� 1998 by Dennis Miller

Ah, Washington, D.C. Now, I don't want to get off on a rant here, but it's more obvious than Marlon Brando in a Day-Glo thong that our nation's capital runs on the kind of you-scratch-my-back-and-I'll-scratch-yours mentality that one rarely sees outside of Ed Asner in a burlap tube top.

The stories of corruption that manage to leak their way out of Washington barely hint at the degree of venality, the positively Byzantine intrigue, that fuels day-to-day doings along the Potomac. Special-interest groups, PACs, lobbies... there's more palms being greased on any given day in D.C. that there are in a boys' dorm during MTV's The Grind. You know, if Frank Capra took a look at today's Washington, Mr. Smith would have stayed home. Let's face it, our nation's capital is more self-serving than Ikea, and our lawmakers get more perks than Jerry Lewis in the twenty-third hour of the fucking telethon.

Washington, D.C., is no longer an honored and revered institution commanding the respect of its republic, but a soap opera circus, a tabloid dart board, a Hollywood with better acting, a bemusement park called Punditland, where the rides are four years long and the popcorn is a billion dollars for a small bucket.

Washington was built on a bog. And in a scant two hundred years it has grown from a dirty swamp into a bureaucratic quagmire. At one time Washington actually meant something. But now it's about as relevant as Bob Dylan's tuning fork.

The main problem with Marion Barry's District of Colombian is that it just... it seems like nothing ever gets done there. It's like an Etch-A-Sketch that gets shaken every fourth November, just never hard enough to completely erase that residual maze of dangling connections and stairs to nowhere.

The average American works about three hours each day to pay taxes to keep Washington, D.C., humming. Go to Washington and see what that gets you. You won't see that much cash being pissed away at Vitamin Expo '98.

Washington is clubbier than an LAPD-sponsored baby seal hunt and more insular than the Freemen compound under quarantine for the Andromeda strain. It's a system in which the demands of survival cancel out the qualities one would expect in a public servant, like intelligence, integrity, and selflessness. Instead, those who are most successful in public office have got a jones for power and influence that makes Naked Lunch read like The Velveteen Rabbit. It's the only town where the phenomenally untalented, boorish, and downright stupid can Quayle their way up the ladder and into the national spotlight.

Al D'Amato... Al D'Amato? I mean, did the entire state of New York get drunk one day and elect him just for a goof? Al D'Amato is a waste of an apostrophe. Allowing this guy to chair an ethics committee is like having Kevorkian teach you the Heimlich maneuver.

Newt Gingrich? New Gingrich is so cold, when he opens his mouth a light goes on. This guy's further to the right than the part in Sam Donaldson's hair.

Stro Thurmond's birthday cake has more candles than a Sting video. This guy used to baby-sit Bob Dole, for chrissake.

You know, folks, some are born great, others achieve greatness, and still others have greatness thrust upon them. And then there's Washington, D.C. There, a good man is harder to find than Montel Williams's cowlick.

We're talking about a group of people who wouldn't know greatness unless it donated a large sum of money to their reelection campaign and asked for only a small favor in return.

But maybe there's some light at the end of the reflecting pool. Voters are getting tired of the name-calling and back-biting that goes on in politics. There's more labeling going on on Capitol Hill than in a Wal-Mart the night before the Labor Day weekend. Political philosophies and platforms are now quartered into inside or outside, left or right. It's like we're calling pitches. Clinton, to the left and inside, Dole to the right and inside. Ross Perot? High and outside. Buchanan? Hit the fucking batter.

It's time to get past the labels and check the contents within the package, that in many cases has settled all too comfortably at the bottom of the legislative bag.

Look, if our nation's capital is a monster, we're not only the angry, torch-carrying taxpayers looking to cut its head off, we're also Dr. Frankenvoter. We went into the booth that stormy night, we pulled the lever, and screamed, "It's alive." Well, guess what, pal? It is, and it's incumbent upon us to realize that ultimately we're the Hazelwood on this D.C. Valdez, and if we keep trying to sleep through our shifts and letting the other guy steer, we're going to end up on the rocks spewing wasted democracy.

The solution is very simple. Move election day to April, 15. Pay your taxes and hold elections on the same day. See if any of these duplicitous sons of bitches would try to get away with their crap if we payed their salaries on the same day as we voted for them. I don't think so. Storm the Bastille.

Let us eat cake and let them eat me. Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

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