Misplaced Loyalty

Whether it's Chalabi or Mike Brown, Karl Rove or Tom DeLay, one of our President's calling cards is his loyalty to his chosen people far past the point where it might be reasonably expected. It's really a rather unusual political trait, and might be admirable in a sense, in a game where friends are often dropped like hot potatoes when the association might tar one's political future.

In an interview with Brit Hume of Fox News, Bush insists that his relationships with Cheney, Rove, and DeLay are as strong as ever. Our President:

[Cheney]'s got a nasty speculation about whether he's running the government or not running the government, whether I like him or don't like him.

The truth of the matter is, our relationship hasn't changed hardly at all. He's a very close advisor. I view him as a good friend. I had lunch with him today. We discussed a wide variety of topics.

And the good thing about Dick Cheney is when he discusses a topic with me and he gives me his advice, I never read about it in the newspaper the next day. And that's why our relationship is so close and his advice is so valued.

[On Rove]we're still as close as we've ever been. We've been through a lot. When I look back at the presidency and my time in politics, uh, no question Karl had a lot to do with me getting here. And I value his friendship. We're very close.

[On DeLay]Well, I like him. When he's over there, we get our votes through the House. [chuckles] We had a remarkable success of legislative victories. A remarkable string of legislative victories. We've cut the taxes and delivered strong economic growth and vitality. We've had an energy bill that began to put American on its way to independence.

But I really loved his attempt to spin the culture of corruption as a bipartisan problem:

I'm — you know, the Abramoff — I'm frankly, not all that familiar with a lot that's going on up there on Capitol Hill. But it seems like to me that he was an equal money dispenser, that he was giving money to people in both political parties. Yes, I mean, it's really important for all of us in public life to have the highest of ethics. So we can only trust the American people.

Thanks, George, for your trust. So will you trust me, this time?

Here's the LA Times article.

I personally have no doubt that but for the fact that so many Republicans are politically indebted to him, Tom DeLay would have been long since out of Congress, and very likely in jail by now.

What's not to get about his shenanigans? No doubt he follows the letter of the law more often than not, but the spirit of fair play or human decency is utterly absent in this man who had the gall to get all sanctimonious during the Terry Schaivo affair, while abetting sex slavery and sweatshop conditions in the Mariannas, coercing votes on the house floor with veiled threats, or killing popular bills in committee which otherwise would pass.

I've never voted for this man who wields so much power in this country, and am confident that an overwhelming margin would toss him out in a nationwide referendum, if we could have such a thing. But W likes him. Choice.

Congress Critter Calling Campaign

With Republicans reeling, there's no better time I can imagine for the concerned public to start hammering their representatives in Congress for reform and passage of a few bills that Tom DeLay managed to keep from ever coming to a vote.

It may be hard to generate public outrage over inappropriate procedural power in the hands of the majority leader, but the public can easily understand flagrant mistreatment of guest workers, and perhaps the need to limit corporate consolidation of media ownership. These are two bills that I know of which were proposed in the House of Representatives, which had bipartisan support and a high likelihood of passing, but which were never brought to a vote because DeLay had political debts to uphold, and was able to use his position to keep them off the floor.

Now is the time for Democrats, and Republicans for that matter, to re-introduce these pieces of legislation and insist that they get a fair hearing in Congress. I don't trust them to act on their own - we need to start a nationwide calling / letter writing / leafleting / emailing campaign to let our Congress critters know that we DO care about having popular measures getting a vote in Congress. George Miller has introduced the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2005, which one site lists as bill 2429 and another lists as 3732. But 3732 appears at another location to be a Republican sponsored bill to credit employers of tipped minimum wage earners. I'm looking into the discrepancy.

At any rate, we need to push Congress at this critical time to take on the issues that DeLay pocketed, and bring more public scrutiny to the process.
NWPT74

[UPDATE: The George Miller bill which includes an increase in the minimum wage is H.R. 2429; and a nearly identical bill introduced by Sherwood Boehlert of New York is H.R. 3413. Both are now stuck in the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, where DeLay apparently used his influence to keep them parked there. I have sent an email to my Congressman, Jay Inslee, seeking his advice on how citizens might most effectively have a voice concerning bills which are stuck in Committee. Certainly contacting your Representative is always appropriate, but those on the relevant committee may be the best to contact. I'm especially thinking of any Republicans there who are in contested Districts. I'll report back with further info.

