"We Must Stop Inflating Our Elected Leaders"

[applegrove]

We Must Stop Inflating Our Elected Leaders

By Alec MacGillis at the New Republic

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/119335/mcdonnell-case-reflects-our-inflation-our-elected-leaders

"SNIP........................

But I would argue that there is a larger lesson to be taken from this tale. The McDonnell saga is, to me, just the most glaring recent example of a tendency in American politics and government that has bothered me for some time: our weird, unhealthy inflation of executive elected office at all levels of government. As the McDonnell revelations unspooled, first in the dogged reporting of the Washington Post’s Roz Helderman and Laura Vozzella and then in the trial itself, it became clear that driving much of the McDonnells’ behavior was their extremely exalted conception of the office of governor.

This conception not only contributed to the McDonnells’ extraordinary sense of entitlement but also fed the pressures that led them to accept the favors of the vitamin-supplement salesman, Jonnie R. Williams Sr. For one thing, Maureen McDonnell felt great anxiety about being sufficiently well turned out for her husband’s 2010 inauguration and, generally, about living up to the expectations for being the First Lady. Think about that for a second: in the 21st century, a woman needed to worry about performing a role called “First Lady” because her husband was the elected head of one of the nation’s 50 state governments. Does this happen elsewhere? Does the wife of the head of Germany’s state of Lower Saxony (whose population is roughly the same as Virginia’s) fret about living up to the role of “Erste Frau?” Is the wife of the premier of British Columbia or Saskatchewan worrying about whether her wardrobe will measure up?

Sure, one could write some of these anxieties off to Maureen McDonnell’s personal insecurities—but not entirely. After all, her husband was taking on a role in which it was deemed appropriate, by traditional protocol, for him to be referred to as “His Excellency.” (Virginia is hardly alone in this—Connecticut, Georgia, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina and West Virginia all use this royalist language, a holdover from colonial times.)

.................

How did this happen? How did a country that was founded in rebellion against royal overlords become so prone to its own sort of executive self-importance? Part of it has to do with the problem that my editor Frank Foer laid out in an essay in the current issue of this magazine, on the ways in which our federalist system and delegation of powers to countless fragmented municipalities has created thousands of little princes with their own fiefdoms and aggrandizing tendencies. But it may go even deeper than that, to some ancient feudal habits deep within us that allow and even encourage our elected leaders to think they’re lords of their domain. Regardless, it’s time it stopped. No more “His Excellency” for men who, more often than not, are anything but excellent.


..........................SNIP"

[djean111]

1. Ain't that the truth.

[applegrove]

2. In Canada, I would say there is more respect for government itself than politicians.

Our motto is peace, order and good government. So we see government as good. Then again someone who has been a provincial premier is unlikely to want to be prime minister. Maybe governors in the USA often want to be seen as presidential? Maybe it is by design? Would the GOP up the prestige of executives and lower the prestige of the government relatively speaking? Yup. Would they try and institute fielty for the 'big man' psychology to change the way people vote/relate to 'big men' (CEOs, tv & radio pundits, politicians, the individual not the group)? Yup. Have they? I don't know.

[sabrina 1]

4. Our politicians have become so far removed from the 'little people' and yes, that is how many of

them arrogantly view those who elect them, that they live in a bubble where they seem to believe they ARE royal. See some of the comments made by a few or our top officials regarding the people, eg, 'this issue is complex, the people wouldn't understand it'. That was in relation to economics, what caused the financial collapse. I have to say that it was THEY who appeared to not understand it.

When I read the history of the US and see how presidents like Washington and Adams eg, after serving their terms of office, returned to their lives and mingled again with their neighbors and family with none of the ostentatious trimmings of today's politicians, it is clear we have wandered far from what was originally intended.

Someone said back then that a politician should to go DC, do his job and then return home.

[unblock]

3. just the sort of "society's to blame" crap the right-wing says we use all the time.

yeah no matter what, society does, the governor's job is going to have stresses galore and opportunities galore and rationalizations galore for corruption.

anyone who wants to argue that gubernatorial ceremony is overdone and the expected displayed could be taken down a few notches is more than welcome to do so, and i wouldn't disagree.

but to take that argument and put it next to a recent, high-profile example of outrageous criminal corruption?

seriously?

we're to blame because of the term "his excellency"? as if that's practically a command to commit crimes of office?

[Ilsa]

5. Rosalynn Carter sewed her inaugural gown. Even

Sarah Palin shopped at consignment stores, and she was the governor. Pickles Bush was rich enough to be properly trussed, so no slack there.

No, Maureen McDonnell owns this one. She felt like she had to keep up with the rich Republican women. Being in the public eye, she should have resolved to put up with their sniping at her for not being rich enough to buy expensive clothes.