Corrupt on Both Sides
Okay, we need to take a deep breath. Do readers really believe corruption is owned by either side of the aisle? The anti-government and pro-big business philosophy was alive and well during the Clinton Administration, as best illustrated by its Reinventing Government catastrophe (and here), and of course embraced with both arms and legs by the Bush Administration.
In The Wrecking Crew, Tom does a terrific job unraveling the insidious impact of the cynical conservative anti-government movement, most clearly seen in political appointees who do not believe in the mission of their agency. He also shows that this disease really infects both parties, although a more virulent strain has inflamed the Republican party. But in his blog, Tom is, I think, letting the Dems off too easily. On the Wall St. collapse, for example, the Center for Responsive Politics' analysis showed the biggest Senate recipients of Wall St. money were Democrats, after all.
The privatization cult (or public-private partnership) that Tom highlights is absolutely at the center of the culture of corruption that has permeated Washington since the early 90s. It didn't start with the Republicans, though. For nearly two decades the Democratic and Republican Washington elite have fundamentally undermined the very purpose of government as envisioned by the Constitution-- to promote the GENERAL welfare -- by embracing the notion that private interests can and should be trusted to shape public policy, the underlying tenet of privatization. In fact, as the theory goes, the private sector not only should be trusted to know better, but is in fact smarter and more efficient than the stupid old government. I certainly agree with Tom that this philosophy is the underpinning of the corruption in DC -- I'm just not willing to pin it all on conservatives. On this, Nader has it right.
So I'm mighty uncomfortable when my progressive friends are dismissive of Democratic corruption. Do they need me to start rattling off all the Dems who have hung a shingle on K Street, and are chowing down on the corruption trough? Will these progressives apply the same stardards to an Obama Administration that they would McCain? POGO was around in 1992 when a few of our progressive friends even told us that with Clinton in the White House government oversight was not going to be needed.
Uh, yes, progressives will apply the same standards to an Obama administration that we apply everywhere else. Read the posts around here, we'll likely be tougher on Obama than on somebody we don't expect anything good from like Bush or McCain. We were tough on him about FISA, we've been tough on him about faith base initiatives, we're tough on him on ethanol. We're so tough on him that a lot of people worry that we're too tough on him.
Yes, anyone can be corrupt but they own the current corruption and we have to deal with that. We're really good at eating our own, so don't worry about it.
October 7, 2008 11:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
Danielle, spot on. That's why I'm voting Green for president again, and would vote Green for Congress if I had a candidate.
Example No. 1 of how Dems have been lacking?
The Democratic Congress (either now or in previous majorities), has never pushed for public financing of Congressional campaigns, let alone a bill that would provide some public financing for viable third-party candidates.
And, this goes back pre-Clinton. Remember all the Democratic senators nailed in Keating Five? (Not excusing McCain's part, at all.)
Basically, under our current system, whoever has the majority in Congress is going to have some of its members cast greedy eyes and open palms.
October 7, 2008 10:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have been outspoken about corruption and pandering on the Dem side, however, the Republicans are playing in another league the past ten years. The DOJ scandal shows a deeper and more, ahem, organized effort to fundamentally break the rule of law in this country.
Otoh, in keeping with the spirit of this post, I think it is pretty easy to see the Rubicon that was crossed that led us to the place; When campaign finance was unreformed, and it was conveniently determined that 'Money Equals Free Speech.' Now, it is presented to us as a fait acompli that makes perfect sense--just like lobbyists writing bills.
Publicly financed elections would go a long way towards draining the swamp.
October 7, 2008 11:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
It seems most of the corruption during the Clinton years amounted to nothing. I don't think that can be said of the Bush years. See for instance: Torture, loss of civil liberties, detention without trial and the massive transfer of wealth upward. The biggest problem I have with the current democrats is they are essentially complicit in most of these crimes. They almost gleefully went along with some of the most despicable acts of the Bush administration. To what end? So that they can use these things to their own benefit later? One wonders.
October 7, 2008 12:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
It wasn't really corruption during the Clinton years. It was just Third Way politics that a lot of us disagree with. What we're dealing with now from the right is real corruption.