ALSO - If you have any information on the particular legislation from much longer ago which had been proposed to limit media consolidation, but which the Majority Leader used his power to keep from coming up, PLEASE let me know with a comment here.]

The Neocon - Religious Right Alliance

Jack Whelan has captured some essential truths which I would really, really like every thinking liberal, moderate, and conservative to read before further participating in whatever version of the culture war that has captured their fancy. You can read the whole thing by going to his site and scrolling down to:

The Neocon Nightmare World
But because I want this to be seen, I am excerpting liberally:

Both Bloom and Lasch understood that a society pays a price when it values individualism and freedom above all other values. For both men the laissez faire in Liberalism creates a fragmented, atomized society. This is a problem for Lasch because it diminishes the possibility for human community life, destroys local traditions and neighborhoods, and creates a culture of narcissism, a culture of minimal selves--of lost souls who don't know who they are, a society of ungrounded people who are empty of any real interior life, and who are therefore weak and easy to manipulate.

In other words, Liberalism creates a vacuum in the life of a society where instead there should be a soul. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so the emptiness is filled with the crudest kinds of impulses. ... The problem lies with a society that is fragmented, because it is weak. An open, multicultural society in which every thing is equal, in which no value or cultural ideal is considered any better than any other, an anything-goes "different strokes for different folks" society loses any sense of cohesiveness and is very vulnerable to manipulation by a willful, well-disciplined minority that has no qualms about violently asserting its own values and suppressing any other value system as inferior and to be annihilated.

In other words, the easygoing, nonjudgmental laissez faire of Liberalism invites its own destruction by those whose attitudes are anything but laissez faire. ...

For the neocons, politics is thuggery, and you fight thuggery with thuggery, so the only thing that matters is whether the thugs you approve of are running things. The thuggery that we began to see assert itself on the right starting with Newt Gingrich, the impeachment of Clinton, through to the the bullying of Tom Delay in the House are all justified by Straussian theory. It's thuggery in the cause of the higher good. They really believe that. Liberalism must be destroyed or America will be destroyed by its enemies.

For the Straussians, following Carl Schmidt, politics is not the sphere of compromise and working things out, it's the realm of domination of the weak by the strong. For the neocons, politics is war. It's about controlling the political process or being controlled, annihilating or being annihilated. They understand power as the central truth, and every other value has value only insofar as it promotes power. And the neocon influence in the Republican party seems bent on proving their theory right by doing everything it can to discredit and destroy Liberal ideas and Liberal institutions. And so far, judging by the compliancy of the Democrats, they seem to have proven their case.

All of this has become so much clearer for me after reading Shadia Drury's Leo Strauss and the American Right -- particularly the virulence of the conservative attack on Liberalism which until recently I had naively dismissed as crackpot. Most normal people think of wingnuts like Limbaugh, Robertson, and Coulter as comical, barely sane troglodytes. These wingnuts, on the other hand, take the Liberals very seriously, and see them as a cancer that is destroying American society and making it spineless and weak, and as such all the more vulnerable to its enemies. They believe that Liberalism is destroying America, and they are totally committed to preventing that by destroying Liberalism. "Let the Liberals laugh at us," think the wingnuts. "We'll see how hard they laugh when eventually we put our boot on their throats."

The great virtue of the Liberal credo is its belief that a society can be built on truth, philosophy, and enlightened self-interest. But I also think that over the long haul that's not enough. Conservatives understand that a society needs myths, religion, and to stand for something worth dying for. Otherwise, as Drury points out, "it is little more than an animal farm." I would say that a postmodern America needs to find a way to integrate both the Liberal and Conservative credos. ...

Until reading Drury's book, I thought that the alliance between the intellectually sophisticated neocons and the simplistic religious-right extremists like Falwell and Robertson was a marriage of convenience engineered for short-term political gains. But Drury makes clear that the neocons believe that the religious right is essential for continued American dominance because it provides the requisite myths that justify American supremacy. ... ...

