No. Just No.

     I dug around over at CNN this morning, looking for something to comment on.  It's just depressing.  I don't mind a deadlocked Congress or the Press yapping at the heels of the White House: all Presidents ought to be closely watched (alas, some are watched less by the mainstream media than others, but I'll take it when I can get it) and a Congress that can't get much done is a Congress that can't make things much worse: like Enrico Fermi, I have reached the conclusion that most political change is for the worst, no matter who's pushing it or how much I admire their intentions.

     But politicians are such children -- no better than their contemporaries in Hollywood, who they resemble more and more with every passing year. We're wired up to live in small groups, without a whole lot of socioeconomic distance between the fat cats on top and the losers who haul out their trash on the bottom; we're wired up to breed young, get the kids raised, and be out of the way as soon as the next generation doesn't need babysitters for their offspring.  We're wired up to live on fairly short rations and to hanker after the stuff that's not so easy to come by -- rich meat, salt, fats, sweets.  We get too much of the last four and almost none of the rest; most people go through life riled up about one part of the shortfall or another and never understand why.  It's why we get creepers, and envy, and all manner of abuses of power and such badness, and not a bit of it is quickly fixable if it can be fixed at all.

     But money and power are amplifiers.  If you're a little creepy or obnoxious at minimum wage, just wait 'til you're managing the fast food joint -- or when you own a whole string of them and wind up on the City Council.  A good many of the dull, boring, old-fashioned and/or arbitrary rules of society are roughly aimed at keeping our worst impulses in check (or, perhaps unfortunately, well-hidden) and when you throw off those "tired old strictures," you're damned unlikely to wind up building a paradise on Earth.  We're much better at building our own Hells and purgatories -- and we have.  This is a hell, at least, and some of the biggest demons are on campaign posters and in movie ads.

     And we don't even get a seat next to fire near Mark Twain.