I don’t have a whole lot to add to this except that it seems all you have to do in the modern show business of politics is declare an interest in politics and you’re a politician. In the wake of the Arlen Spector swtich to a three-digit IQ party today, CSTB endorsed Alabama gubernatorial candidate Charles Barkley made a slideshow of pols who switched parties. A list Barkley made, but not Ronald Reagan? Still, Barkley finds himself right between decorated war hero and Virginia Democratic Senator Jim Webb and President Theodore Roosevelt. He could also make political lists of sportscasters turned politicans (with Reagan); athletes turned politician (Gerald Ford; George Bush, Sr.; Bill Bradley; and that guy who used to pitch for the Phillies); and politicians in search of oral sex … which is too long a list for this space. The difference “ Barkley hasn’t even been elected to anything. I hope his political career is better than his hoops life, and he at least makes it out of the primaries.