For the Straussians, if a society does not believe in itself as superior in every way to its enemies, it will be defeated by an enemy who is not intimidated and that believes itself superior. The neocons therefore have formed an alliance with the Christian Right not for political convenience, but because the Christian Right naively and fanatically accepts the myth of American superiority and of its special God-given role in world history. The neocons support the wingnut attitude that anyone who does not believe this myth is an America-hater and, as Ann Coulter puts it, is guilty of treason. There is no gray area. There is no room to criticize. It's my country right or wrong--any other attitude leads to inevitable defeat by another society that believes in itself more.

Sane people dismiss extremists like Coulter as comical crazies. I know that's been my attitude. But the very fact that her views have been legitimated by her ubiquitous presence in the media points to the drift of things in this country toward insanity. What should by now be clear to everyone is that the right is not just indulging in a lot of crazy talk. They are walking their talk. ...

Does that mean that anybody who wishes to oppose the neocons must resort to thuggery to defeat them? No. But I do not believe that secular liberalism has the resources to defeat it. Even if the Democrats win in the short run, the problem remains for the long run. We need a tough, principled, idealistic politics in the spirit of King, Mandela, Gandhi. These men were not nihilists. They were genuinely religious humanists who understood evil and knew how to fight against it on their own principled terms, not on the terms defined by the thugs.

The Straussians are convinced that we all live in a nightmare world and that there is no ultimate purpose or meaning to human existence... They believe that the masses have to be anesthetized and controlled with myths and religious fictions, but that the grownups have to run things, and the grownups understand that it's all about power, and that so long as the U.S. has the enormous power it now possesses, it had better use it or lose it.

This explains their gambit in Iraq--it was an opportunity to fill a geopolitical power vacuum with American power after the collapse of the Soviet sphere of influence in the Middle East. It's a gambit that has failed--the Muslims there are not Liberals, and they do not fold so easily. But I for one am worried about what they have up their sleeve now that their policies are being discredited by their failure. They will not walk away with their tail between their legs. They still believe they are right even if their tactics were ineffective. They will not be gracious in defeat.

And they are not going away. Wingnuttery in America will always be a problem so long as there is a vacuum in American society where there should be a soul. How to solve that problem in a sane, progressive way is for me the most pressing issue that confronts Americans in the 21st Century.

Picking at Nits While Ignoring the Elephant

Rove and DeLay are the whipping boys for Democratic outrage these days. Were identities leaked inappropriately? Were trips paid for by lobbyists? These peccadillos are serious enough and likely to be breaches of the law, but the truly odious behavior is the whole gestalt of power abuse and slander which is not necessarily illegal, but has become standard operating procedure in the halls of power. [Continue reading]

It's rather analogous (at a lower order of magnitude, of course) to the attempt to ding Saddam Hussein for maybe being out of compliance with his weapons development, when his indisputable history of genocide, torture, and oppression should be fully sufficient for the world community to demand his -bloodless- removal from power. The same is true for the scores of tyrannical despots still in power around the world - but I digress.

Must the opponents of treachery wait around for the perpetrators to slip up on the petty stuff in order to bring a halt to their treachery?

This elevation of the nits to public prominence in lieu of the overarching generalizations, however obvious they may seem to some observers, is nothing new and operates on all sides and from local politics to global diplomacy. I'll even concede that it is not all bad, as often the nits represent specifics which are less deniable than the more general observations which may spring unfairly from ideological bias. But it is important to understand the nits in context to the whole, lest the casual reader misconstrue the debate as defined wholly by how a particular conversation between Karl Rove and Matt Cooper started and proceeded, or whether Tom DeLay knew that his golf trip in the Marianas was being funded illegally by lobbyists.

