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Driving Triangulation "Over the Dead Bodies" of the Progressive Movement
The term "triangulation" in politics means a set of leaders trying joining with their opponents to pass measures that run counter to those leaders' own supporters. Typically, triangulation is practiced by presidents against their own parties in Congress, with the master of triangulation being President Bill Clinton who, among other things, rammed welfare reform and NAFTA "over the dead bodies" of rank-and-file Democratic lawmakers and the progressive movement. Can congressional leaders can pull the same move? Unfortunately, we're going to find out very soon, as congressional Democratic leaders are very clearly attempting to triangulate against their own party on the three issues the party ran on to win Election 2006.
TRADE - TRIANGULATING WITH A SECRET DEAL IN PURSUIT OF WALL STREET CASH
On trade, Public Citizen has shown that the Democratic Party relied on candidates who ran against lobbyist-written trade deals in order to win many of the crucial conservative-leaning districts that were necessary to win the congressional majority. Yet, as we've seen over the last week, a handful of senior Democratic leaders are joining with the Bush White House in an attempt to ram an ultra-secret free trade deal through Congress, acknowledging that in order to be successful, they will rely on all Republicans and just 25 percent of Democratic lawmakers. As rank-and-file Democratic lawmakers and organizations representing millions of workers, farmers and small businesses have raised objections to the deal, Reuters reports today that Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel (D-NY) is digging in, saying that if he knew what he knew now about how serious rank-and-file Democratic opposition to lobbyist-written trade policy was, he would have tried to negotiate the deal in even more secrecy than it was negotiated in in the first place.
On Bill Moyers' terrific PBS report on Friday about the secret deal, author John R. MacArthur says the motivations for the triangulation on trade are obvious. "This is like the NAFTA campaign of the '90s, an attempt by the Democratic leadership - in those days it was the Clintons - to raise money from Wall Street." You can watch Bill Moyers' entire piece on the secret deal here.
This drive to triangulate on trade has now reached a point where the handful of Democrats who made the deal are publicly attacking those rank-and-file Democratic lawmakers, labor, environmental, health, human rights, religious, consumer protection and agricultural groups raising questions about the deal. On Friday, Reuters reported that Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel (D-NY) "offered no apology" for negotiating the deal in secret or for continuing to conceal the legislative text of the deal. Instead, he went on the attack, saying the only thing he would do differently would be to "ignore a lot of people that really were just wasting my time." He claimed innocently that "I cannot see how anybody would be upset" by the deal, even though as Public Citizen shows today, the list of reforms to current trade policies that fair trade groups forwarded to Democratic leaders many months ago was almost entirely brushed aside by Rangel, as were proposals for a whole new framework for global trade deals.
TRIANGULATION STRATEGY: The dynamics set up a situation whereby the Democratic congressional leadership and less than half of all Democratic lawmakers (as during NAFTA) join with all Republicans to ram a free trade package through Congress over the objections of the progressive movement and rank-and-file Democrats who ran against lobbyist-written trade policies in 2006.
LOBBYING - TRIANGULATING TO PERPETUATE THE CULTURE OF CORRUPTION
Most observers agree that outrage at the Republican's corruption scandals and Democrats promise to clean up the "culture of corruption" helped Democrats win in 2006. Yet, late last week, The Politico reported that Democrats on the House Judiciary committee yesterday "scrapped a beefed-up provision of the Lobbying Reform Bill that would have prohibited former lawmakers and senior staff from lobbying their former colleagues during their first two years out of office." The original bill would have extended the revolving door ban from one to two years, but the amendment eliminating that provision passed by a unanimous voice vote. AP reports that "several days of backroom deal-making where some of the toughest proposed reforms were left on the cutting-room floor." The shenanigans come just as freshman Democrats announced their demands for a much stronger anti-corruption bill.
TRIANGULATION STRATEGY: The dynamics set up a situation whereby the Democratic congressional leadership would join with all Republicans to ram a sham lobbying "reform" bill through Congress potentially over the objections of many of rank-and-file Democrats and the progressive movement.
