© 2008 by Michael Swickard, Ph.D.
“My little plum, I am like Robin Hood; I take from the rich and give to the poor.”
“What poor?” asks the skeptical Poppy.
“Us poor,” replies W. C. Fields as Professor Eustace McGargle in the 1936 movie “Poppy”
Somehow W.C. Fields being an engaging dastardly character in a 1936 movie is ever so much more palatable than the just released transcripts of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich enhancing our notion that Illinois politicians are like Robin Hood — they are on the take. He is the fourth Illinois governor in a row to be ensnared by scandal. The last three governors are serving time, as it appears he will. The issue is not corruption; rather, it’s the prevailing sense of illegal personal entitlement that is constant with those leaders.
However, the governor of Illinois is innocent until found guilty by a jury of his peers. Can we find 12 moral degenerates like him to serve on the jury? Lacking that, can we find 12 people of his arrogance? Probably not. But whoever serves on the jury may be the best we can do for a scoundrel of his magnitude.
Here in New Mexico we have had a deeply embedded culture of that same arrogance and sense of entitlement by leaders. From local to statewide, we regularly find our trust abused. There are even investigations at this time of “play for pay” in Gov. Bill Richardson’s administration.
Importantly, suspicion is not proof, so Bill Richardson is only being investigated. We will have to await the results of investigation, but the whispers have been constant for much of Richardson’s time as governor that the only way to get his ear was with a fistful of dollars.
It makes me wonder: What is this notion that we, the people, are really the masters of the elected servants such as our governors? What utter nonsense. They live like kings and we live like peasants. To them we are just “giving units” to be “milked” regularly. It appears to me that some of our leaders personally hold common citizens in contempt since they do not breathe the rarified air of the elite.
There has never been a time when corruption by our leaders did not raise its ugly head, nor a time when that corruption was more onerous than now. As much as there is lip service about the elected as our servants doing our bidding, no one watching their actions and ours would guess we were the ones being served.
The importance of a free and active press
The only thing keeping the politicians from doing even more wrong is a free and active press. This is hard to keep since there is so much that our servants can offer journalists and so many ways to make their lives miserable if they have the temerity to report things that our servants do not wish the common people to know.
It is common for both Republicans and Democrats to “freeze out” reporters and media outlets that do not “play ball” with them. I have personally experienced it from politicians of both parties. The only reason that I notice it more from Democrats in New Mexico is that so many more are in office in our state. But neither party suffers criticism well.
So our only real hope to hold down the arrogant corruption is to constantly value our independent media. Our independent media are fragile because it is very hard to “go it alone” in a world of big mergers and conglomerates. But they are the only ones who will stick to a story against the flurry of ways that government can make things hard.
I salute our independent watchdogs, because without them we would be rolled up and smoked by the corrupt ones. We see those media members in our stores and restaurants. They do not live as kings, and only by their shinning light upon the corrupt ones are we able to prevail.
Swickard is a weekly columnist for this site. You can reach him at michael@swickard.com.