Now it may be true that Karl Rove as he wanders the halls of the White House humming "Onward Christian Soldiers" believes that he is doing the Lord's work; but only by applying a "means justifies the ends" type of logic which I grew up associating with Marxism. The likelihood that his revelations to reporters (that Joe Wilson's wife was a CIA operative) was designed more to smear Wilson than to save the reporters from the embarrassment can be guessed at by Rove's historical track record of slander and innuendo. Frank Rich in his recent NYT Follow the Uranium (subscription required) op-ed piece is right on target when he writes:

This case is about Iraq, not Niger. The real victims are the American people, not the Wilsons. The real culprit - the big enchilada, to borrow a 1973 John Ehrlichman phrase from the Nixon tapes - is not Mr. Rove but the gang that sent American sons and daughters to war on trumped-up grounds and in so doing diverted finite resources, human and otherwise, from fighting the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11. That's why the stakes are so high: this scandal is about the unmasking of an ill-conceived war, not the unmasking of a C.I.A. operative who posed for Vanity Fair.

Similarly, in the case of Tom DeLay, it is laughable that the big news is that lobbyists might have paid for any number of his international jaunts. No, what is odious is that DeLay secures for the powerful business interests in the Marianas "protection" from American labor laws which might throw a wrench in their ability to exploit foreign workers in sickeningly inhumane fashion, while still being able to carry a "Made in America" label.

None of this was a secret back home in the U.S. In 1998, ABC, CNN, the BBC and the New York Times each confirmed reports of forced labor, sex slaves and domestic forced servitude among the Marianas' so-called "guest workers."

What is outrageous is that DeLay carries the power (apparently legally!) to prevent a measure holding Marianas manufacturers to these labor laws from even coming to a vote on the floor of the house in spite of widespread bipartisan support. He used the same power nearly two years ago in preventing a measure limiting media consolidation from coming to a vote, even though it would have won easily due to wide popular support. It is small wonder that our corporate controlled media did little to cover the story.

I believe that DeLay will get his comeuppance yet, as the TRMPAC scandal from several years back appears destined to expose plenty of illegality. It is sad, however, that we seem unable to derail the structure of power that allows one man elected from a single district to hold so much sway over our nation's laws.

Instead of insisting on decent public behavior from our officials, we are reduced to picking at the nits, which are easily cast as not so odious as a sitting president allowing his prestige and rank to afford him gratuitous sexual favors from a lowly intern. And make no mistake, I believe that too was a despicable abuse of rank. Clinton's behavior was clearly worse than allowing a lobbyist to pay for a trip, but not nearly as condemnable as leveraging one's power to perpetuate virtual slave labor abroad.

Ironically this administration's dishonesty with respect to "fixing the intelligence and facts around their policy" can be partly attributed to the tendency of the community of nations to pay more attention to nits than the big picture. As I stated earlier, Saddam's unfitness to rule any nation was starkly obvious to any observer, and yet for official steps to be taken it was necessary for him to violate particular rules which he could just avoid violating. The same can be said of dozens of other tyrants whose nations are officially represented at the United Nations. It is easy to understand conservatives' problems with taking the UN seriously when we are required to engage in diplomacy with the representives of thugs in order to accomplish baby steps in reining in the abuses of despots. But in spite of the necessary hypocrisies, the method of nations acting in concert to make demands of other nations, is far preferable to any one nation's unilateral military action.

Saddam was a particularly thorny problem because of the decades of Baathist rule which had allowed him to create layers of protection, and a whole class of people dependent on his despotism for their standard of living. Dethroning him and his party in a bloodless fashion was sure to be problematic in the extreme, while doing so militarily was bound to produce the type of fallout we're seeing today. Acting with the blessing of a much larger world community, and without the type of retributive actions as were undertaken in Fallujah would have certainly helped, though.

It is a sad testament to the disconnect between America's ideals and her foreign policy, that Saddam owed much of his ability over the past several decades to consolidate his iron grip to U.S. policy. It is a further irony that in attempting to reverse (selectively) our support of tyranny abroad, the current President has not taken seriously the need to curb our own excesses and fully honor longstanding Geneva protocols, leading to justifiable perceptions that we are the bullies on the world stage.

This is why much of the world, including plenty of Americans of diverse ideological stripes, stand in slack-jawed wonder at the willingness of a populace steeped in a democratic tradition, to reelect this administration.

