democrats – or even Republicans – were really concerned with keeping their seats, they'd pass a Medicare-for-all health care bill. They'd be assured of being re-elected for at least a generation by a grateful nation. In no country which has such a system is there any widespread, grass-roots movement to get rid of it. If there is any at all, it is from a right-wing fringe or some disgruntled doctors. Politicians in those countries wouldn't voice a desire to do away with universal medicare for a second, unless they were tired of their jobs. Even a right-wing nut like Bush-loving Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of a minority government in Canada, would not openly try to do away with Medicare, even though it appears to be the most cherished of his demented dreams. Yes, friends, our politicians are, for the most part, only seeking public office to get in the way of the K-Street Pimps and their money.

When these whores come looking for your vote, tell them to forget it. Vote for a candidate from a party other than the Democrats or Republicans. If you can't, either because their isn't one to your liking on the ballot, or because your local Democrats and Republicans have passed laws making it impossible for other candidates to get on the ballot, go to the polling place on election day, and take your ballot, and return it without making a choice. You'll do this in different ways depending on the way your ballot is set up. After that, get involved with ways of effecting change in other spheres of public life. Remember, democracy is much more than an election or rigged referendum. In short, we've got to stop playing along in this game where we can only lose.

The U. S. Supreme Court has made political prostitution legal. You might write the justices and ask that, when laws against prostitution come before them in the future, that they look as favourably upon sex-trade workers as they have on politicians and corporations.

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