December 2004
December 30, 2004
A campaign system only an incumbent could love (part four of seven)
By Bill Kraus
Over the course of the last 30 years a campaign system has evolved in this country that is driven by money, beholden to special interests, and has alienated independents and political moderates of all persuasions. While the 2004 election (estimated cost $1.2 billion) was no kiss for Christmas, I still think the Wisconsin gubernatorial election of 2002 illustrated the depths to which we have descended even more dramatically.
In that election, Jim Doyle was convincingly elected by 19 percent of the eligible voters at a cost of $8.50 per vote.
I have identified seven culprits and events that got us to this pretty pass, and I will enumerate them over the course of seven weeks. Stay tuned.
Culprit(s) number four are the hired guns that a marketing driven money dependent system spawned.
Once the money flow into politics rose to unprecedented levels across the entire spectrum, from school board to president, campaign management became an industry instead of an avocation.
The hired guns who brought their "expertise" to the game also brought marketing to politics. They made politicians into consumer goods. The main difference between selling soap and selling candidates is increasingly semantic.
In consumer marketing what the experts do is called market research and how they validate their research is by putting products and product advertising into test markets. In politics we call market research polling and test markets focus groups. Both play to consumer and voter feelings. In both disciplines the advertising campaigns are geared to Marshall Field's great dictum: "Give the lady what she wants."
Political power shifted from parties to politicians and then to money and to factions and ultimately to the hired guns that the politicians used (or vice versa) to spend the money the politicians spent hours on the phone raising. Many of the people and almost all of the political volunteers who once ran parties and campaigns were displaced by campaign industry "pros."
The hired guns are not stupid. They gear campaigns to the heavy users (or voters) who increasingly are organized around single, simple issues. They build majorities wedge by wedge until they get to the magic 50.1 percent. This process inevitably ignores the general interest and the citizens who want a government that works more than they want an advantage for their faction's interests.
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December 27, 2004
Calling a rift a rift
By Dustin Beilke
I have long contended that the term "conservative" is no longer applicable to most American Republicans. Despite what liberals might want to contend, there is nothing fundamentally conservative about waging illegal, preemptive wars against sovereign nations, ignoring civil rights and subverting the nation's economy to the whims of corporate overlords.
It is an easy mistake to make, for those are certainly the hallmarks of a majority of today's elected Republicans, including those in the Wisconsin Assembly.
Nonetheless, the only appropriate term for such thinkers is "radical." There is no living or historical model for the kind of economics these people envision, for example, except perhaps for the third-world shock therapy kind of economics that always result in the enrichment a handful of already rich people and the further impoverishment everyone else.
Every now and then a real conservative like DuWayne Johnsrud or John Eisenhower will stand up and say "enough is enough," but most Republicans stay the course the same way progressive Democrats bear with the Clintons, Gores and Zell Millers in the Democratic Party.
But now the American Conservative Digest has officially declared a rift between the radicals and the conservatives in the Republican Party, at least where the Iraq war is concerned. The magazine says the war is not consistent with conservative principles and is, in any event, folly. One might ask where the magazine was two years ago, but whatever.....
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December 24, 2004
A campaign system only an incumbent could love (part three of seven)
By Bill Kraus
Over the course of the last 30 years a campaign system has evolved in this country that is driven by money, beholden to special interests, and has alienated independents and political moderates of all persuasions. While the 2004 election (estimated cost $1.2 billion) was no kiss for Christmas, I still think the Wisconsin gubernatorial election of 2002 illustrated the depths to which we have descended even more dramatically.
In that election, Jim Doyle was convincingly elected by 19 percent of the eligible voters at a cost of $8.50 per vote.
I have identified seven culprits and events that got us to this pretty pass, and I will enumerate them over the course of the next seven weeks. Stay tuned.