Celebrating What's Right

It has been a few days now since I returned from the westbound leg of my cross-country family car trip. Open water of the Great Lakes, waterfalls, forests, prairies, badlands, mountains, and wildlife; these trips never disappoint, and the memories sustain me for years to come. Good people come in many flavors and from many places and bring meaning to our experiences. Happiness springs from the ability to amplify the kindnesses we encounter so that the meanness and pettiness that gets tossed our way becomes but a minor nuisance. I've been very fortunate in my life to have the former in healthy doses, and the latter in manageable doses, most of the time. And so it is that I return from the wide open spaces resolved to celebrate the positive, more than to curse the negative.

The politics of denigration and mockery persists, however, and I confess you may find me celebrating the potential demise of Karl Rove or Tom DeLay, as Rove's current troubles take center stage in our daily news. My objection to the actions of Rove and DeLay is amplified by the extent to which the promotion of their agenda is dependent on the disparagement, mockery, or sometimes worse of their opponents. I may differ fundamentally with their agenda, but if it were pursued in honest and fair debate with the ideas of their political opponents, I would not so resent their successes, and could grant their right to a place in the discussion about how to shape our public policy.

But if I become so enthused about their potential downfall that I lose sight of why an alternate way forward seems preferably to me, then I put myself at risk of succumbing to the negative political spiral which spoils so much of the current discourse in our society. While Rove tries to spin reaction to 9/11 to create distrust or even hatred of "liberals", it behooves those of us who are prone to wear the liberal label to be unafraid to celebrate what we see as right and noble about liberalism, rather than simply denigrate the agents of changes with which we disagree. It may not be the most expedient political strategy, but in the long run I think people will respond to a positive message, especially one which allows a breadth of ideas to be considered. I steadfastly maintain that there are principles of both liberalism and conservatism that hold legitimate value, as there are both libertarian and communitarian principles of value.

Perhaps my inclination to wear the liberal label is partly a contrarian one, because it is currently out of favor, but I know that liberalism's precepts, which I intend to expand on in future posts, are not deserving of the rebuke which they are currently receiving from the disdainful faction of the right in this nation. I also know that there are many conservatives who are impatient with the tenor of the message of their fellow conservatives who are predisposed to dismissive language, and they will be our allies in finding the best way forward if we are able to exhaust society's patience with the politics of disparagement.

One Year Ago

Well, there's still 2006, though the logic I used a year ago doesn't bode well for Democratic pickups in 2006. Then I wasn't anticipating the turnout on the other side generated by anti-gay initiatives. It all depends on the extent to which the various constituencies fall off in the non-presidential year, and whether there is any movement based on intervening public exposure to the corruption of DeLay and his ilk. The sooner the GOP cuts loose DeLay, not just from Leadership but from Congress entirely, the less that corruption hurts them. That's why my bet is that Tom won't be a congressman at the end of this calendar year.

Humor Envy

Perhaps I'm loath to dedicate any posts here to the outrages of Tom DeLay because his antics rile me so that I lose all humor and equanimity. Jim Hightower avoids that malady as he notes that DeLay "doesn't need a cosmetic make-over, he needs an entire ethics transplant" in his latest essay over at Common Dreams. Perhaps I derive much of the humor from Hightower's high-pitched Texas twang which comes through for me as I read it.

For my part, I'll try to remember Texas as the home of Hightower, Moyers, Ivins, Ann Richards, and Barbara Jordan, rather than of Bush, Rove, Cornyn, Tower, and DeLay.

Foley lost in '94; DeLay in '04?

A remarkable 26% of the electorate is polling as undecided in Texas' 22nd Congressional District, where it is widely assumed that Tom DeLay will be reelected. This is according to Democratic challenger Richard Morrison's own polling which shows DeLay ahead approximately 41%-34%. I've seen other polls that show DeLay with numbers closer to 48 or 49 percent, and running 11 or 12 points ahead of Morrison, but anytime an incumbent's numbers are less that 50%, that's cause for concern as undecideds traditionally break heavily for the challenger.

In 1994, I don't remember anyone seriously predicting beforehand that speaker Tom Foley would lose his own reelection campaign. His speakership was considered in jeopardy only because the Democrats might (as they did) lose majority control. I see many parallels this year with voter dissatisfaction, and cannot help but wonder if a surprise is forthcoming. It is true that safe districting has taken root all the more, taking more and more districts out of play, but if there is a year where unanticipated shifts may occur, this is it.

