From an E-mail I got today:
March 11, 2013—It costs a lot of money to win a seat in Congress, but how much exactly? MapLight has conducted an analysis of money raised by members of the 113th Congress who won election in 2012.
Data:
House members, on average, each raised $1,689,580, an average of $2,315 every day during the 2012 cycle.
Senators, on average, each raised $10,476,451, an average of $14,351 every day during the 2012 cycle.
http://maplight.org/...
My first thought when I read this was, "Gee, over two grand a day. That's worse than an expensive drug habit. But it's not as if politicians have an actual addiction to politics," I thought.
Or is it?
The article jogged my memory of something I'd read long ago by Hunter Thompson, about the rush he got from politics. I found it, at the end of Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72. Thompson had covered the Nixon-McGovern presidential race for Rolling Stone, and most of the book is the columns he contributed every other week. What I'd remembered wasn't something he wrote in a column, it's from an interview of Thompson by his editor, a month or two after the election, printed at the end of the book. Hunter Thompson, by the way, had actually run for office -- to be Sheriff of Aspen, Colorado, in 1970. He almost won.
Ed: One last question, Dr. Thompson, will you be covering the 1976 election as a journalist if you are not actually a candidate?
HST: I think so, yeah. There's a sort of weird, junkie, addictive quality about covering a presidential campaign. You can see it in almost everybody in the press corps. I noticed it particularly in Tim Crouse who got hooked so fast it was just like somebody getting hooked on one shot of heroin ... . I doubt if Crouse will miss another campaign as long as he lives; there's a tremendous adrenalin rush, a hell of a high in politics particularly when you're winning or you think you have a chance to win. ...
Ed: Even for the reporter?
HST: Yeah.
snip
Ed: Would you describe yourself as a political junkie?
HST: I guess I have the potential for it. At the moment I'm not, but now I'm just exhausted ... you know ... you know it ... any time you've been involved in it, I mean really involved in it ... on a level where you had some control over it ... that Sheriff's campaign in Aspen was a high that I've never gotten from any kind of drug. It's mainly an adrenalin high, that's what it is ... [Emphasis in the original.]
The quotes are from pages 493 and 495 of the Popular Library edition of 1973, Library of Congress # 72-88840.
By all accounts, Hunter Thompson had sampled the high you can get from most of the drugs available up to 1973, when he said that. If he says the "tremendous adrenalin rush, a hell of a high in politics particularly when you're winning..." is stronger than any drug he'd tried, I believe it. That may not apply to everyone, but it probably applies to most members of Congress.
So, the House of Representatives is composed mostly of adrenaline junkies, supporting their habit to the tune of $2315 a day, on average. A Senator's habit costs an average of $14,351. Keep that in mind when you hear some politician pontificate about the evils of illegal drugs.
It's been said that addiction to cocaine seems to blot out maternal instincts to the point that a mother will sell her children for sex to support her habit. Well, it's no news that politicians sell out their constituents' interests, and maybe this explains why it happens so reliably -- the stigma is far less, the 'drug' is comparably addictive, and the habit is much more expensive.
What could we do about this? Tight limits on campaign contributions and spending might at least bring down the cost of a political addiction. Good luck on that with the current Supreme Court. It would be nice if we could force politicians to campaign from inside a bubble, and then govern exposed to voters on a regular basis. Don't ask me how we'd arrange that.
One small but easy step would be to ask everyone in Congress, every day, "How much do you have to raise every day to support your politics habit?" They probably won't appreciate being compared to drug addicts. Tough.