A number of thoughts and outrages have been swimming around in my mind lately. Yesterday, I read with great interest a Daily Kos diary talking about House hearings relating to Rep. Kucinich's impeachment resolutions, but which were studiously arranged not to seem like impeachment hearings. One thing in particular about the diary resonated deeply within me:

Many people watching the hearings will wonder at some point why no one is just coming out and saying Bush lied. There's extensive precedent in the House against "personal abuse, innuendo, or ridicule of the President."

Personal abuse, innuendo, or ridicule of the President, is not permitted. Under this standard it is not in order to call the President, or a presumptive major-party nominee for President, a "liar" or accuse him of "lying". Indeed, any suggestion of mendacity is out of order. For example, the following remarks have been held out of order: (1) suggesting that the President misrepresented the truth, attempted to obstruct justice, and encouraged others to perjure themselves; (2) accusing him of dishonesty, accusing him of making a "dishonest argument", charging him with intent to be intellectually dishonest, or stating that many were convinced he had "not been honest"; (3) accusing him of "raping" the truth, not telling the truth, or distorting the truth; (4) stating that he was not being "straight with us"; (5) accusing him of being deceptive, fabricating an issue, or intending to mislead the public; (6) accusing him of intentional mischaracterization, although mischaracterization without intent to deceive is not necessarily out of order. [Notes omitted]

This striking bit of information made me think instantly of Cass Sunstein's fairly recent defense of refusing to aggressively go after the Bush Administration's years of rampant lawbreaking, from torture to warrantless wiretapping. In particular, Mr. Sunstein, who is reportedly a very close Obama advisor, described prosecuting government officials for these clear felonies as "criminalizing public service," as if these unapologetically aggressive abuses of power have been little more than matters of polite disagreement over reasonable policy choices.

Consider in addition to these two exhibits the Democratic Congress's repeated refusal to use every power at its disposal to enforce subpoenas against high Bush Administration officials such as Karl Rove and Harriet Miers, officials who do not simply fail to answer certain questions or produce certain documents, but actually refuse even to show up to the hearings for which they were summoned. Let's also now pile onto this rotten heap the Democrats' craven (perhaps cynical) support for legislation that would forgive and even normalize some of this administration's worst abuses of power, from its lawless detention system to its felonious surveillance programs.

Now bring your mind full circle to the excerpts above about the hallowed House procedures concerning the supremely important need to avoid anything so clearly uncivil as "suggesting that the President misrepresented the truth" (gasp!), "charging him with intent to be intellectually dishonest" (wince!), or "stating that he was not being 'straight with us'" (faint!). Oh thank goodness these rules of discourse are in place in the great People's House, otherwise this country would likely suffer from all sorts of terrible moral afflictions!

These pathetic behaviors are all connected - in a sickly web of human weakness, denial, opportunism, and self-preservation. They all point to a brittle and precious obsession with appearances, a nearly singular fixation on superficial displays of civility, and an instinctual refusal to utter any words that might carry the faintest whiff of ugly truth about the nature of power and wealth in this country.

Why all these overriding and paramount rules of political engagement, in which one must never even intimate that the president was untruthful, or punish clear crimes by high-ranking government officials, or use all available political and legal tools to aggressively confront the institutional brushfire that threatens to engulf the very fabric of our constitutional republic and rule of law?

Reduced to its essence, the reason is that the power elite desperately work to protect themselves from even the suggestion that they could break the law as crudely and nakedly as the common thief, because otherwise it is vastly more difficult for them to maintain the illusion of elite superiority. Truly, the inviolable parlor rules of political engagement and speech are not so much directed at the members of the elite for whom they pertain, but are instead aimed at the onlooking, voting public. After all, so much of being in the upper echelon is about preserving the appearance of deserving to be in the upper echelon. Otherwise, the entire edifice threatens to crack and crumble, and the scaffolding of social/political hierarchy groans under the weight of popular incredulity.

Of course, perhaps the most bitter tragedy accompanying all this is the ruinous incentive scheme that it inevitably creates. When the entire system is built around a sanctimonious need to preserve the superficial trappings of elite dignity - the proverbial Emperor's New Clothes - the poisonous fruit of abuse is ripe for the picking. What better environment in which to violently plunder the very foundations of human order than one where the gravest sin is to openly acknowledge the plunder so plainly taking place? Adding absurdity to the tragedy, however, is the now naked (yet consistently misread) fact that the public already harbors intense loathing for these pretenders to the throne of superiority, yet the players only respond by more adamantly miming such pretense.

The sickness is so virulently thick and pervasive, one can nearly taste it in the Washington air. The dizzying, revolving door whipping around from public service to personal enrichment and back again. The feverish lobbying and mercenary advocacy. The incestuous intermingling of the handmaidens of supposed bitter foes and factions. The bloodless buck trading. This is not just something witnessed in a film, or read in a suspense novel. It happens. All the time.

Indeed, this nightmarish kaleidoscope of mendacity is seen and treated as a game by its participants. Why? Because there are rarely ever any repercussions for these jaunty exploits. Social circles are intertwined like vines on the trees they strangle. Helpful moral ambiguities spring up like weeds where none existed before. Strident opposition, disrespect, and even legal violations are summarily forgiven, because friends, associates, and acquaintances are at stake, and who knows - you could be next. In this marionette prom dance, the ethically scrupulous become the boring wallflowers, the dorky killjoys testing the punch for booze. And at the end of the dance, the Homecoming King and Queen hand out the best party favors to the most enthusiastic participants.

Pathetic and fatuous as it may seem, this social and monetary dynamic steadily overwhelms principle, ideology, and worst of all, the ability to see the real-world consequences of one's actions. The human craving for approval, friendship, influence, and wealth constantly cries out like a hungry child, and the endlessly compartmentalizing human intellect dutifully provides the necessary rationalizations for abandoning one's starting premises, if any existed. Drunk on firm handshakes, phone calls, back slaps, and the hot flush of power's flattery, the advocate slides into a superhighway slipstream of abbreviated thinking in which principles are either kept safely in the rear view mirror or left in the dust outright.

I am sad to say that this mentality, this way of life, infects everything in politics. When you get that pit in your stomach, when you sense that nobody is genuinely looking out for or even acknowledging your interests, when you get the visceral feeling that something somewhere is terribly broken as it lies hidden away, you can be sure that the cause is contentedly toasting its success at a game in which the only losers are the ones not playing.