Very troubling too for Republicans, is a recent Harvard University poll showing unprecedented levels of interest in the election by college students nationwide. There is simply so much that's unpredictable this year with the increased interest, that my first advice is to doubt the pundits, and that includes me.

[Update:
Another update on Tom DeLay's political troubles.

            &

A call to action to help defeat him.]

Boorish Political Behavior

One unfortunate side effect of the politically charged atmosphere we Americans live in right now, is the thoughtless and uncaring behavior which comes out when people get so emotionally invested in their desire for a particular outcome, or the dominance of a particular world view. The flip side is that it's encouraging to see so many people make the connection, and see the relevance of public policy on their lives and on our society.

Even if people don't get it quite right, or focus too narrowly on side issues, I think it's actually a positive thing that the level of engagement is so high. But because Americans aren't used to that, the discourse too frequently descends to shouting and name-calling, and that certainly is not good. My hope is that when the election is behind us, and we all realize that we're still here living together, that engagement can translate into a more civil discourse based in the knowledge that there is no imminent election and the improvements we need to work toward are long term efforts which will require the cooperation of folks with different opinions.

I don't claim to be immune from the negative side effects of political passion. I'd like to think that I would never grab a sign from the hands of a child (or anyone else for that matter) or shout down a veteran marching in a parade - two instances of boorish behavior by Bush detractors, which I've seen reported. But I did catch myself nearly shouting on the phone in a conversation with my aunt this summer, and I've talked with friends who admit that they've gotten too carried away.

Some tend to take a bean counter approach to these incidents, but that proves nothing that we don't all already know. There are boors of every political persuasion, and their presence or number has nothing to do with worthiness of any particular policy position. Feeling cornered can bring out the worst in some people, so as the pendulum swings in one direction, those at the other end will feel marginalized and sometimes act out in unseemly ways. For that reason if instances of misbehavior by Bush detractors outnumbers those of his supporters this season, as I suspect is likely the case, it's not really a surprise.

Most candidates for public office behave themselves reasonably well in public, leaving any misbehavior to surrogates who can spread innuendo, while absorbing most of the backlash in lieu of their candidate. Kerry and Bush were both mannerly in last night's debates, which came as no surprise to this observer. People from both sides will attempt to read ill intent into the reactions of the candidate they oppose, but ultimately it is the policies which are paramount in making this awesome decision of whom to entrust with the reigns of the most powerful government on earth.

Between now and the election, I will continue to make the case that the Bush administration represents a danger to our continued well-being, our environment, our security, and our freedoms. Through it all I will continue to respect many fellow citizens who have earnestly come to a different conclusion. Many think that I ought to also respect our President. Well, I don't. I can't. I've said before that I can't know what's in George W. Bush's heart, and that's true. But I would be disingenuous if I didn't also admit that I suspect the worst. What I do know something about is his policies, and consistently they bespeak a contempt for many of my most strongly held values. About that, I cannot be silent.

I've already made the case that the political spectrum in this country is oversimplified, and that almost everyone has a mixture of conservative and liberal values, and other values not neatly labelled as either. What I find so objectionable about this particular administration and part of the leadership of the House of Representatives is not WHERE they fall along some left-right continuum, though I do feel they are significantly to the right of the mainstream, but the total lack of empathy for anyone or any group which stands in the way of pushing their agenda, and the wanton disregard for the concerns, and yes even the lives, of the downtrodden, when those concerns are at odds with the moneyed interests which prop them up.

Much of the right in this country misjudges many like me, who they see as "Bush-haters". I think they believe that our "liberalism" is a misguided justification for loose moral behavior, and that we see ALL conservative values as a threat to our agenda. But that is wrong. Speaking for myself, I think it is essential that wise conservative voices continue to have a place in our national discourse. I genuinely share some of their values, and respect others which I may not share. Importantly they also share some of my liberal values, whether or not they label them as such, like concern for the dispossessed and the sense that society has the responsibility to take care of its least fortunate. George Bush mouths some of these values, but his policies tell a different tale, the details of which I'll not attempt to address in this post.

