Gross-out politics

You know, I thought we'd hit the bottom of the barrel in politics with the year of the outing of the gay Republicans--Mark Foley having dirty IMs with male teenage pages, Larry Craig trying to get gloryholed in an airport bathroom, etc. but the truth is we apparently have seen absolutely nothing yet.

The Australians have actually shocked me in a way I never thought possible with the scandal that is sweeping their Parliament. The leader of their opposition party, Kevin Rudd, who has been leading the polls in the quest to overtake Prime Minister John Howard, is in political hell right now for the most surprising source of scandal you can imagine: there's footage of him picking and eating his own ear wax. I swear to God I'm not making this up. The YouTube video has apparently been spreading like wildfire. (I would link to it except I have no desire to watch a video of a guy eating his own ear wax and in order to confirm I was linking to the right video, I'd have to do just that. Sorry. If you really want to see it I'm sure it can't be hard to find.)

Can you imagine if an American politician lost their seat because footage emerged of them eating their own boogers? Wouldn't the heads of the collective punditry just explode? Can you imagine Paul Begala sitting there theorizing that maybe this will help John Edwards get the boogereater vote, or Michelle Malkin saying that while she might have forgiven Rudy for cheating on his wife or dressing in drag, that picking his nose and eating it is just one of those breaks so vile that true conservatives can't forgive it?

My brain can't even wrap around how fucked up it must be to be a political junkie in Australia right now.