Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Why Edwards is compelling

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John Edwards correctly identifies the original sin of our political culture:

The private contractors [e.g. Blackwater] are Exhibit A of the corruption in Washington that Edwards emphasized in the question-and-answer session.

For him, it's a seamless theory that hits all the major themes of his campaign: Powerful special interests hire an army of lobbyists. Those influence peddlers get Congress to pass laws that benefit big corporations and the wealthy. Political candidates go to the rich and powerful for the money they need to campaign. Average Americans lose out and get discouraged from participating.

“It's a cycle that feeds itself,” he said. “And it's unhealthy.”

It seems so obvious to me, and yet I'm surprised when I actually see someone of influence say it. And it's one of the main reasons for the weakness of the national Democratic Party: Dem politicians are naturally caught between their ostensibly “natural”, populist, social-democratic constituencies on one hand, and their inherent need to reward moneyed special interests on the other.* That's why there are always a few Dems to peel off and vote with the GOP against, say, stricter CAFE standards, or Bush's tax cuts; or for continuing tax breaks for hedge fund managers; and so on.

But I'll repeat my concern with Edwards' campaign: If he's campaigning as a knight in shining progressive armor, ready to vanquish special interests … how's he going to do that? Does an Edwards victory actually signal a massive shift in the country's priorities? Or does he remain a quixotic lone crusader — even if he gets elected?

I want to hear less about what John Edwards feels in his heart of hearts, and more about changing the tone and expectations of our political culture as a whole. How do we break the vicious cycle to which he refers? I just don't think he can do it all by himself.

*(Yes, sometimes populism and money go together, as with much (though decidedly not all) of the organized labor agenda; but the Republicans are in a much easier, more consistent postion: They openly, proudly support oligarchic capitalism and derive much of their support from those who benefit — or imagine they benefit. The silver lining for the rest of us is that if you continue to favor the few at the expense of the many … eventually the many will decide it's not working out so well for them anymore. Not all that shocking.)

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  1.   If that what he’s saying, it’s great. Even talking the talk is more than the others seem to muster. Possible sources of countervailing power, ah yes….  Well, there are corporations and corporations. Maybe there are progressive ones, powerful enough ones, that might see the peoples’ prospering, peace, even the Constitution as important and understand the roles of governments. Maybe no one has asked them, really asked them. Now I’ve been reading of the power and visciousness of the Israel lobby. That’s a concern re Edwards.

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    Yours,
    Tom from Troy

  2. Sorry, but I don’t believe in a silver bullet to take away the influence of moneyed interests. The reality is, money will equate to power, and power will always protect itself. That’s why people acquire money in the first place. So the first step is to recognize the limits of what can be accomplished.

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    Now, we have hundreds if not thousands of laws to regulate (not stop) the influence of money on politics. Let’s enforce those laws to the T. Would that make a big difference? Yes.

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    So much happens in the light of day simply because no one cares. What happened to the billions of $ spent on Iraqi development? No answer…and none is needed to meet the resounding lack of a question coming from the American public.

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    No politician can fix our “vicious cycle”. We have to start by enforcing our own laws…and that means caring enough to enforce them.

    • Certainly not the Von Spakovskys and John Tanners of the world. And let’s not forget the Bushies in the US Attorney offices, where most of the election offenses and public corruption cases would be prosecuted. When you have a Department of Justice that is used for partisan political gain, it’s unrealistic to expect our election laws to be enforced fairly and equitably (Don Seligman, anyone?)

      • I’ve heard a few ideas bandied about, such as creating another national office for the AG – where they’d be elected by the people. However, if people from different parties were elected it could result in squabbling that’s just as bad as the ineptitude that’s currently gone on. Think Kenneth Starr, but with real electoral power. Yikes.

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        So electing a national attorney general clearly doesn’t work. So where does that leave us?

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        I say what we have right now is a decent system – President nominates, Senate confirms. Yet, it would be nice if the Senate actually took confirmations seriously and didn’t allow them to become a process of bowing down to King George. The problem is exacerbated by a moribund 4th Estate.

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        Hypothetically, we could have a President forced into getting a decent Attorney General who’ll really be a true law-and-order kind of person, if the POTUS knew he or she had to contend with a 4th Estate examining every detail of the proposed AG’s record and a Senate confirmation process that was no walk in the park, truly dedicated to making sure the AG would uphold the law of the land, especially the constitution. Given Mukasey’s lack of honest and forthright answers on such simple things as waterboarding, I figured that’d happen now. Whoops.