October 7, 2008 12:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree. Most of that stuff was created by the right to distract and keep the Clinton administration from functioning well.
October 7, 2008 12:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, yes. But the Democrats should be held responsible for their failure to see what they were up against: a dismantling of the regulatory apparatus of government that has led us to the present crisis, and which also removed the brakes from Executive power, which Dems were eager to sunset in the wake of the Clinton impeachment.
Failure to see what was coming is matched by their failure to properly appreciate the institutions themselves. This has led to Pelosi, Emanuel, et al. seeing their own function as campaigners, not legislators. This is a disgrace.
October 8, 2008 9:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes! Not just more democrats but better democrats. A lot of these morons that got elected as so called "democrats" are really republicans in democratic clothing. Hopefully we can dump these chumps.
October 8, 2008 1:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
I hope such toughness as there is comes in the form of electing more liberals across the board.
October 7, 2008 1:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
In a sense I am more upset with the D's then I am with the R's. I know what the R's stand for and expect them to govern the way they do. The D's on the other hand abandoned many of the core principles to have their turn at the money trough. I agree with Destor's first comment (and Dave Bowman's very good comments also) on this thread...I hold and will continue to hold D's to just as high a standard if not higher than the R's. They should 'know better'. There is nothing wrong with a large government if in measuring its size we are talking about its effectiveness and not its sheer mass. We need an effective FEMA, we need the D's to stand up to invasive large government programs like FISA, we need a government which puts the common good ahead of the corporate bottom line.
October 7, 2008 1:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Great stuff but posts suggest that in our poisonous-partisan atmosphere you can lead a horse to fresh air but you can't make him breathe
October 7, 2008 2:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
In my opinion, Washington D.C. is a whirling, sucking eddy of corruption. malfeasance and misfeasance beyond redemption. I don't trust any of them.
October 7, 2008 2:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
BevD,
I agree, a pox on both parties.
The Democratic party has evolved into Republican lite. From the Republicans we get supply side economics, from the Democrats we get supply side Government, and this is why 90% of the public is losing ground.
Whatever integrity the Democrats had when they took control of Congress was sold by Pelosi/Hoyer and Reid in order to stay in the majority.
October 7, 2008 3:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's not a matter of ideologies; it's a matter of moral sense and sensibility.
Jewish-American brains and hearts saved us in the '30s. Will Indian-American brains and hearts save us today?
October 7, 2008 3:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ellen,
I disagree it is all about ideology, not about parties. The magnitude Reagan Revolution's electoral success lead the way to the 'private sector' is better movement. The DLC, Clinton's brand on Democratic politics co-opted this notion from the Reagan Revolution in order to achive electoral success.
I am extremely anti DLC and Republican because the ideology does not work for several reasons.
1. Profit taking companies are only in it for profit. Once they win a contract they have incentive to perform, just collect the money.
2. People who fundamentally believe government can't work can't govern, the Bush Administration has proven that. Can anyone say self fullfilling prophecy.
3. What has happened, with both sides of the aisle immersed in corporatism closely resembles a Facist State more than a Democratic one.
4. Nader is right.
5. While the democrat's are indeed culpable for their own misdeeds, they are not the ideological keepers of this problem. They responded poorly in our eyes to maintain the offices they held. The ideology held sway across our political landscape so they adopted the practice. Not particularly noble, but they did not introduce the poison in the well, they just drank way to deeply.
6. Being a democratic politician became a survivalist activity. Those that stood for ideological purity lost to the squabbling, interest group driven democrat repeatedly while the Republicans controlled the ideological debate.
this is why I actually like Obama, he is talking about transforming the nature of the debate back to more sane terms in my view. If he can get little else done this would be of great benefit to the country,
October 7, 2008 4:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
We need a rejuvenated moral politics.
Obama's surrounded himself with the same old same old. We're headed into the winter and he's wearing Bermudas.
October 7, 2008 4:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
pdxbuckeye,
Reagan put the sharks in the water with his; Government is the enemy, get government off our backs, deregulation, deregulation, deregulation bullshit.
Reagan came into office with his deregulation mantra and we quickly had the HUD scandal, the Savings and Loan, the Leveraged buyout scam that was no more than a 'stolen car chop shop' writ large, tens of thousands lost their jobs as companies were sold off piecemeal.
