The Politics of "The Swamp"

After reading, Michael Grunwald: The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and the Politics of Paradise “Endgame” in the Colloquium Reader, I was very baffled with how big of a mess politics actually is.  You would think that something like politics, that affects everyone and not just the people making the decisions, would make more sense.  The quote that really caught my attention on this subject is “As a public servant, Gore was often far ahead of his colleagues on issues like nuclear proliferation, environmental protection, and the ‘information superhighway’, but as a politician, he had a tendency to straddle.”   Last time I checked, if you want to get something accomplished in politics, you do not “straddle” on the subject at hand.  Who is going to side with you, if you don’t even have a clear side of your own.  In my opinion, the reason you would have the tendency to straddle on certain issues is because you either don’t have an interest on the subject or you do not know how to handle the situation.  Yes politicians are very smart men, but when it comes to the politics side of things, they always seem to take the easy way out. 

Another quote that caught my attention was "Everglades restoration could set an international standard for sustainable development. It could prove that man and nature could coexist in peace."  I think it is very important that we come up with a international standard for sustainable development before it is to late.  Why not be proactive on the situation instead of waiting for something to go seriously wrong.  The environment is not something that you can replace once it is destroyed.  We must take a stand now before the world is never the same as it once was. 

The last quote that really caught my attention was "the single greatest threat to restoration of Americas Everglades is the lack of time left in the congressional session.”  In my opinion, if Americas Everglades were really that important to politicians, then time would be made to help restore them.  When something is really important in politics, it is pushed to the front and dealt with right away.  This quote just gives the impression that politicians are just pretending that the Everglades are important to them, when in reality it is not that important of a subject to them.