IRAQ - POTENTIAL TRIANGULATION TO KEEP THE WAR GOING
Finally, Iraq - the big issue that helped Democrats win in 2006. The Associated Press reports that congressional Democratic leaders may be backing away from using their power to oppose the war, floating the possibility of an Iraq War supplemental bill that "would allow the president to waive compliance with a deadline for troop withdrawals." The New York Times says that the "likelihood that any final agreement will specify no withdrawal date for American troops from Iraq raised the possibility that antiwar Democrats will not support it, particularly in the House, and that the measure will need substantial Republican support to pass."
TRIANGULATION STRATEGY: The dynamics set up a situation whereby the Democratic congressional leadership would join with all Republicans to ram a blank check Iraq spending bill through Congress potentially over the objections of many of rank-and-file Democrats and the progressive movement.
***
Where is the motivation for triangulation coming from? As MacArthur says, at least some of it comes from money - especially the issues like trade and corruption that deal directly with Wall Street's power over the Democratic Party. But I'd also say it comes from the psychology of those who the Democratic Party elders in Washington have grown used to listening to. Remember, Washington is a place dominated by David Broderism - that is, the religion that says bipartisanship for bipartisanship's sake should be the ultimate goal of politics, regardless of the policies being pushed in bipartisanship's name. The Democratic Party - far more than the Republican Party - often seems to play to the opinions of the David Broder, rather than the opinions of the vast majority of the American people.
That has more than a little something to do with the kinds of people who have dominated the Democratic Party: Washington insiders, many of whom are former Clinton officials. Many of these people really do believe that making David Broder happy is more important than making America happy, and thus that making any deal, even a bad one, is better than fighting for things.
We see this with, for instance, Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-IL) - the Clinton aide who helped triangulate the White House against congressional Democrats to ram NAFTA "over the dead bodies" of the progressive movement, as American Express's CEO bragged at the time. He is running around bragging about working to pass the secret trade deal over the objections of 75 percent of congressional Democrats, and he has been using his position as chairman of the House Democratic Caucus to try to prevent an open debate on the still-secret deal.
Then there is Leon Panetta, a former chief of staff to Clinton. He is quoted in the New York Times vomiting up a rancid bucket of Broderism:
"Leon E. Panetta, a former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, said he had been concerned, once the Democrats took control of Congress, that "an awful lot of blood in the water" would prevent the parties from coming to terms on 'low-hanging fruit' like immigration and trade. In Mr. Panetta's view, the talks [over trade and immigration] are a good sign. 'Whether it can go into bigger areas like the war remains to be seen,' he said. 'But it clearly helps build at least a rapport that you absolutely need if you're going to try to come to a deal.'"
As you can see, Panetta doesn't care about what's being talked about, or the substance of whatever deals are made on issues - all he seems to care about is making a deal. This same kind of attitude is spewed by the Beltway press, as evidenced by its trumpeting of the secret trade deal without ever having seen the actual legislative language of the deal. It is a psychology that prioritizes any deal on any issue - even one that sells out the Democratic Party's agenda and the interests of the vast majority of the American people - is good.
Thus, we get Democratic leaders who just months after election to the majority are attempting to triangulate against their own party and the progressive movement. That this strategy helped destroy the progressive agenda, the Democratic Party, and Democrats' electoral prospects for the better part of a decade seems of no concern to the people trying to perform these acrobatics - all they seem to be focused on is bringing a smile to David Broder's face and a truckload of Wall Street cash to their campaign coffers. Whether their triangulation defies political history and brings them electoral success in 2008 is less important than what the actual real-world consequences of such behavior is for the country - and if the current trend continues, those consequences could be severe.
David Sirota is the author of the book Hostile Takeover. To subscribe to Sirota's regular newsletter, go to www.davidsirota.com and sign up on the left hand side.
© 2007 David Sirota
25 Comments so far
Show AllIt is, as John MacArthur says, very much about money. But the false "bipartisanship" that Sirota alludes to has to do with more than money alone (or even David Broder). It has to do with specific political structures, processes and control.
