Every politician is a hypocrite or a lunatic.

Here's what I mean.

If we require that a politician's positions and behavior remain consistent over time-- that if you are for something today but actually you voted against it 8 years ago you are a hypocrite-- well, pretty much all politicians will fail that test. Circumstances change, viewpoints evolve. Whether you're talking about Obama having voted against raising the debt ceiling as senator, or about Romney's beta version of Obamacare in Massachusetts, if a politician is in public life long enough, he or she will almost certainly self-contradict over time.

Unless, of course, that politician is so zealous and fanatical in their ideals as to be inflexible. In which case, bingo, lunatic.

Given the choice between hypocrites and lunatics, I generally vote for the hypocrites.

Labels: The politics