Culprit number three: Herb Kohl (aided and abetted by Bill Christofferson)
The Watergate reforms created PAC’s, which let the factional money loose. With the help of campaign consultant Bill Christofferson, Herb made money---his money, their money, everyone’s money---politically acceptable with the ingenuous and, perhaps, ingenious slogan---Nobody’s Candidate But Yours---which somehow laundered or legitimatized the millions he poured into his campaign for the U.S. Senate.
Up until then it was politically dangerous to spend too much (a subjective but real number which everyone guessed at; no one thought it was more than seven digits) on a campaign. Big money was regarded as tainted, and the Midwestern political ethic would balk at any perceived attempt to buy an election. In the 1950s a manager of a congressional campaign in Wisconsin would not accept more than $100 from anyone and not a dime from anyone who did not live in the district. “Too dangerous,” he said, and he was probably right.
The Kohl campaign put that bugbear to bed for good, for everyone.
Once the floodgates were open, we were into hired guns running (rather than working for) campaigns, expensive television-based campaign advertising, the need for much larger campaign kitties, dialing for dollars by candidates (in the 30 campaigns I participated in during the pre-Kohl/Christofferson era, candidates did not ask for money; only surrogates did), newspapers asking the money question on the assumption that money qualified candidacies and the lack of money de-legitimatized them.
Thanks a lot, Herb (and/or Bill).
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December 22, 2004
The writer Russ
By Dustin Beilke
I wrote in this space a couple weeks ago about Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold's recent "byline" on Alternet. That article was adapted from his remarks on the Senate floor following the announcement of Condi Rice's promotion.
But the piece he currently has on the seminal Web magazine Salon.com appears to be an actual article (Salon is a paid-subscription site, but you can get a free one-day pass), and a rather good one at that. It is about his post-election vacation in Alabama and his new insights on how the GOP manages to convince the working poor to vote Republican against their own economic interests.
There is a reason politician bylines are rare in respected publications such as Salon. Politicians and their staffers are usually so beholden to "message" that their writing is mostly unreadable. (Feingold does manage to make mention of his annual visits to each of Wisconsin's 72 counties.) But our Feingold is not like the others, and he (or his surrogate) has written a good piece. He even works in a reference to Neil Young.
While you are on Salon, check out the article about Congressman John Conyers' efforts to make sure the votes are counted in Ohio. Sounds like a great idea to me.
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December 20, 2004
Voting didn’t work, so now what?
By Daniel N. Renc
John Kerry’s loss happened almost eight weeks ago, but the Democrats’ cannibalistic feeding frenzy is only getting worse. Online and elsewhere, whether the topic is Ohio, the DNC, the DLC, Michael Moore, MoveOn, or whatever, Democrats cannot seem to talk amicably to each other, let alone agree.
Political campaigning is not about making promises you may or may not be able to fulfill; it is about creating a winning image. Democrats tried to beat the Republicans with their own jingoistic rhetoric and failed. Meanwhile, the Republicans outdid the Democratic ground game and turned out the churches. (Remember when turnout was the Democratic campaigner’s battle cry and the bane of every Republican opponent?)
My greatest fear is not the next four years of regressive tax reform, preemptive, protracted war, and a pro-life, anti-gay agenda. It is that the Democratic Party will be unable to find itself and splinter into shards of progressive, liberal, moderate and conservative pieces. Without unity, there will be no chance of defeating the Republicans in the future.
Perhaps the reason this seems as dark to me as it does is because this year had the most unity and cohesion I have seen from Democrats. If we cannot unite and win against the likes of Bush & Co., what is it going to take?
Significant change can only occur with a realization and acceptance that what is being done does not work. I don’t know what to do about the Republicans, or the Arabs, or the undecided voters. But I do know one thing: Democrats need to get mad without getting quite so mad at each other.
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December 17, 2004
A campaign system only an incumbent could love (part two of seven)
By Bill Kraus
Over the course of the last 30 years a campaign system has evolved in this country that is driven by money, is beholden to special interests, and has alienated independents and political moderates of all persuasions. While the 2004 election (estimated cost $1.2 billion) was no kiss for Christmas, I still think the Wisconsin gubernatorial election of 2002 illustrated the depths to which we have descended even more dramatically.