The problem is that the Democratic Party has become a subsidiary of the corporate-military-police state. The one party "duopoly" that Ralph Nader has been talking about for years(and is vilified when he challenges it)is quite real.
The problem is not Rahm Emanuel, as sleazy as he is; nor Charles Rangel, no stranger to sleaze either. Nor Leon Panetta. Nor the Clintons. Nor any other individuals, as petty, vile and inhumane as they may be.
The problem is that big business has engineered a highly successful effort to neuter the progressive agenda in the Democratic Party through the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), which Bill Clinton initially chaired.
Unless this corporatist structure is clearly described by progressives for the rank-and-file; unless there is an explicit public campaign to expose and dismantle the DLC and drive it out of the Democratic Party, the endless debates about triangulation (lying) and sell-outs will continue.
Once again, we see the Party possibly snatching defeat from the jaws of victory in 2008 by alienating energized anti-war voters of 2006, who seemed to breathe a bit of life into the gangrenous donkey.
This is no accident. A DLC-controlled faux-Democratic Party is a permanently-divided, weak organization that distorts political focus and honesty. Meanwhile war-mongers and financiers continue to reap vast material rewards and the whole damned world goes down the tubes via nuclear waste/nuclear war, global warming and environmental degradation and a radical maldistribution of economic wealth between nations and within nations.
Either we break the strangle-hold of the DLC on the Democratic Party - or get out altogether and create something new that meets our needs - or we go on as we have until the walls come tumbling down of their own corrupt accord, Soviet Union-style. The last alternative aint particularly pretty.
"Either we break the strangle-hold of the DLC on the Democratic Party - or get out altogether and create something new that meets our needs"
This is why I left the Democratic party and became an Independent.
I say we create something completely new. The problem will be in hanging on to it (keeping it from being over-run by corporate interests) should we ever actually get it elected.
We've lost our media, we've lost both parties... and no one seems willing to do anything about the rampant corruption in the Bush administration, other than publicly wring their hands about the fact that Gonzales is 'lying' to them, and Rove won't turn over his emails (why should he? Who's gonna make him?)
Its likely that democracy is in its last gasp in the USA, swallowed whole by corporate capitalism.
The Green Party is out there.
The question was, and remains, whether tis simpler for the progressives to take the reigns of the Democratic Party (for the first time) and enact IRV or Range voting and open source/clean balloting (also for the first time). Or whether this is only so much head-banging and it would be far better to divorce from the dysfunctional relationship and go full-tilt with a preexisting progressive party. The Green Party is probably the most logical choice in that regard.
There's an awful lot of merit to this idea. If the poor, middle-class, progressive democrats, greens, etc. combined their effors -- it would result in an empty shell of the Democratic Party, bearing no real difference between it and the Republican Party. The DLC would be left high and dry. Indeed, it would be the Republican vote which would then be split 2-ways, Republican or Republican-Lite. So it may well be the strategic fault of the progressive democrats for giving too much legitimacy to a party clearly co-opted by corporate America. If the the progressive democrats can't take the reigns, then don't allow it to bait-and-switch any more voters. Divorce it like an abusive spouse.
The gang that can't shoot straight is at it again. I honestly don't know what's wrong with them. They ran on specific promises and didn't wait even 4 months to start breaking them. Or are they convinced that the voters will always choose bad over worse no matter how bad it gets? Or do they think that none of it matters as long as they pull in enough corporate money to outspend the Republicans? Or do they think voters have short memories and it won't matter in 2008?
Ralph is right. The solution must come from the bottom up. The top is completely rotten.
Wait - according to Galloway, we're just 600 or so days away from the Dem White Horse riding to our rescue! Things will be different! Better! Isn't that what he said?
This article puts Gore's book "The Assault on Reason" into proper perspective as the Clinton/Gore administration paved the way for much of the "assault on reason" Gore blames on Bush.