  3. seems like a good bet to me. If we get candidates addicted to our money, instead of large corporations, maybe they’ll be more interested in us than, say, HMO Blue, or Blackwater or any other big defence or hmo corp. If we can at least get more politicians concerned in internet cash from people than unfriendly PACs, then at least that could buy us some time to force politicians to create proposals that would take special interests out of the equation, or at least regular old Joes a shot at winning using equal public funding.

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    I’ve heard the following idea thrown about – and I think it’s a great one. Tax whatever money candidates spend if they choose to opt out of public financing at an exorbinantly high rate, using those taxes to pay for public financing of other candidates. I say that’ll solve the problem quickly.

  4. For him, it’s a seamless theory that hits all the major themes of his campaign: Powerful special interests hire an army of lobbyists. Those influence peddlers get Congress to pass laws that benefit big corporations and the wealthy.

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    http://online.wsj.co…

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    Johnstown’s good fortune has come at the expense of taxpayers everywhere else. Defense contractors have found that if they open an office here and hire the right lobbyist, they can get lucrative, no-bid contracts. Over the past decade, Concurrent Technologies Corp., a defense-research firm that employs 800 here, got hundreds of millions of dollars thanks to Rep. Murtha despite poor reviews by Pentagon auditors. The National Drug Intelligence Center, with 300 workers, got $509 million, though the White House has tried for years to shut it down as wasteful and unnecessary. Another beneficiary: MTS Technologies, run by a man who got his start some 40 years ago shining shoes at Mr. Murtha’s Johnstown Minute Car Wash.

    A review by The Wall Street Journal of dozens of such contracts funded by Mr. Murtha’s committee shows that many weren’t sought by the military or federal agencies they were intended to benefit. Some were inefficient or mismanaged, according to interviews, public records and previously unpublished Pentagon audits. One Murtha-backed firm, ProLogic Inc., is under federal investigation for allegedly diverting public funds to develop commercial software, people close to the case say. The company denies wrongdoing and is in line to get millions of dollars more in the pending defense bill.

    Mr. Murtha, a gruff, combat-decorated former Marine, was thrust into the national spotlight last year by his opposition to the Iraq war.

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    I dont think it took an army of lobbyists to make all that happen. 

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    Earmarks and pork for sweetheart deals for the local district are the real source of corruption and waste.  Time to wake up to that reality.  If you guys on the left would join those on the right who are trying to combat this it would really help.  I know it happens in both parties and it seems to be an irresistable temptation, but it seems like a much greater problem than some back room money for influence lobbying deal by blackwater.  (Not that lobbying money isnt also a problem, just one that is far far harder to eradicate because it is so closely tied with freedom of speech)

    • You’re kidding, right?

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      What you mention, that’s a huge problem, yes. The bring-home-the-bacon issue. Although the industrial-military complex with its lobbying is also part of that system, so you can’t pretend it isn’t.

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      However, when credit card companies are allowed to WRITE the legislation regarding bankruptcy to their great profit, yes, there’s an even bigger problem with lobbyists. When energy policy is secretly produced by energy companies, when health care drug benefits for seniors is written by big PhArma, the system’s worst problem isn’t baconitis anymore. It’s lobbying and money from corporate donors.

      • …you think that our drug benefit, bankruptcy laws, and energy policy we have come up with are actually bad for America/unfair and not the reverse.

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        ALso I assume you are using hyperbole when you say that the bills were literally written by the lobbyists.  OK fine.  Lobbyists weild influence, thats what they do.  Luckily for them, they ran into a sympathetic administration who probably wanted to do the exact same thing and just tapped their industry expertise to make it work.  Its not all that sinister.

