Conservative Politics-- It's All About "The Men With The Gold"... On Both Sides of The Aisle

Pelosi picked him 'cause he knows how to sweet talk Wall St.

Former Blue Dog co-chair Dennis Cardoza, a real sleazy piece of work from California's Central Valley, couldn't wait to flip from Congress to lobbying-- so he didn't. Citing some nonsense about "family needs," he resigned his seat this week and took a managing director job at Manatt, Phelps, one of the more disreputable Beltway firms. Cardoza was a quintessential Blue Dog, frequently voting with the GOP on crucial policy matters. His career long ProgressivePunch voting record is a dismal 55.85. But during the current session-- while he was looking for a lobbying job-- his tendency to vote with the Democrats around half the time cratered precipitously. His score for the past year and a half has been 36.22, one of the worst for any Democrat in Congress, slightly to the right of Ron Paul (R-TX) and Walter Jones (R-NC). As a fairly senior member of the Agriculture Committee (and the Subcommittee on General Farm Commodities and Risk Management) he was in a position to be on the receiving end of huge bribes from AgriBusiness and he was always happy to take advantage of that. While on the Agriculture Committee he vacuumed up $1,245,555 in bribes from AgriBusiness and amassed a voting record that favored their interests over consumers, public health, the environment and independent farmers. His record on corporate subsidies for Big Agriculture is a putrid 13.04, a pure right-wing Republican voting record.

But let's head east from the Central Valley for a moment-- straight across the country to southwest Pennsylvania, where we'll find Somerset County, almost 80,000 people (97.39% white, mostly of German heritage). The county has 53,527 registered voters, 25,248 (49.61%) Republicans and 21,574 (42.39%) Democrats. But most of the elected officials are Democrats... more or less. They're actually conservative Democrats, while the Republican politicians are unhinged reactionaries. Somerset is divided between two congressional districts-- Bill Shuster's 9th and Mark Critz's 12th-- and both congressmen are very right-wing, both ultra-homophobic and both deranged anti-Choice fanatics, one with a red t-shirt and one with a blue t-shirt. Both state Senators, Rich Kasunic and John Wozniak are anti-Choice Democrats and both state Reps-- Republican Carl Metzgar and Democrat Frank Burns-- are as well. The District Attorney, Sheriff and County Treasurer are also conservative Democrats and the three County Commissioners are Democrat John Vatavuk, chairman, Democrat Pamela Tokar-Ickes, Secretary and Joe Betta, the vice chair. Betta's an odd bird. This week he left the Republican Party... again. Betta started his political career as a Blue Dog Democrat, wretchedly conservative as you'd expect from a Blue Dog. Then, like Blue Dogs tend to do, he eventually realized he was a Republican and switched to the GOP. But he couldn't stand them and he reregistered as an independent. But then reregistered against as a Republican last year. So why did he just dump the GOP again?

“I reregistered Republican in hopes that coming into it I could help fix it, but the local Republican Party is part of the national machine,” said Betta. “Am I anti-everybody that’s in the party? No. They want to paint me that way.

“They say I’m not a team player. Of course I’m not a team player. If you’re not going to have God, country and family foremost in mind, I’m not going to play.”

Last year, the outspoken United States Marine Corps veteran ran in a two-person team with fellow Republican candidate Jeff Henry against Democrats John Vatavuk and Pamela Tokar-Ickes. A rift quickly developed between the GOP ticket and the local party bosses. Republican Bob Bastian, a former state representative, ran an advertisement in support of the incumbent Democrats. Betta felt Jim Marker, then vice chairman of the party, made disparaging remarks about him and Henry.

Vatavuk, Tokar-Ickes and Betta won seats on the board. Henry lost.

The two GOP candidates eventually filed grievances with the Somerset County Republican Committee for what they considered a lack of support during the election cycle. Betta withdrew his complaint for what he called the sake of party unity. At the time, he thought Henry would still be able to have his concerns addressed.

However, party bylaws state only elected officials or committee members can file a grievance, so Henry had no standing.

The experience soured Betta on the party establishment.

Betta also felt the county party attempted to control the decisions he made through his first half-year as a commissioner. “I was told you’re going to do what you’re told by the men with the gold,” Betta said.