Hey frank, isn't that what the abusive spouse always says, things will be different? And are they ever? Paul is right. But how to wedge the unconscious electorate out of this abusive relationship? If we could fire up the unions to say we won't take it anymore, that might be a start. Of course there aren't very many unions left to depart. For some reason, I don't think we would find much support from MoveOn for a new party. Maybe I'm not being fair to them, but they seem pretty mainstream to me.
Guess why I'm seeking a third party.
I left awhile ago. After the 2000 campaign, there was a lot of talk about efforts to reform the Democratic Party from within, and the progressives in the Democratic Party were saying that was the way to go.
Well, when you read this, how's that working for you?
To me, trying to force change from within the Democratic Party is playing in a rigged game. The leaders of the Democrats want the progressives to pretend to try to work within the Democratic party, always lose, then line up and support the money-grubbing corporate Democrats in the general election.
One of the first things I found out about politics is that if you contact your local Secretary of State's office asking for the rules and proceedures of the Democratic primaries, they'll tell you to go contact the Democrats. Primaries and such are entirely the concern of the Party, and are run the way the party wants. As long as they keep within some limits in Federal law.
So, ask some questions ...
Why don' the Democrats conduct their internal contests using Clean Election type rules? You know, the rules that places like Vermont and Arizona have set up to try to lower the influence of money in elections. The Democrats could conduct all their primary races with such rules if they wanted.
How come no Instant Runoff Voting in a Democratic primary?
How come the Presidential primaries are all so front loaded on the calendar that a grassroots campaign can't compete? Many big state primaries all at once favor the campaigns with big advertising budgets and control of the state party machinery.
That's just the obvious procedural votes. Watch the way any progressive that runs against a corporate Democrat is immediately attacked as being divisive. And that there's an immediate attempt to quash the primary and get the challenger to withdraw. If that doesn't work, watch the party machinery kick into gear to try to defeat the progressive. If that doesn't work and the progressive wins the primary, watch the party machinery immediately abandon the party and support either the defeated candidate or some other candidate in the general election. (see Lamont v Lieberman for a recent example of this).
Trying to fight within the Democratic Party is playing in a game that's rigged against us. Today, it seems clear to me that its better to go our own way.
BTW, the big prize on Iraq is not the supplemental. The big prize passed the House last week almost uncontested. The House passed a massive $600+ billion Pentagon budget that contains $140+ billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. No strings attached. No withdrawal. That gives Bush all the money he wants for his wars next year. Any restrictions on attacking Iran were removed, with lots of Democratic support. The whole thing passed with only 27 no votes. And the committee chairman is bragging about how he kept Iraq out of the debate to make the passage easy.
So, while all the smoke and mirrors about the supplemental was going on, this is the real vote that was happening behind the scenes. Unless the Senate pulls the war funding, and I think hell will freeze over first, the war is already funded until Bush leaves office. With kisses and love from the Democrats.
It seems the American populace does not have the resolve or fortitude to follow the example of Dr. King and participate in events of mass disobedience against the current power structures (war/oil/business/NAFTA/whatever).
The majority finally seems to understand what years of not paying attention have cost the american population(jobs, constitutional guarantees of freedom, health care, you name it.) The income gap is the largest ever. The rich control the corporations which now control the government which is cutting all the social programs to pay the arms suppliers to continue the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
Our elected officials ignore the voters' who elected them. Dr. King promoted mass civil disobedience as the primary means to obtain a bargaining chip in negotiating with the power elite.
I've heard local officials when pressed, claim that foreign policy is out of their control. The next thing you know, local social services , such as health and education, are being cut by these same local politicians due to lack of federal support.
Dr. King's call for massive non-violent disobedience is still awaiting an answer. Any ideas if or when that may be?
I feel the same way curmudgeon. I fear we will only see massive civil disobedience when it gets so bad all of us are immediately and clearly affected.
This will happen when we get a draft.
I'm tired of this progressive punditry. Get off your journalistic asses , get some guts and tell the soldiers to desert and then PAY(support) them when they do.
