A Blind Hog

Even a blind hog roots up an acorn once in a while.

With that in mind, let's check in with the late great WaPo, where it doesn't matter what's true or what's good or what's right (this is the age of "New Media" y'know - all that matters is delivering readers to advertisers).  But I'll pat 'em on the back on that rarest of occasions when they manage to break through the deafening clutter (that they're helping to create) with something that isn't just their usual Red Team / Blue Team bullshit:

For prosecutors, the key question is whether there was a clearly articulated “quid pro quo.” If so, the gifts were bribes. If not, they were gifts. To me, as an anthropologist, this largely misses the point.

Across the massive cornucopia of human culture, anthropologists have found relatively few universals. One of the strongest of these, however, concerns gift-giving. Gifts are given in all cultures, and to remarkably similar effect. As every graduate student in anthropology learns, gifts by their nature create social ties and a sense of reciprocal obligation. To give a gift is to expect something in return, though it undermines the power and mystique of the gift to spell out too clearly what that something is. It would be uncouth to give a friend a birthday present and say “now when it’s my birthday I expect you to give me this model of this product,” but the expectation of a well-chosen gift in return is no less powerful for that. The failure to give something in response can end a friendship.

 --and--

When politicians accept gifts such as Rolex watches and Oscar de la Renta gowns from multimillionaires, they often lack the means to reciprocate as equals. Surely, Williams has wealthy friends — his equals — with whom he exchanges gifts, but the McDonnells are not wealthy. From an anthropological perspective, Williams gave McDonnell gifts that the governor lacked the means to repay in order to subordinate him. Unable to afford, say, a $10,000 purse for Williams’s wife in return for what was given to his own wife, the governor can only return Williams’s generosity by lending him the power of his office in some way. Whether the expectation of a return was ever crisply articulated as a “quid pro quo” is really beside the point — even if it is the whole point to lawyers.

My guess is that Vaginal Bob will dodge the indictment, and maybe get slapped around a bit by an "ethics committee" stacked with politicians who will give us a great look at Irony In Action by deciding not to be so "hypocritical" as to condemn McDonnell for something most of them have been doing for as long as they've been in politics - all in the name of good government and bipartisanship and fairness.

But, of course in the end, it all fits neatly into the "Both Sides Do It" narrative.

If everybody does it, then there's nobody to hold anybody accountable for anything - and we're right back to status quo.  Never mind.