Politics By Ordeal
by Erica Jong
What is this foolishness? Obama is pure and not a politician and
Hillary is "tainted"?
Does anyone get to be a presidential candidate in our country without
being a politician?
Does anyone run for political office -- a humiliating and exhilarating
marathon -- without wanting power more than sleep?
Come on. Get real. You and I could never endure the punishment of
debates, of columnists who don't fact-check, of swift-boaters, of dumb
pundits and corrupt colleagues, without the lust for power being the
overriding emotion in your life.
I do a book tour of six cities and come down with the flu -- and I'm
pretty strong and healthy. I can hardly imagine what candidates go
through. Yes, they fly on private jets. Yes, they don't take their
shoes off at the airport, but they don't sleep either. I'm amazed they
can even croak a coherent sentence.
I once did a lecture tour of Australia and New Zealand with bronchitis
and laryngitis. I caught it in Hong Kong, I think, and it lingered for
three weeks. My voice barely functioned. But I spoke anyway. And I
signed hundreds of books after every appearance. Once I got home, I
took to my bed for two weeks. The jet lag was awful and the bronchitis
turned into a resistant infection. No antibiotic worked. I was
silenced for six weeks and my vocal chords still have their off days.
How do these candidates do it? I still can't understand. They must be
bionic. By the end of a book tour, I'm so sick of answering questions
about myself that I start to interview the journalists about what they
like to do in their spare time -- skiing, sailing, snowboarding, golf?
The intensity of being interviewed by hostile reporters is absolutely
exhausting. No wonder people misspeak. It's amazing they don't
throttle the press. And the public. By the time they get in office
they must hate the public. Why do we put them through this torture?
Shouldn't they be thinking about governance, coming up with new ideas
for the commonweal rather than being flogged by the press?
This is no way to audition for "the most powerful job on earth." I
doubt that the ordeal helps anyone -- neither the candidates nor the
public.
And is it really the most powerful job on earth? The way our country
is going -- with our deficit, our plunging dollar, our $100 oil, we
are becoming a banana republic, ruled by corporations that deceive us
and buy our politicians.
Where is this pure politician? In your dreams, folks, in your dreams.
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