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HE is a man who has lied and dissembled, and a man who has crawled. He knows the taste of boot-polish. He has suffered kicks in the tonneau of his pantaloons. He has taken orders from his superiors in knavery and he has wooed and flattered his inferiors in sense. His public life is an endless series of evasions and false pretenses. He is willing to embrace any issue, however idiotic, that will get him votes, and he is willing to sacrifice any principle, however sound, that will lose them for him. I do not describe the democratic politician at his inordinate worst; I describe him as he is encountered in the full sunshine of normalcy. He may be, on the one hand, a cross-roads idler striving to get into the State Legislature by grace of the local mortgage-sharks and evangelical clergy, or he may be, on the other, the President of the United States. It is almost an axiom that no man may make a career in politics in the Republic without stooping to such ignobility: it is as necessary as a loud voice.
H.L. Mencken, Notes on Democracy

Eye on Politics & Law Lords: An End to Election-rigging in the State that Gave Gerrymander to the English language
We tell ourselves that we live in the world's greatest democracy, one whose government derives its powers from the consent of the governed. In fact we live in nothing of the sort, at least as far as our national legislature is concerned. Thanks to modern gerrymandering, most congressional districts have been turned into a Democratic or Republican monopolies -- constituencies meticulously mapped to lock in one-party supermajorities and guarantee election results long before voters go to the polls.
• The Gerrymandering scandal in American politics [ PDF version: Presidential Selection: Electoral Fallacies ]
• · That losing elitist feeling Are Most of Us Destined to Join Life's Losers? [Great Britain of Timothy Ash: Many think intellectuals begin at Calais. But we have them and need them in Britain; Lesser Amerika of Mark Schmitt: On Barbara Ehrenreich and Elites; Elitists repeat that France is in crisis: Even conferences on French national identity outnumber the striptease shows in Paris]
• · · Europe's youngest leader: Czech Prime Minister Stanislav Gross's government took office on 4 August 2004.
• · · · It was a winter's night in Iowa, round about midnight: John Kerry should have been wrapping up a town meeting, but he had decided to go into his I will answer every question mode
• · · · · EVEN as parliament workers moved into the new building at Holyrood last week, the message running round the world is how angry the Scots are about the escalating price, up from £40 to £431 million Almost 11 times the initial estimate; the Sydney Opera House cost only 10 times its original budget. Scottish Parliament: Was it worth it?
• · · · · · · Bear Pit Laboratory: Psychologists try to learn how to spot a liar