        • … and it is sinister

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          From Chait

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          … When Republicans won control of Congress in 1994, in part as a result of having defeated health care reform, they set about to re-shape K Street as a partisan Republican force.  Conservatives called the undertaking the K Street Project.  It involved, in part, pressuring business lobbies to stop spreading their donations between both parties and instead donate exclusively to the GOP.  They also demanded that lobbying firms hire only Republicans for top positions and use their political muscle to support the Republican position.  In return, Republicans gave these lobbyists extraordinary deference in shaping legislation.  Republicans demanded total loyalty from K Street and offered total loyalty in return.  The business lobby and the GOP would no longer be separate parties with overlapping interests but partners in an ironclad alliance.  … It has been increasingly difficult to distinguish between business and government, with the former regularly taking on the duties of the latter.  In 2001, Enron interviewed several candidates to head the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and Bush ultimately appointed two who met with their approval.  Enron’s chairman Ken Lay met with the holdover FERC chairman and instructed him that he could keep his job only if he reversed his opposition to energy deregulation.  The next year, two of Bush’s appointees to a commission regulating lead poisoning revealed that they were first approached not by the administration by by the lead industry itself.  The patters is not merely “influence,” it is the wholesale delegation of the tasks of governing.
          …The evidence of the GOP’s enmeshment with with its business supporters is so overwhelming that few conservatives deny it outright.  Instead they offer two basic defenses.  The first is that Republicans behaved no differently than Democrats.  But the contrast between the chummy bipartisan sleaze that characterizes Republican Washington is enormous.  It’s not just a difference in degree but a difference in kind.  Democrats accept the prevailing political culture by which lobbyists would cultivate ties with both sides.  They do not expect total loyalty, nor do they grant it.  The depredations produced by the K Street Project – Government treating lobbyists as full partners, not merely interests with a seat at the table – are all unique Republican innovations. More to the point, Democrats have frequently found themselves working at cross-purposes with K Street.  This is because the nature of the two parties is fundamentally different.  The Democrats’ economic base consists not only of business but also labor, environmentalists, and consumer groups.  In Congress, most Democrats do the bidding of their home district employers, and there are pro-business Democrats on the right as well as pro-labor Democrats on the left. …Its’ impossible for the Democratic Party to be completely captive to its funding base because its base disagrees with itself so frequently.  Nearly all of Bill Clinton’s domestic agenda alienated large segments of his party’s base…. The GOP, on the other hand, faces minimal divisions within its economic base.  Yes, social conservatives do not always agree with economic conservatives, but the social conservatives focus almost exclusively on social issues and so do not usually weigh in with much force on economic issues…. Even at the height of their political power, Democrats never sought, let alone won, the sort of alliance with K Street that Republicans enjoy today.

          • To show that lobbyists in fact did literally write the bills?  Maybe you can point out where this opinion article even says that much less proves it.  Sounds to me like someone is in a huff over R treatment of lobbying firms!  Damn those R’s!

            • What Mr. Lynne is posting is well-known about the Republican Congress. I would not have gone to the effort of looking up references, but I applaud his good conduct in doing so.

        • Professional staffers were deliberately left out of the process.  This is why, even if one supports the stated goals of the legislation, it is an absolute clusterfuck.  It is internally inconsistent, it loose ends all over the place, it does not dovetail with the portions of the code left untouched by the revision.  Much of the point was to remove discretion from judges, but the statute is so poorly written that the only way to make it work at all is to rely on the discretion of judges.

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          In other words, even if, as an ideological matter, one supported the goals of the legislation, it is in many respects a bust.  That is to say, the Republican Congress that enacted the law was not even sufficiently competent to make sure that the lobbyists writing their legislation were capable of doing so.

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          The Republican Congress from 2000 must be one of the most titanically inept in our history.  They were not conservative in the slightest.  They presided over massive expansion of the federal government, even discounting defense spending, bu handing out subsidies at every turn, and enacting massive entitlement programs.  They ceded much of their authority over the government, enabling an executive branch with delusions of monarchy.

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          Many Republican denunciations of Democrats are true.  They tax and spend, are too quick to apologize for our nation, are too fond of the UN, and, left unrestrained, would regulate us all into penury.  And my, oh my, how much better they are than the Republicans.

          • Hey I’ve never heard about the bankruptcy bill being a CF, can you point out some problems that have arisen as a result?  I’m not saying you aren’t right, I just need more than your simple statement to prove the point.  Also, can you source the assertion that the lobbyists wrote the bankruptcy bill?  I know its alot to ask but a neutral source would be appreciated.

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            I share your angst about the big new entitlement, but on the other side of the coin, if it was coming anyway then at least:
            1. we didn’t destroy our pharma industry over it
            2. we controlled cost more than the D’s to some measure
            3. we took the issue off the table.

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            This is only solace if you believe it was coming anyway and that the D’s would make political hay out of it and then craft some mega boondoggle which rapes industry, ends innovation and creates YET ANOTHER wealth transfer.  Same old story with those guys, over and over and over and over. 

            • Portions of BAPCPA were written, badly, by lobbyists for originators of car loans.  Except that they did it very badly.

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              There are other, similar problems throughout.