Man,you guys are "thick". You are arguing over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
Advocate,support and approve of desertion before it is illegal to do the first three.
Curmudgeon: The civil disobedience in the future may not be agitated by the progressive 1-5%. Rather, it may be triggered by the bankers, lenders and other controlling groups. I see people squatting illegally in foreclosed homes, priced racketeer-style beyond an ordinary market value. I see people choosing between sending their kids to college (or keeping their homes) or risk not sending the IRS its full "due." The civil disobedience which will come will be naturally emergent, out of root human selfishness and not out of a larger vision, scope, or capability to see systemic problems that caused it. Hopefully there will be those in the wings with sufficient gray matter to shape the new Democracy pro-actively.
As for the Democrats, the old bait-and-switch thing is really losing its "charm". Lots of of apologies, like from an abusive spouse, followed by lack of follow-up. They rope or shunt people in, corral them into a safe-zone of hopeful opposition. Today's X-Generation is re-learning what Abbie Hoffman, etc. learned in 1968 in Chicago. We need to speed up the learning cycle, get the Y an Z people on-board and aware while they're still in their teens or 20's.
Curmudgeon: The civil disobedience in the future may not be agitated by the progressive 1-5%. Rather, it may be triggered by the bankers, lenders and other controlling groups. I see people squatting illegally in foreclosed homes, priced racketeer-style beyond an ordinary market value. I see people choosing between sending their kids to college (or keeping their homes) or risk not sending the IRS its full "due." The civil disobedience which will come will be naturally emergent, out of root human selfishness and not out of a larger vision, scope, or capability to see systemic problems that caused it. Hopefully there will be those in the wings with sufficient gray matter to shape the new Democracy pro-actively.
As for the Democrats, the old bait-and-switch thing is really losing its "charm". Lots of of apologies, like from an abusive spouse, followed by lack of follow-up. They rope or shunt people in, corral them into a safe-zone of hopeful opposition. Today's X-Generation is re-learning what Abbie Hoffman, etc. learned in 1968 in Chicago. We need to speed up the learning cycle, get the Y an Z people on-board and aware while they're still in their teens or 20's.
I'm thinking the Green Party, a Progressive Populist Party or something else. The time may be neigh to quit listening to the promises of the DLC. I say brain-drain them. Let the public see absolutely no difference between the Lieberman's etc. and the Republican neocons. If they want to vote for real opposition, it might be a Green or Progressive Populist...
Paul Bramscher is absolutely correct. We progressives can either keep wasting our time voting for the other corporate party or we can take the bull by the horns and defect to the Green Party, to our party. How long would it take Rangel and the rest of the DLC to change their tune when the liberal majority finally unites and forms our own voting block?
"This is why I left the Democratic party and became an Independent."
So where is this Independent Party? Where is the electoral alternative? I gave up on the Greens here in NC (after busting my butt on 2 Nader campaigns) cuz I found them to be a bunch of university snobs more interested in debate, in getting the ideology right than in accomplishing anything. Ballot access laws here make real third party alternatives almost impossible. Unless like the Libertarians you make your own deal with the devil and get the money to hire an army of petition circulators. (And their no government but national defense just will not work..) Contempt for the Dems is all well and good, and I hate being taken advantage of and treated like a fool, but where is the alternative, really.
Joining a 3rd party is purely mental masturbation.
I say again:
'It seems the American populace does not have the resolve or fortitude to follow the example of Dr. King and participate in events of mass disobedience against the current power structures (war/oil/business/NAFTA/whatever).'
The current state of affairs, with only two corporate parties to chose from, is quite arguably an anomalous situation both in our own tradition, and in modern western democracy. The choice is simple.
The progressive democrats have been locked out of a large fortified mansion and have been banging to get inside since the Vietnam War. By doing so, they legitimize it as a bona fide voice of opposition, of the people, etc.
They'd be better off walking away, and encouraging all smart/progressive/middle-class/poor/etc. to follow them. Leave the DLC high and dry, as the Republicratic Party that it is. Currently, it still has a popular glimmer-of-hope for change -- and that's due to the few progressives (or progressives in name only, PINO's) that have been allowed in. We need to either take over that party, within a couple years or so, or abandon it permanently. No more head-banging after that.
