We Do It For The Love
It's a strange beast the 'world of politics' - because at it's very core is the apparent desire to serve the people. Which unfortunately seems to be rapidly overthrown by the ego and the desire for power and status starting right about the time you get enough power to do anything more than vote on whether the local council meeting tea break should be 10 or 15 minutes long...
From there on it seems to be a slippery slope of self-serving, back-scratching decisions that become less about the real people the higher you climb. Because of course, who funds your campaigns and powers the votes that send you each step further up the ladder? It's not the masses that you serve, it's the minority with the money. So bit by bit you serve the people a little less, and bow to the money a little more - before lo and behold, your soul is now owned by corporate monsters who's only agenda is more money and more power for themselves. You're just the puppet to help them get it.
The best politicians are the ones who don't want the power, who don't want the limelight - they just want to make things better and serve their communities. Just a shame then that few of those people will ever rise high enough to make a difference on anything but a local level.
It's a twisted system, but it's the only one we've got I guess.
Oh, Yes He Did Get A Tattoo
Both President Obama and his wife promised their daughters that if they ever got tattoos then he and his wife would get tattoos too!
It's true - it was reported in the Washington Post here.
After all, what better way to convince your kids not to get a tattoo than to threaten to make it a family tattoo that instantly kills any coolness it may have had... "you mean your mom and dad have the same tattoo as you..." - try it folks ;-)
But maybe this one backfired a little, after daughter Natasha got a small one of her father right over her heart.
So true to his word Barack went out and got this impressive piece of ink done:-
Wife Michele is not too impressed with either of them however, as the agreement was that she too would get the same tattoo. I think Michele would much rather both of them got their tattoos removed (after all, laser removal is very effective these days).
But how did the tatoo get discovered? Well, the President welcomed the entire team of NBA Champions, the San Antonio Spurs, to the White House recently:-
Which kicked off a bit of 'boys will be boys' competitiveness. It's understood that some of the team were then shown the tattoo, which is where the photograph of it originated. Barack allowed the picture only on the understanding that at least 3 members of the team agreed to get a similar tattoo of Barack done themselves. The chosen San Antonio team members would not be allowed to remove the tattoo for at least one more presidential term! It remains to be seen if they have followed through on the promise.
It should of course be pointed out that very little of this story is actually true. In fact, just the part of the couple telling their daughters they would copy any tattoo they chose to get and the San Antonio team visiting the White House are the only elements that are true :-)