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              Yes, I disagree with the policy behind the law, but the statute at written is shamefully sloppy, regardless of where you stand politically.  Which means the Congress voted for it without reading it, or read it and didn’t understand what they were reading.  In either event, they were incompetent.

              • I assume you meant you agreed with the policy behind the law. 

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                Watch the next time at any new Tax Bill, inevitably to be followed by a Technical Corrections Bills.  Or, this one, the Gitlitz loophole ultimately closed by Congress after the Supreme Court rolled its collective eyes and said we don’t what the lawmakers meant, here’s what they wrote.

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                And I’m sure any patent attorney, SEC attorney, elder law attorney….can point to a statute within his or her expertise, to show how screwed up the statute is, primarily because, the statutes are so damn complicated, what with all the f*cktards wise and progressive Legislators trying to cure the Nation’s woes with law. (Oh, universal health will be different. I’m sure.)

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                Politicians turn it over to industry experts to write because for staffers not immersed in the business, the high-minded legislation is nearly impossible to effectively write. Congress votes it without reading it, because it’s near impossible to read.  And voters don’t care about the facts, because we’re just going from the gut.  And to claim Dems are better or worse than Reps at the whole process is pure spin.

                • Some of my clients do, so on those days, I guess I do.  On the whole, I think it ill-advised.

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                  Doesn’t matter though, I just do my job.

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                  My point is that there lawyers on the staff of the Senate Judiciary Committee who know that statute inside and out– it isn’t nearly so complex as the tax code– and could have easily made the technical changes required to make it fly as intended.  They were specifically excluded from the process in order to allow lobbyist drafting only, and those guys apparently had no exeperience whatsover in that kind of thing, and they produced an abortion.  So, even if the BAPCPA was paid for and written by lobbyists, it doesn’t even accomplish the lobbyists’ goals.

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            • Its just a frame.  And it shouldn’t be a surprise that I am not so much lining up with the Democrats at the moment as I am with the non-Republicans.

  5. Republicans are in a much easier, more consistent postion: They openly, proudly support oligarchic capitalism and derive much of their support from those who benefit — or imagine they benefit. The silver lining for the rest of us is that if you continue to favor the few at the expense of the many … eventually the many will decide it’s not working out so well for them anymore. Not all that shocking.

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    I wish you could get this part right.

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    Republicans support LESS government, not same government which taxes the poor to feed the rich.  We want in principle NO interference in our lives.  The same fundamentally fair treatment for everyone.

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    It is a mistake to confuse that with a regressively redistributive system.

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    Want to talk tax money spent on big pork projects or with the dreadred “big companies”?  That is the domain of the D’s as least as much as the R’s my friend.

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    You don’t have to agree with republicans but gosh you should at least TRY to understand them.

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    • That may have been true once.  It is obviously untrue now.  And this

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      We want in principle NO interference in our lives.

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      is even more of a laugher.  Federal marriage amendment, anyone?  Come on demo – I’m as sorry as you are that your party has lost its way, but you need to wake up to the fact that it has.  Only then can you reclaim it.

      • You can nitpick a few relatively minor (in my eyes anyway) status-quo preserving transgressions and rant about the religious right all you like, but in the entire domain of how we make our living, the thing we all probably spend the better part of our lives on, it is quite largely true.

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        If you make R’s into some evil scary boogie men ala Kos&co you’ll weaken your own understanding of the world, your country, and how to deal with it.  This is why progressives are often referred to as the “Loonie Left”  (not “Reality Based”!)

        • You are wrong.  But it’s obviously pointless to argue with true believers like yourself, who cannot see the current administration’s non-stop expansion of government power for what it is: big government in the service of itself.  “Status quo preserving” is a bad joke — there’s nothing status quo about what’s been going on the last few years.

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          As for “reality based,” you are aware, aren’t you, that it was a Republican who coined that phrase about Democrats?  To refresh your no doubt foggy recollection:

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          In the summer of 2002, after I had written an article in Esquire that the White House didn’t like about Bush’s former communications director, Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House’s displeasure, and then he told me something that at the time I didn’t fully comprehend — but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency.

          The aide said that guys like me were “in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who “believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. “That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued. “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”

          • I never knew the source of the term before now.  I always assumed it was a joke on “faith based” this or that.

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            That quote and article seem like the typical Bush-bash to me.  I’m sure you’ve got plenty more where that came from.  I wonder who the “unnamed Bush aid” was? 

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            Anyway if that quote represents your view of the way the Bush administration works and thinks then I’d say you’ve got one foot in conspiracy theory. 