"We need to either take over that party, within a couple years or so, or abandon it permanently. No more head-banging after that."
Corporate Dems will continue to keep progressive wins enticingly close, but just out of reach. If progressives switch to Green NOW, we wont have to wait a couple of years to see the DLC start backpedaling furiously, stepping up their attacks against the Greens and pulling their hair out by the roots. That's a peaceful revolution we can have right now if we do the near impossible and unite.
OK, let's take a lesson from the Religious Right of the 1980s when they decided to take over the Republican party. I remember watching the 700 Club in the mornings before school and so much of the discussion was about how to infiltrate the local elections.
Why did they do this? Simple. We live in a Republic. The people immediately under the geographic area controls the next geographic level up. For instance, run for City Treasurer, School Board, etc. Win those first. Once you control the city level, target the county and state. Get the legislatures in your pocket. From there you can take on national government. This must be done nationwide.
Very few people vote in local elections. Make sure those few are your supporters. And demand an independent auditor certify the election. (Votes are often not actually counted in local elections because they are so often a "foregone conclusion.")
Yet it may be a misreading that the Christian right "took over" the Republican Party. Perhaps the better model should start out with this proposition: that the plutocrats are always behind-the-scenes, pulling the strings. They've employed autocrats and theocrats over the centuries to win by forceful coercion or by mental/memetic/psychological conversion respectively. Arguably, it's been this way since the dawn of agriculture, sedendary living, labor specialization and so-called civilization.
Certainly the local takeovers are well worth aiming for. However, we're rather top-down in practice. The mayor's hands are somewhat tied by the county commissioners. They take their marching orders from the State, which takes its orders from the Feds -- which, in turn, takes its orders from the plutarchs in the backdrop? At least, when I complained about double-digit property assessments on my problematic 40 year-old ranch home, this is the line I got. Mayor said his hands were tied, I spoke to a county assessor who claimed he was required by the State to assess at within x% of "market value", and so on up the pike.
The whole system is problematic: ultimately it answers to the top rather than the bottom.
It's going to be hard to undo what is already in place.
Check Today's (5/22) PBS Newshour with Jim Lehrer.
3 in depth segments on:
1. immigration
2. REAL cost of Iraq War
3. Gasoline prices
Watch and share your thoughts
Curmudgeon: It seems strange that you invoke Dr. King as you cry out for the disenfranchisement of any voter who chooses to belong to a party other than the Democrats or the Republicans. In the current political climate, the movement to build a multiparty democracy on the ashes of the corporate duopoly certainly qualifies as "mass civil disobedience." We are actively engaged in mass disobedience to the dictates of the corporate-imperialist parties--and that is certainly not "mental masturbation." The Green Party vigorously opposes the "current power structures (war/oil/business/NAFTA/whatever)," yet you blithely dismiss our efforts to confront and challenge them. Our progressive platform emphasizes nonviolence, grassroots democracy, respect for diversity and social justice, and yet you shamelessly use the example of MLK to cast aspersions on our work to push forward a progressive alternative to the war parties. We have been in the streets at the forefront of the anti-war and pro-civil rights demonstrations for nearly a decade (recently Greens took part in a civil disobedience action to protest police brutality in LA--as we have done time and time again over the years) and we are taking the fight to the ballot box as well. Your mischaracterization of us and our efforts is inaccurate and ridiculous.
I rest my case.
Unless the system is brought to a standstill by demonstrations that shut down cities by everyone walking off their jobs and just sitting non-violently in the streets, 'gumming' up the works, nothing will happen. There is no 'bargaining chip'. I am talking on a grand scale here.
I apologize if I have offended your sensibilities. I did not intend to demean progressive green type party efforts. You must admit that there were not a million people at the protests. I have been talking about the general public not willing to stand up for their rights- not individuals like you who are being active and trying to change the way things are.