John McCain in contrast has frequently broken with his own party when a bill was too harsh or not consonant with some of the basic human values he believes in. If McCain were the President today, I am next to certain that there would be little energy in the Presidential race. There would be respectful debates, but the result would be a foregone conclusion. There's not a Democrat who would stand a chance. The angst you now see from the left in America would be centered on Tom DeLay and other corrupt politicians willing to sell our democracy to the highest bidder. But there would be a lot less angst. McCain would have been Presidential in his approach to 9/11, and built on the unity that we felt (and yes I felt it too!) in those dark days in 2001. I can't know what would have happened in the Middle East, but I'm certain it would have been better planned and I doubt that we would have so alienated our European allies.

No the hue and cry one hears against Bush today is the direct result of Bush's own doing. It's not because of how far right he is, but because of how far wrong he is. Without the fear that this administration has nurtured out of the tragedy of 9/11, this would be no contest. But getting beyond the fear, and finding hope and possibility is exactly what we need to do. I don't pretend that John Kerry is the perfect answer for that, but I am certain that he is at least a step in the right direction. Not only that but the Republican party will be strengthened by Kerry's winning, as it will be forced to find more moderate voices to carry it forward.

In the meantime, we will all do well to remember the humanity of our neighbors, regardless of what they happen to be displaying in their front yard or on their bumper or their lapel. We should not avoid discussion, or be afraid of what they will think of us by revealing our views, but we should be civil. Most of us will still be here on November 3rd, and we will still be neighbors.

Footnotes worth sharing

When I speak of recognizing "good will behind disparate ideological masks", I don't mean vainly looking for good intentions among those whose malevolent methods are well established. Within the current administration and the Republican leadership of the House, I look at the most powerful forces who they wouldn't have dared put on display at the RNC as beyond any reasonable hope of redemption. MoveOn.org, who have been delivering me hope for the last several years, sent an email out to its membership this morning, enjoining us to call on the House Ethics Committee to appoint an outside counsel to investigate the illegal activities of Majority Whip Tom DeLay. The footnotes within that email are worth sharing:
[1] A bribe was attempted while the Medicare bill was held open:
http://www.house.gov/nicksmith/chicago_suntimes_31127.htm
http://slate.msn.com/id/2091787/
[2] The official summary of the formal complaint against DeLay:
http://cdn.moveon.org/content/pdfs/DeLay_complaint.pdf
[3] AP: Four on Ethics Panel Accepted Delay Money
http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Politics/ap20040715_2123.html
[4] Houston Chronicle: DeLay's national committee documents Enron
donation
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/special/enron/2681668
Several other articles detail DeLay's fundraising abuses:
Washington Post: DeLay's Corporate Fundraising Investigated
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43219-2004Jul11.html
Dallas Morning News: As DeLay raises cash, critics raise questions
http://www.moveon.org/r?530 (registration required)
These editorials call for an outside counsel:
Miami Herald: Unethical ethics panel
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/editorial/9187328.htm?1c
Austin American-Statesman: Outside investigation of ethics charge
warranted
http://www.statesman.com/opinion/content/editorial/07/16delay.html (registration required)

The Fight for Congress

Most pundits say there is little chance of the Democrats wresting control of the House of Representatives from the GOP this election year. The latest congressional redistricting in most states further solidified the creation of safe districts for incumbents such that very few districts are expected to be in play in any given election year. With the Republicans currently enjoying a 228-206 advantage, few have dared to suggest that the Democrats have more than a long shot chance to become the majority party. The unprecedented mid-decade redistricting in Texas alone is seen as likely to result in a pickup of 4 or 5 seats for the GOP, further widening the gap that the Demos would have to narrow. Here is one Republican's assessment of which races should be competitive in the House. More attention has been given to the Senate where the margin is much narrower, and more Demos are daring to hope for majority status.