            • as much as I hate to agree with our pal demo, I’ll put it on the record here (only a few years after the fact): I have always believed that quote was made up.

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              It is attributed to a “senior advisor”, yet that smells.

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              It looks like something a low-level official might think, but would be unable to express in so compelling a manner. (“Up yours, dems, ha ha, Bush rocks!” is more how it would come out)

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              It looks like something a high-level official might think, but would not say, because to such a person bragging is a pointless risk.

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              In a word, it looks like something that occurs in a journalist’s mind.

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              I’m not saying the statement – taken as the opinion of the author – is not an accurate view of the Bush administration.

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              I just prefer to keep my history in a separate file from my historical fiction.

            • is by Matt Bai, a reporter who is well-respected by all sides.  He didn’t make the quote up.  My guess is that it was Karl Rove — remember, the quote is from 2002, when Bush was popular and the sky appeared to be the limit for BushCo’s agenda.  Those were heady times at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

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              Anyway, the main point of showing you the history of the term “reality based” was to disprove this:

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              This is why progressives are often referred to as the “Loonie Left”  (not “Reality Based”!)

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              Exactly wrong, I trust you’ll now agree.

              • He didn’t make the quote up.

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                Sounds like you are saying, “I, David, am sure he didn’t make it up. So get a grip.” You can do that, but it means nothing. On the other hand, if you have any back-up, spill it.

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                And PS, it does NOT sound like a Rove remark to me.

      • You’re arguing with a guy whose signature is ungrammatical and incoherent.

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        Just a heads up.

            • I’d love to play video games but I don’t really have time.  I thought everyone on the internet knew of the viral “all your base are belong to us” thing, sorry for being so cryptic!

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              David shame on you for interacting with someone with an ungrammatical sig! 

              • Very clear to me. Always has been. Sort of funny, also, in MHO. Sadly, Demo, you’re wrong about the Republicans, though, I think: they have become the Party That Tells People What to Do, from abortion to prayer to marriage.

                • As a responsible adult – you’ll not be able to protect your home with a firearm.  You’ll not be able to gamble.  You’ll not be able to cut down trees on your own property.  You’ll not be able to smoke.  You’ll not be able to buy and drive the vehicle of your choice. You’ll not be able to select your own Doctor. You’ll not be allowed to say anything that someone somewhere finds offensive.  There are plenty of folks in both parties who wish to hold power over the freedom of others. Pox on both.

    • Republican campaigns are based on convincing people that Republicans want less government. Republican actions when in power show that they actually do want a regressive redistribution system. Earmarks and other wasteful special interest spending increased dramatically once the Republicans had control of the presidency and congress.

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      The Republicans can give all the speeches they want to about what their principles are. But it doesn’t change what they have proven their principles to be over the past 7 years. The Republican party stands for more corruption, more cronyism, more interference with people’s personal lives, and more restrictions on civil liberties. If you don’t like that, work to change the Republican party. Don’t tell us about what wonderful speeches Republicans give about freedom and other ideals. Actions matter. Slogans don’t.

      • Began spending money on absolute foolishness and refused to veto funding for idiocy and in some places corruption and fraud /waste/abuse. Bush never saw a spending plan he did not like, all the while throwing gasoline of the national debt conflagration. So Bush threw a monkey wrench into the “small government” arguement. I see Bush more as a progressive democrat rather than a republican. He’s out to save the world and ultimately he’ll save no one—not even himself.

        • You can tell because almost all of the Republican presidential candidates are trying to prove that they will keep doing what Bush is doing, only with more competence. You can tell because all the Republicans in the House and Senate support everything he does. George Bush represents Republican values. If you don’t like that, try to change the Republican party.

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          Also, Bush is not in any way a progressive. Progressives don’t like spending just because it is spending. They like spending money on useful government programs because they are useful programs. The recent SCHIP bill shows what progressive spending looks like.

    • There’s no rating for “Delusional” so I guess I will have to leave your comment unrated.

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      You are the sort of voter that the oligarchs are hoping never wake up to the fact they’ve duped you twenty times seven.

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      But oh lordy, I needed that laugh!

      • I’m delusional yet you claim that one of the 2 major parties in the United States constitutes “oligarchs”.  Judging by how many presidential elections they win, either:

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        a. they are AWFULLY good at fooling people over and over again
        or
        b. you and your ilk are clueless

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        Keep on laughin’

        • You’ve misread Lynne’s comment and you seem to have missed a lot of the recent news as it fell outside the ideological filter.

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