I wince and squint when I like

Maybe this is all a part of being a post-Watergate American, but I can't help but think it's uniquely 21st century American: when there's a politician I really, really like, I find myself squinting and wincing when I read things about them, like I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop - like there aren't any clean politicians left.  How many Obama appointees dropped out due to issues over paying their taxes?  Seriously?  Everyone I know pays their taxes (well, okay, I know one woman who didn't file for seven or eight years, but she's an anomaly to me).  In fact, most of us pay our taxes UP FRONT, i.e. in our paychecks, and then get a smidgen of money back the following year.  Meanwhile, the people running the system we pay our taxes to can't get it right?  Either they're dumb (which worries me) or they're liars (equally worrisome).

I have high hopes for Obama, but I just wish people would give him a little breathing room.  The problems in our country are so huge right now; just let the man do his job.  How would you like to start a new job and have everyone on the news commenting on how you hadn't gotten anything done yet, even though you'd only been there for a month and a half?  Most of us would have stress-induced illnesses at that point.

But back to liking politicians.  One person I think is an up-and-coming star is Cory Booker, the mayor of Newark.  He's smart; he's well-spoken; he seems to be very level-headed and bipartisan.  The more I read about him, the more I like him: he went to Stanford and to Yale Law.  He was a Rhodes Scholar, where he became friends with Rachel Maddow (yay!) and Rabbi Schmuley (crazy, but seemingly true).  He's lived in the projects in Newark, so he knows of what he speaks.  When he ran for mayor of Newark in 2002, he was defeated - but he ran again in 2006.  He's a senior fellow at Rutgers (rah rah) and on the Board of Trustees for Teachers College (dream school).  He's a vegetarian (interesting) and totally straight-edge (also interesting).

He's exciting to me the way Obama was when he made his keynote address at the 2004 Democratic convention - when I turned to my dad and said, "I think we just saw the first black president speak."  (I would have never guessed it would be soo soon, though.)  I think Cory Booker has that same level of promise and he certainly seems determined.

Yet... I find myself wincing, waiting for something to go wrong - waiting to hear something terrible about him that will ruin his political career, like he hides thirsty puppies in his closet or has an addiction to scratch-off cards... or any other meaningless (or, worse, meaningful) error or indiscretion on his part that makes him less of a superstar.  I hope I'm not wrong about him.  Very few people are as great as they might initially seem, but I hope he is.

Comments

[Mike Harmon]

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[bookishpenguin]

Thanks :)