Yes, "the men with the gold." That's what right-wing politics have always been about-- across history, across geography. And it's no less true among Republicans and among conservative Democrats. The tragedy is that ordinary working families in America have had precious few champions for their cause since FDR. American political elites-- 100% of the Republicans and some growing number of Democrats-- don't give a rat's ass about the interests and the legitimate aspirations of the middle and working class. It's all about the men with the gold. That's been expected among Republicans from as long as I can remember, but that it is also prevalent among Democrats these days, is tragic.

We've been looking at how Beltway Democratic leaders-- blatant corporate whores like Steny Hoyer, Steve Israel, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Joe Crowley-- consistently serve the interests of Big Business, Wall Street and their wealthy donors... just the way the Republicans do. And they've got a death grip on the Democratic congressional caucus because of the immense value put on the sleazy characters (like them) who can raise cash for elections, instead of the people who can raise ideas for elections. Steny Hoyer, Steve Israel, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, and Joe Crowley are all devoid of ideas and have little or no interest in real policy. But they have great connections to the men with the gold. The party is out of balance and in danger of continuing the turn off traditional Democratic voters the way it did in 2010.

And, yes, this is exactly why the DCCC (under Steve Israel) furiously recruits Blue Dogs, New Dems and other conservatives and works just as hard either sabotaging progressives or ignoring them. It's why all 8 conservatives who made it through their primaries with Blue Dog endorsements were immediately put into the DCCC Red-to-Blue program (the 9th, right-wing asshat Rob Wallace, is in a runoff August 28 and the DCCC has him waiting on their "Emerging Races List"). Same story for the New Dems... those are the candidates Steve Israel has decided to spend DCCC donations on. With just a few sad exceptions, progressives get just about nothing. No one who cares about women's Choice or about equality, or about economic justice or about gay rights should give one dime more to the DCCC than they give to the GOP. Donations should be given to specific candidates who back the values and principles that motivate you, hopefully these men and women.

Meanwhile, a few minutes ago, the White House issued a report that highlights the impact of the teacher layoffs that conservatives are forcing on school districts wherever they've managed to seize power. It finds that the loss of teachers and other education staff is forcing communities into difficult choices that harm our children’s education and future, including increasing class sizes and shortening school years and days. The report shows that more than 300,000 local education jobs have been lost since the end of the recession-– a figure that stands in stark contrast to previous economic recoveries. As a result, the national student-teacher ratio increased by 4.6 percent from 2008 to 2010, rolling back all the gains made since 2000. Increased class sizes have negative consequences for the future of America’s children at a time when education has never been more important to finding a good job and maintaining our competitiveness as a nation.

“This year, several thousand fewer educators will be going back to school.  Since 2009, we’ve lost more than 300,000 education jobs, in part, because of budget cuts at the state and local level,” said President Obama. “Think about what that means for our country. At a time when the rest of the world is racing to out-educate America; these cuts force our kids into crowded classrooms, cancel programs for preschoolers and kindergarteners, and shorten the school week and the school year. That’s the opposite of what we should be doing as a country.”
 
Analyses from independent academic experts confirm what we know from common-sense: that laying off teachers, increasing class sizes, eliminating critical programs, shortening the school week or shortening the school year all mean that our students receive less attention and fewer chances to achieve in their education.
 
President Obama has proposed a plan that would prevent teacher layoffs, invest in comprehensive reform and strengthen public education. The President’s plan would provide $25 billion to prevent layoffs and support hundreds of thousands of teacher and other education jobs. 
 
Unfortunately, Republicans in Congress continue to block critical investments in the education of our children and the economic security of our nation as a whole. Instead, they have passed a budget that would slash education funding while showering massive tax benefits on millionaires and billionaires. The budget passed by Republicans in Congress would cut non-defense discretionary spending by almost 20 percent. If cuts were distributed evenly, this budget would imply $2.7 billion in cuts to basic Title I education grants, meaning that nearly 38,000 teachers and aides could lose their jobs as a result of cuts to Title I spending alone. Cuts would also be made to early childhood education and special education, significantly impairing schools’ ability to best serve their students.
 
“That’s backwards. That’s wrong. That plan doesn’t invest in our future; it undercuts our future,” said President Obama. “If we want America to lead in the 21st century, nothing is more important than giving everyone the best education possible-- from the day they start preschool to the day they start their career.”