Even in my cynicism, I am occasionally shocked by statements that I see in the news about how politician so-and-so is doing such-and-such because of the impact it will have on the upcoming election.  Not because it's good policy, or because a constituency needs it, but because it will get them elected, period.  Unfortunately, I don't have a good example of this ready to hand.  I don't go looking for them -- gods know that things are depressing enough -- but I do run across these statements with some frequency.

The shocking thing of course is not that politicians act this way, but that the expectation of a pretense of statesmanship has fallen so far by the wayside that such statements are regularly made in the media, and no one bats an eye.