It can be hard to discuss ubiquitous phenomenon like the professionalization of politics precisely because they are ubiquitous: pointing to any one example trivializes the argument by reducing the scope to a single incident, and it’s hard/boring to list enough examples to broaden the scope sufficiently to do the topic justice.

Here’s an article-ish thing from the Chicago Tribune which hits a nice balance of detail and comprehensiveness: a laundry list of the lobbyists on the US presidential candidates’ campaign teams:

McCain, the maverick, and all McCain’s lobbyists

Frightening that, assuming it’s accurate. And it has that “too strange to not be true feel”. And the last paragraph foreshadows new horrors to come. How is lil ol democracy suppose to survive this stuff? I guess nobody is suggesting it is.