Note to Congress: Dirt Washes Off, Blood Stains

[xchrom]

http://www.nationofchange.org/note-congress-dirt-washes-blood-stains-1356187244

Anybody eager to gain a better understanding of the corruption that pervades politics in the nation's capital, the origins of the super-charged gun culture that has emerged in the post-Reagan era, and the relationship between the two can do no better than to read Richard Painter's article in the New York Times ("The NRA Protection Racket" on Dec. 20, 2012).*

Painter captures an essential feature of the political landscape today. He writes, "The most blatant protection racket is orchestrated by the National Rifle Association, which is ruthless against candidates who are tempted to stray from its view that all gun regulations are pure evil."

Political theorists have devoted reams of paper to the problem of "dirty hands." Basically, it involves the dilemma politicians face when confronted with a necessity to act in situations where the moral stakes and consequences of action (or inaction) are ambiguous, uncertain, or unknown. When there is no good choice unencumbered by the likelihood of "collateral damage," or where choosing between the lesser of two evils is unavoidable, the problem becomes endemic to the very process and project of politics among their self-interest and the exogenous political pressures.

As Painter's article makes clear, the problem of "dirty hands" can now more accurately to be viewed as a problem of "bloody hands". Politicians who have climbed into bed with the gun lobby, who have turned the once-respectable Republican party into the political wing of the NRA, and who manifestly care much more about not getting targeted for defeat in the next election than about the safety of our citizens – including schoolchildren – who are literally the targets of gun-crazy lunatics armed with lethal semiautomatic weapons designed to massacre people, not to hunt elk – such politicians are not just corrupt, they don't just have dirty hands.

[niyad]

1. thank you