Reagan told the sharks; 'Go forth and multiply', and they did. Some were running Fannie Mae and/or Freddie Mac and earning $20 million? per year.
$25 Billion to bail out Fannie and Freddie? Peanuts compared to the S&L.
George Bush Sr., New World Order, Phil Gramm, Ivan Boesky, Michael Milkin, the ENRON gang, Global Crossing, World Com, Adelphia, Tyco, Bush/Cheney, Halliburton/KBR, Blackwater, EXXON's Lee Raymond retirement package $400 million.........
More recently its the sharks at Lehman Brothers, AIG, Bear Stearns, Merril Lynch with more to come.
And to make matters worse, many Democrats, mostly the DLC, aided and abbetted this bullshit.
All MBAs should get leprosy!
October 7, 2008 6:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Reaganomics began in the latter half of the Carter Administration. The Clintons coopted some conservative nostrums and in the process coopted the Democratic Party. This included eliminating many Federal civil service positions, in favor of contractors who do not necessarily do a better job at lower cost. On top of that they bragged about downsizing the Federal gov. I don't recall much corruption, but the real problem then as now is with what is legal.
Danielle's post is on point. Hopefully in the frenzy of anti-McCainism, which I share, people will take heed to the limitations of the alternative.
October 7, 2008 4:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not sure I can take the new, improved reasonable and adult Rotwang for long.
Gimme the madness of German Expressionism every time!
October 7, 2008 4:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Placing blame as far back as the Clinton Administration seems silly, given the immediacy of the problems we are facing, and the fact that we are in the 8th year of a Republican Administration. Sure, a culture of freewheeling risk and unlimited corporate donations pervaded Wall St. and Washington long before Bush, and Clinton created new methods of expression for rich fat cats to influence Government. But, only since 2000 has the Republicans' philosophy of hoding nothing but contempt for the institutions of Government taken over. This has become so pervasive that it has eroded the basic functions the Government is supposed to perform, as set out in "The Wrecking Crew". I suppose it is somehow politically correct at this point to say we are all at fault, and I admit, as a citizen of CT, I am left wondering why my Democratic Senators haven't been talking about this for years. Of course, it is because they were too busy drowning in Wall St. financial contributions. But when they are up for reelection, I will exercise my right to vote the bums out.
This ultimately, is my point, the most immediate impact we can make is at the ballot box in November, not by engaging in an academic debate about who is to blame, and why. Of course that is needed, and admirable. But, in the contect of an election in 28 days, what we have experienced the past 8 years has taken our problems to new, and disturbing levels. Our Constitution is at risk, our financial system is in ruins, and our Economy isn't far behind. Bush and the Republicans were in charge and had a majority in Congress for 6 of the past 8 years. Should we just forget that, label both parties crooks and move on? I think not.
There will be plenty of time to write histories and discuss causes of all this mess after Nov. 4th. Right now, I and many Americans are rightly laying blame squarely at the feet of this President, and his party, so faithfully represented by McCain-Palin. Bush has two terrible bookends to his Administration; 9/11 and now the Financial Crisis. Why not throw in Katrina in the middle, for a trifecta of failure. All of these moments represent the utter defeat of the Republican party's philosophy of governing. Each of these moments show us exactly why we need capable and thoughtful government. When we don't have it, and a crisis happens, we end up with the Iraq War, Abu Ghraib, "heckuva job, Brownie", and now a $700 Billion Bailout for Wall St.
Nice legacy.
Just as an aside, I'll let historians make the final call, but I'm pretty sure William Jefferson Clinton is going to come out smelling a lot cleaner than George W. Bush.
Just sayin'.
October 7, 2008 4:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry for typos and such. Also, I don't mean to be snarky or diminish the work of people much smarter than me who are diagnosing this crisis.
The last point I wanted to make is that ultimately it is the voters, all of us, who are to blame. In America, after all, we are the government.
I am looking for the electorate to take some responsibilty on Nov. 4th, and I think they will.
Then of course, the promises end, and the hard part of governing begins. I plan to be in the front of the line asking our new leaders next January to deliver on the changes they are promising. I expect all of you to join me, and I know you will!
