You Really Want To Be A Politician?

Today I am in Ottawa and thought it might be interesting to take in Question Period on Parliament Hill. So I called my MP, Maurice Vellacott at his Ottawa office, and he graciously provided me with a pass to sit in the gallery and take in Question Period.
Was interesting arriving on Parliament Hill. Lots going on. Outside the door on one side was a group opposed to abortion trying to garner support for their cause. Directly across from them were the Tamil demonstrators, lots of them, trying to draw attention to their plight. In the middle of it all a group of wide eyed school children taking it all in.
Time to go inside and after being led through some elegant hallways and a thorough security check it was into the gallery.
Inside one of the security guards told me I had picked a good day to attend question period. When I asked why he smiled and said "The Liberals are really going to go after her today". "Her" turned out to be Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt who is under heat for leaving supposedly confidential "top secret" documents in the CTV offices.
Well go after her they did. Question after question, many times the same questions rephrased in different ways and each time answered by the under seize Natural Resources Minister. Amid calls of "move on", its over and time to move on, the Liberals continued their attack on Raitt.
Why did she allow a young 26 year old assistant to take the heat and be forced to resign instead of doing the right thing and resigning herself? Comparisons to Maxine Bernier who left confidential documents at his girl friends and was forced to resign.
Why the difference, the Liberals demanded to know and on and on it went.
I was left with two impressions. 1) These guys need more to do. There must be more urgent items that both the government and the opposition could be working on. How about the economy, the deficit, more companies needing financial assistance
including the CBC and 2) why would anyone want to be a politician? Why would anyone want to open themselves to that kind of attack ? Think about it. You make a mistake on your job. Likely your boss would call you in. Maybe you would be terminated, maybe you wouldn't be.
But how about making a mistake and having fifty or sixty people sitting around demanding that you resign, television cameras shoved in your face and numerous questions for days on end.
My impression was that Lisa Raitt handled herself extremely well. She stayed cool despite the heat and answered the questions with little help from anyone including the Prime Minister. Her only mistake, accepting or demanding (whatever the case) the resignation of her assistant Jasmine MacDonnell. Not unlike the Lingenfelter case in Saskatchewan where an overzealous campaign worker took the fall, Minister Raitt just tossed Jasmine MacDonnell under the bus. That seems to be the political way. So why would anyone want to be a politician or an assistant ?