The conventional wisdom may well turn out to be true, but here is my contrarian speculation that the House is actually likelier to change hands than the Senate. I will grant that this is partly wishful thinking on my part, as a majority switch in the House stands to create more political thunder than a switch in the Senate where greater moderation on both sides of the aisle tends to dampen the influence of the majority, especially when it's a slim one. Some may argue that the Senate is more important due to its role in confirming appointments, but it's the House where continuous control by Republicans since 1995 has resulted in partisan entrenchment and the establishment of rules creating institutional barriers to change rivaling those which the Democrats had built up after forty years of control of that body prior to the Republican Revolution of 1994. Frankly our nation would be well served by at least one switch in party control per decade to avoid that type of petty partisanship.

My inclination to believe a Democratic surprise may be in the works stems from the tide of unabashedly liberal activism, and the rising concerns of libertarians and fiscal conservatives, both of which have sprung up in reaction to the Bush administration's four-headed approach to governing by warmongering, rights abatement, deficit spending, and cultural divisiveness. This isn't to suggest that I don't believe the polls that show a closely split and increasingly polarized electorate, nor that I believe the Republican base isn't also going to vote in record numbers. But among the many constituencies which are NOT in either party's base, I suggest that those who are inclined to oppose Bush will be voting at a substantially higher rate than those inclined to support him. This is why the polls may be "lying".

While events could yet conspire for things not to turn out that way, this potential differential in who shows up in November could translate into both an unexpected landslide for Kerry, and longer coattails than have been seen in years. The reason I think the coattails might be more noticeable in the House than the Senate is largely regional. Only one-third of all Senate seats are up for a vote, and many of the closer races are for southern seats currently occupied by Democrats. The stronger cultural conservatism in the South is likely to mitigate my suggested turnout differential there, and the loss of just two or three of those Senate seats is likely to be insurmountable. In contrast, as always, every seat in the House is up for re-election, and a motivated large anti-Bush turnout could produce more surprises in House races previously not believed to be in play.

As a partisan myself, I am especially anxious to see the Democratic Leadership put more resources than they might otherwise be inclined to into House races which have historically gone Republican with percentages in the high 50s and even low 60s, especially outside of the South. One strategic arm of the Democratic establishment, the National Committee for an Effective Congress (NCEC) seemed to share my take on the unique opportunity of 2004 back in their September 2003 Board Memo:

As President Bush’s ratings continue to slip, and the Republicans continue to be wrong on the issues that matter most to people, Democratic races for the US House and Senate have become even more competitive. Principally because of 2002 redistricting there are a smaller number of competitive US House races. While it will be a truly difficult challenge to overcome a 22-seat GOP advantage in the House, a weakened Bush and discredited GOP has the potential of putting many more House seats “in play” in 2004. It is possible that by this time next year there will be significantly more competitive House races and the Democrat’s prospects of recapturing control of Congress will be much brighter.

But in their more recent winter newsletter, they backed substantially away from such optimism, only barely mentioning that:

In addition there is a strong chance Democrats will be able to pick up a couple of seats in the House of Representatives.

In contrast, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, more of a fund-raising organization dedicated to winning seats in Congress, at least officially, seems to remain more hopeful. Personally I wish that Tom DeLay could become the sort of political lightning rod for the left, that Ted Kennedy and Hillary have become for the right. "Demote DeLay" could become the generic "vote for your local Democrat for Congress" yard sign. Alas it would be lost on the average voter outside of DeLay's own district, who's not inclined to think of their vote as having anything to do with majority control of Congress.

Control of the House by the Democrats, should my November surprise actually occur, is likely to be short-lived however. If accompanied by a Kerry Presidency, the motivated electorate I'm hypothesizing to show up to turn out Bush will fall back to their usual habits in two years, and the redistricting to favor the party currently in power will not have changed, meaning the GOP would retake most of the seats they lose this time around. Even so, an interruption to a Republican majority, should be celebrated by moderates everywhere, as it should substantially quell the activist right-wing freight train being led by Hastert and DeLay.

As far as my personal druthers are concerned, I actually am hoping for my prediction not only in the House but in the Senate as well, since I see the advantage of some of the moderate Republican leadership in that body tempering possible excesses of what would otherwise be one-party control across the board. This in spite of the fact that I test to the left of Kucinich in this on-line measurement of one's political compass, though I remain very skeptical of that result.