In that election, Jim Doyle was convincingly elected by 19 percent of the eligible voters at a cost of $8.50 per vote.
I have identified seven culprits and events that got us to this pretty pass, and I will enumerate them over the course of the next seven weeks. Stay tuned.
Culprit Number Two: the United States Supreme Court
In the now infamous 1976 case Buckley v. Vallejo, the U.S. Supreme Court added a dictum to the basic decision of the case which said in effect, maybe in fact, that money is not just money. Money is also speech. This meant that money, political money anyway, would from that day forward get all the protections of the well protected 1st Amendment to the constitution.
All attempts at political reform from that day forward have had to somehow disempower money. The only acceptable way to do that has been to insert public money into the campaign funding mix. A candidate who accepts public money, under this ruling, can be subjected to campaign spending limits. It will not surprise you to learn that no millionaire has done this. Nor has anyone who has access to large amounts of money from other places, no matter how tainted.
The route to meaningful spending controls and campaign finance reform has been full of constitutional potholes ever since 1976. All attempts to fill the potholes in since then, despite the very favorable ruling on the McCain-Feingold reforms, are constrained by that 1976 decision. Until and unless the court lets Congress and state Legislatures set the rules for political campaigns and activity, the court will still be culprit number two.
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December 14, 2004
Yes, I’m writing about Scott Peterson
By Stacie Whitacre
So, it has been maybe 18 hours -- are you sick of the Scott Peterson Death Penalty Media Circus yet? (Yes, I know, I’m participating in it too.)
His sentencing was a sideshow, with people who didn’t even know Laci cheering outside the courthouse when it was announced the jury had decided he should die. Total strangers lusting for blood, for vengeance against a man they’d never met, who’d been convicted of killing someone they’d also never known. I find it hard to believe that these people were cheering because of simple human empathy.
I am 100 percent opposed to the death penalty (yes, even for Hitler), and this is why -- it's not about paying the price. It’s about the spectacle and the thirst for blood and TV ratings and the fact that the San Francisco Examiner was able to sell a special afternoon edition within hours of the verdict.
I have always appreciated that Wisconsin does not have a death penalty -- it seems to give us, at least in my mind, a bit more humanity. However, during nearly every legislative session in recent memory, somebody introduces a bill to re-introduce the death penalty here. Thankfully, the bills never get very far. I do wonder, with the Republicans retaining their control of the Legislature, and the scary wingnut contingent commanding more power, what will happen this time around.
Will we keep our humanity? Or will bloodlust and flashy news headlines win? We will see.
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December 13, 2004
Remembering Vietnam
By G.A. Custer
JP: Do you remember my analogy of the U.S. economy as the Titanic, with Bush as the Captain?
GA: Yes, I do.
JP: The iceberg is the war in Iraq, the tax cuts and the prescription drug benefit. That sound you hear is the sound of money rushing into the hull at an almost uncontrolled rate. Alan Greenspan has been managing the bilge pumps, but at some point he will not be able to keep up. The captain, finally sensing a problem orders all social programs slashed to the bone. Now there are two options left. One is to just let it go, figuring it will all take care of itself as we drown in a sea of money called inflation. The other option is to throw overboard everything not absolutely essential; raising taxes, with balanced cuts. And pray to God we can ride this out.
GA: Another Faith based initiative? I know it seems grim, but could this really happen?
JP: Remember Viet Nam?
GA: Yes, and if you want to know how Iraq’s going to turn out read A Bright Shining Lie about John Paul Vann in Viet Nam. It is not one to one but you will get the idea.
JP: Not the war! How we paid for it?
GA: Okay….
