I VOW to never vow again.

As soon as a politician vows about anything, a hole should open up in the ground and disappear him or her from the face of the earth. If anything, politicians should know not to make promises, vows, or anything else related to permanent commitments.

And we the voters should know that promises are meant to be broken. This is the reality of politics (and life), and no other rule (or guideline, or truism, whatever) encompasses the uncertainty of context, circumstance and the imperative of flexibility in democracy.

Politics, which is of course the semantic result of governors and the governed haggling over who gets what, is by nature a process of evaluation and reevaluation. Governing, even in totalitarian or rigidly hierarchical cultures/nations/states, is the process of negotiating between the prerogatives of everyone that shares a geographic space, a set of cultural ideals and an economic livelihood, and nobody gets what they want all the time.

The media's "revolutionary" sensationalism, broadcast as a result of the Democrat take-over of the US Congress, is hilarious for three reasons, some of which are beautifully, though limitedly addressed in this BBC News article:

1. Our electoral system is built to mitigate revolutionary changes in the system, thus the nearly imperceptible difference between the espoused values of the Republicans and Democrats, and their dominance in all elected venues. And that's the way the idolized Founding Fathers planned it!

2. The penchant of the US electorate for belief in values as the determinants of good government over stated legislative platforms is the source of unending conflict, and eventually, disappointment. And we keep digging our own graves.

3. The pseudo-liberal Democratic resurgence pleases the media just enough to pump up the underdog revolution story and then - inevitably - drum up popular support for the most convenient, indulgent and normative solution to every problem that faces us in the days, months, years ahead. But it makes for great TV!