Wither honour.

From Bill Simmons’ December 14th column on, among other things, the Mitchell Report on illicit substance use in Major League Baseball:

The greatest hitter and pitcher of the past 50 years both cheated to get where they were … and if that’s not enough, our all-time hits leader was a convicted felon who bet against his own team. Ladies and gentleman [sic], America’s pastime! Is it time to remake “Field of Dreams” and include a scene where Shoeless Joe sells $3,000 of HGH to Moonlight Graham?

These revelations come in the same week that a former Prime Minister of Canada testifies under oath that, while still sitting as a member of Parliament, he received $225,000 -in the form of a series of envelopes stuffed with cash – from a man now accused of bribery and fraud in Germany. He swears that this money was paid to him as a retainer for legitimate services to be rendered, yet he issued neither a receipt for the cash nor any invoice detailing the work done. He tells a parliamentary committee that he put this cash in safe deposit boxes, strangely eschewing the more conventional (but alas, less invisible) choice that an experienced man of business might make – depositing the funds in an interest-bearing account at a financial institution. He further admits that he neglected to declare these monies as income and to pay tax on them for something like six years, an oversight that was not remedied until such time as his generous benefactor was arrested and charged with various crimes. This man then looks with all the apparent sincerity he can summon into the virtual eyes of his former constituents and claims that there was nothing improper about this transaction. He seems almost indignant that anyone could be suspicious.

I suspect there is something of the same malaise in evidence from these two storylines as is detailed in Lewis Lapham’s excellent lament (in the January issue of Harper’s ) for the demise of the virtuous public servant. Comparing the presidential hopefuls advancing upon Iowa to merchandise of expensive, if not quality, manufacture, Lapham says:

The media showroom salesmen rummage through the season’s political piece goods as if through an unsatisfactory shipment of summer hats – this one the wrong color, that one too wide across the forehead, these other ones lacking the moral fiber of genuine Panama straw. The candidates on tour with the balloons and the gospel choirs compare their rivals to defective Christmas toys – Senator Hillary Clinton wobbles; Senator Barack Obama comes with no directions in the box; Rudy Giuliani makes strange clanking noises.

It seems that the more we commoditize our pubic figures, whether southpaws or senators, the more we get mass-market merchandise instead of a nicely knit sweater.