The people we love to hate

Today's "well, duh" story:

Sixty-four percent of Americans rate the honesty and ethical standards of members of Congress as "low" or "very low," tying the record "low"/"very low" rating Gallup has measured for any profession historically. Gallup has asked Americans to rate the honesty and ethics of numerous professions since 1976, including annually since 1990. Lobbyists also received a 64% low honesty and ethics rating in 2008.

Those rankings put Congress and lobbyists in the company of telemarketers and car salespeople as the least respected for honesty and ethics. Poor car salespeople, to be stuck with that bunch! At the top of the heap -- also no big suprise -- are nurses, pharmacists and medical doctors, with high school teachers and police officers rounding out the top five. It's worth noting, I think, that despite people's low opinion of Congress as a whole, they tend to rate their own district's congressman pretty high.

Journalists, you might like to know, are in the middle of the pack, with 26 percent ranking our honesty and ethical standards as high or very high, and 27 percent rating them as low or very low; 46 percent gauged us as average. Small surprise there. I would have thought our image worse than that.