JP: Johnson and Nixon weren’t going to raise taxes. They didn’t cut programs. They simply printed the money. It took three to five years but eventually it caught up with us. Remember the double-digit inflation of the ‘70s, double-digit unemployment, and the stock market had its worst decade of the century. Is any of this getting through? I mean, the only ones working overtime in the Bush administration, excepting Karl Rove, are the guys at the Treasury printing all the money.
GA: Yeah, but in the ‘70s inflation was brought about by an unstable situation in the Middle East resulting in sky rocketing gas prices.
(“G.A. Custer” is a pseudonym. The author works close to the Wisconsin Legislature and wishes to remain anonymous.)
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December 10, 2004
A campaign system only an incumbent could love (part one of seven)
By Bill Kraus
Over the course of the last 30 years a campaign system has evolved in this country that is driven by money, beholden to special interests, and has alienated independents and political moderates of all persuasions. While the 2004 election (estimated cost $1.2 billion) was no kiss for Christmas, I still think the Wisconsin gubernatorial election of 2002 illustrated the depths to which we have descended even more dramatically.
In that election, Jim Doyle was convincingly elected by 19 percent of the eligible voters at a cost of $8.50 per vote.
I have identified seven culprits and events that got us to this pretty pass, and I will enumerate them over the course of the next seven weeks. Stay tuned.
Culprit Number One is Richard Nixon.
His abuses of the parties' money raising system suborned campaign finance reforms that effectively put the parties out of business. These reforms created a Political Action Committee (PAC) system. This cut the candidates loose to slate themselves and fund themselves.
This unintended consequence was countered by the legislative leaders who invented the legislative campaign fundraising system to get control of the fundraising and bring the PAC's to heel. And the slow slide to 2002 (and 2004) was underway.
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December 8, 2004
Feingold on the floor; Janitors at the Capitol
By Dustin Beilke
Alternet's editors thought so much of Russ Feingold's remarks on the Senate floor in the wake of the news of Condoleeza Rice's promotion that they have posted them on the site verbatim in article form. Feingold did not use the time merely for a broadside against the loathsome Rice; instead he took the opportunity of the Rice announcement to lament Bush's disastrous foreign policy record.
Senator Kerry sometimes said things similar to these during the election, but not always and not always very loudly.
Here is my favorite line from the Feingold floor transcript: "The administration's record of the past four years suggests a foreign policy careening out of control, driven by ideologues who want to test their theories in the laboratory of the Middle East one minute, by domestic political considerations the next, and by spiteful attempts to punish those who disagree with their methods the next."
On another, mostly unrelated note, if you are in Madison on Friday during the noon hour please do your level best to make it to the Capitol for the Justice for Janitors rally (King Street steps). Josh Healey did a great job of explaining why the Clean Power employees are organizing and why they are having this rally in his Monday GuestBlog. All we need to do now is show up and make some noise for economic justice.
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December 6, 2004
Human rights
By Josh Healey
This Friday, December 10, is International Human Rights Day. With the Republicans in the state Legislature clamoring to pass the so-called ‘Taxpayer Bill of Rights,’ now would seem like a good time to consider what basic rights we all really deserve.
Housing is a human right. Education is a human right. A healthy environment is a human right. Restricting state spending below the level of inflation may be important to some people, but it is NOT a human right.
One human right we do not discuss often is the right to organize and join with others—like the need to have a good job that pays a living wage, provides health care benefits, and treats the worker with respect. Article 23 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights, signed by more than 100 countries (including the U.S.) on December 10, 1948, states that, “Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his/her interests.”
Yet, as we know, corporations and elected officials often do not respect that human right to organize, and the U.S. labor movement is facing incredibly tough times. But workers continue to organize. The janitors of a Madison company called Clean Power are organizing with SEIU Local 1 to demand good-paying, full-time jobs with security, following the successful model of Justice for Janitors campaigns in other cities. Clean Power, like most corporations, has responded by intimidating union supporters and impugning the union’s motives.