October 7, 2008 4:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Dom,
No doubt the Bush administration hastened and excacerbated the current crisis however the deregulation at all costs movement gained its footing under Reagan. it was many of the members of the movement to dismantle the New Deal and in large measure they succeeded aided and abetted by electorally savvy democrats and republicans alike.
The ideology is to blame, not Clinton or Bush specifically, but the entire philosophy is not compatible with governance.
Democrats should not fear the liberal label, it is a good thing to be a liberal. My liberalism stems from a strong belief I have in capitalism, it is by far the best wealth producing model out their for a society, however, markets need to regulated to mitigate the costs inherent to the system.
Once you combine capitalism with deregulated/unregulated markets the costs to society rise exponentially and unacceptably high.
prior to the Great Depression of the 1930s it was accepted that the market ran on boom/bust cycles that ravaged the middle class. After WWII, with the advent of strong unions and properly regulated markets our nation experienced the most stable and long lasting economic growth in world history. Standard of Living sored, incomes grew, inflation was relatively non-existent, the ranks of the middle class swelled...
We spent money on huge government programs to help build this prosperity, the highways, GI Bill, HUD and so on. It was only in the 1970s, with the oil shocks, delinking our currency from the gold standard and the subsequent hyper inflation both these things caused that the conservatives were able to begin to gain ground. After 30 years of relatively stable growth and prosperity for a majority Americans the externally created oil shocks created the climate needed for Reagan to sweep in Reaganomics.
Now about every 8 years our economy experiences extreme highs and lows. the S&L collapse which got rolling in 87-88 led to the first recession that lasted until 1992. 8 years later the dot com bust lead us to recession which now 6 years later has led to the mortgage bust. Those who profit the most in this environment have enough wealth to survive, the middle class however keeps getting squeezed out. the middle class is shrinking at alarming rates in this country thanks to the corrupt ideology of the modern conservative movement.
October 7, 2008 4:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ut owuld be easy, mechanically, to suppress the peaks of economic activity. They are always speculative bubbles; factories can't suddenly ramp up to 300% of output. Therefore, tax policy that did not reward windfall profit would take the payoff out of speculation. One such is a transfer tax, another is a short-term capital-gains tax.
But those in power are always beneficiaries of those speculations, and are loath to tax themselves. They hope to get out before the others. In this, they usually do, in that senators' stock portfolios have outperformed the market fairly reliably.
Boom and bust is a likely dynamic for an unregulated economy, ergo, regulate.
October 7, 2008 5:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think it's fair to contrast Democrats' truly individualistic corruption with Republicans' communitarian model. It was business that first drove up the price of a Georgetown lunch, in the 80s, to $500/person. But it was Tom DeLay that required lobbying outfits to hire Republicans.
Democrats are not in their league, having never achieved the corruption of political process that Nixon began and Rove completed. Democratic corruption has typically been more like Huey Long, who took bribes but handed out food and jobs. Republicans take bribes and hand out no-bid contracts.
October 7, 2008 6:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
The classic example of this is the venal William Jefferson, squirreling 90K in the freezer while voting against the FISA gutting and other abominations foisted on us by cleverer and more sinister politicians.
I remember thinking, at the time, that Jefferson's thievery insulated him against the bribes of the telecoms.
October 8, 2008 9:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
The test is not who gave money but what the recipients then did .
You can't run without $s so the dems take contributions. Would we be better off if they refused? We'd certainly have fewer dishonest democratic legislators. In fact we'd probably have none of any degree of honesty whatsoever.
Certainly the DLC position is too credulous about the market. And the repeal of Glass Steagal was passed under Clinton. But Senator Gramm's amendment on the last day of 2000 prohibiting any regulation of futures trading must rank near the top of the list of legislation fostering the current financial crisis.
And don't get me started on Wendy Gramm's period as Chair of the CFTC. The Times managed to run an an analysis of Senator Gramm's position as idealogical godfather of the deregulation fiasco without ever mentioning her, or her sponsorship of the so-called Enron Amendment, after which she joined the Enron board- and , wait for it, its Audit Committee.
October 7, 2008 8:53 PM | Reply | Permalink