It was just two years ago that the focus of U.S. politics was on the betrayal of ethical standards by the Republican-dominated Congress. Democrats campaigned on cleaning up the sordid world of selling out to lobbyists, ballooning the deficit with non-legislated “earmarks” in spending bills, and giving favors to fat-cat businesses.

   What a difference a few months make. Democrats found they didn’t mean THESE earmarks, they meant THOSE earmarks. And somehow when the lobbyists showed how much they contributed to Democratic campaign coffers, well, they deserved some favors even if some of the boodle went to fat-cat businesses.

   Citizens can take little pleasure in this (entertaining as it might seem) no matter what their political preferences. There is certainly no pleasure in understanding that what we see in politics is really just a reflection of . . . .us.

   The Eliot Spitzer affair in New York has an especially delicious irony only because Spitzer, as New York attorney general, was a notable scold of corporate executives who padded their salaries as they padded their balance sheets. It turns out Spitzer’s frolic with $3,000 an hour prostitutes was part of the same culture that said power and money don’t have to worry about ethics.

   Ohio Republicans paid a price for actually quite minor ethical lapses in the Taft administration. But Democrats are now squirming as they read of Attorney General Marc Dann’s assistants exposed as sexual harassers, careless drivers, or worse. And if you are interested in a bald-faced political quid pro quo, watch Gov. Ted Strickland dance to the anti-charter school strings manipulated by the Ohio Education Association.

   Not that all of this is new. Mark Twain was just one cynical commentator who said, “Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But then I repeat myself.”

   There was a time when American business depended more on the word of its practitioners than contracts, lawyers and such. It wasn’t a perfect world – humans tending toward sin, and all that – but it was a standard that, if betrayed, resulted in disgrace. Today the tendency is for people to say, “Well, I can understand that. You can’t be too hard on people.”

   We have seen standards of behavior, morals and ethics erode as we say, “Well, we can understand that.” That is a substitute for actually doing anything about the behavior, immorality, or ethical lapses.

   Indeed, the years of the Clinton presidency were marked by extraordinary ethical lapses, but excused as not being bad enough for impeachment. The real message was that the liberal political agenda was more important than honesty. Ideology trumped ethics.

   A natural yearning for something better may explain why many people are seeking answers in religion and are critical of the products of public education who have little or no understanding, much less knowledge, of such basics as the Ten Commandments.

   William Wild is a retired daily newspaper editor and resides in Oakwood, Ohio.