On Friday, in honor of International Human Rights Day, the Justice for Janitors campaign will have a rally at the Capitol at noon to demand that Clean Power agree to neutrality in the campaign. Janitors and community members will stand up for their human rights and the human rights of all people. Join us in solidarity and celebrate the continuing struggle for real human rights.
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December 4, 2004
Think globally, oppress locally
By Kira Fobbs
I learned in college that I am not one of the fortunate ones who can count on the respect and honor “guaranteed” by the Bill of Rights, for I am a citizen of a state first and a nation second. Indeed, there are no such fortunate ones in the United States.
Back then I was a citizen of Illinois. I have even lived in Texas! Now I am a citizen of Wisconsin, but I am equally disenfranchised no matter where I might live.
I am a black lesbian public school teacher and I am only as free as my state Legislature decrees I am.
With Wisconsin’s looming anti-gay referendum and the post-November 2 clucking about our nation’s alleged hateful “morality,” I might have more reason than most to fear my state’s power. And why should you care about whether or not my same-sex spouse (we were married in Canada) is covered by my health insurance, or has the right to make decisions about my funeral arrangements in the event of my death? Why should you concern yourself over my safety or security from rightwing zealots or evangelical activists, after all they are only 23 percent of the electorate? Because Wisconsin has a lot of scary, crazy rightwing legislators, that’s why, and just think about everything you value that they abhor. The anti-gay referendum is their trial balloon. The death penalty, the flat tax, statewide school vouchers, women’s health restrictions and school prayer may not be far behind.
It is not Congress where the real battles are fought it is the state Legislatures. My federal taxes are working for me, but here in Wisconsin I will lose my domestic partnership rights if a simple majority decides my spouse and I pose a threat to the whole world’s well being.
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December 3, 2004
A close call
By Bill Kraus
The path to reform or major change of any kind is nine miles of hard road.
There are two major obstacles to change.
The first is the status quo. The status quo is always at least a two-touchdown favorite. It is not there by accident. Somebody put it there, and that somebody is still around ready to defend it to the death. And the increasingly invincible incumbents whose votes are needed to overturn it got where they are because of a status quo that is important or that is believed to be important to their continued success.
The other formidable barrier to change is contained in the arguments of the my-way-all-the-way-purists who want the clearly unachievable and want it immediately. Like true believers everywhere, they are not open to compromise, nor even discussion in too many cases.
It's a close call, but I'll take the defenders over the purists every time.
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December 1, 2004
Land of the constricted and fearful
By Patricia Acha
I just returned to Wisconsin from a visit to D.C. with my children and husband after finding that our nation’s Capitol resembles nothing like the D.C. I knew as a child. All of our monuments, national treasures and government buildings are barricaded, fenced off and otherwise inaccessible.
We could not even walk around the national Christmas tree -- there was a fence. The White House? Forget it -- layers and layers of barricades, bunkers, fences, and guards. The Washington Monument is completely blocked off by an 8-foot high wall surrounding the entire grounds. It looks like they are installing underground missile launchers. And near the Jefferson Memorial the Navy is installing something secret -- what? They will not say, but it will take another 18 months to complete the project.
I am mourning the freedoms I enjoyed as a child growing up near D.C.; ice skating on the Reflecting Pool, riding the Senate subway, visiting the White House on a school field trip, walking up the stairs at the Washington Monument, riding my bike through Arlington Cemetery, visiting the monuments and memorials at will, whenever, just because. My children will never experience this joy and freedom in our nation’s Capitol.
In the midst of this mourning I was told "this is the world we live in now." No, I replied. This is the world we have made.
We could demand that our government follow foreign policies that eliminate the causes of terrorism. We could help eliminate the oppression of poverty, pollution, and war. We could be the great beacon of freedom and justice in the world; visiting the World War II memorial, for example, one can be humbled and awed at the greatness of which this nation is capable.
And then one can also see, all over Washington D.C., the symbols of our current capabilities.
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