Love that Pelosi.
Rangel’s woes? Nothing much to see there; moving right along.
‘
Democrat involvement in the long and complex build-up to the current subprime mortgage crisis? Nah; it’s all the Republicans’ fault, according to Pelosi.
Forget history, forget truth, forget anything but making political hay out of a bad situation.
Although I must say that anyone who thought that electing generic Democrats rather than generic Republicans in 2006 was going to result in reform of Congress was seriously mistaken. I don’t think I ever was that naive, even back when I was a Democrat.
For any one particular corrupt Congressional representative (such as, for example Rangel)—yes, defeating that particular person is a good idea, especially if the replacement has demonstrated ethical behavior in his/her own record. But to think that either party as a whole is more or less likely to be clean or corrupt than the other party as a whole—that’s just a partisan pipe dream, I’m afraid. Politics presents almost unlimited opportunity and motivation to go bad (often, it even rewards it), and it takes a person of especially strong moral fiber to withstand the temptation.
Previously a lifelong Democrat, born in New York and living in New England, surrounded by liberals on all sides, I've found myself slowly but surely
September 17th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
The Democrats and their allies, paleo-conservatives and just extremists, that people like me love the corruption of Bush, Big Business, Big OIl, and so such.
The truth is that we hate it and we hate them for helping such powerful people and organizations destroy the weak and the poor.
September 17th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
We also hate their efforts to prevent reform from even inside the GOP.
September 17th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
I don’t think I ever was that naive, even back when I was a Democrat.
Most people don’t have your level of wisdom, Neo. Or psychological background.
And those that do have your background in psychology… well you know better than I would.
September 17th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Politics presents almost unlimited opportunity and motivation to go bad (often, it even rewards it), and it takes a person of especially strong moral fiber to withstand the temptation.
I’ve been interested in the exile of Republican leadership in its affect on Republican corruption problems.
Three leaders, as I recall, were tied down and hamstrung. Newt Gingrich=affair, Trent Lott=naive comments, Bill Frisk and the other House Majority leader in 2005=made up charges.
When your most charismatic and best leaders get taken out, how much reform can the Republicans truly do and sustain, Neo, in your view?
September 17th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Good question, Ymar. But I can’t get away from the fact that two distinct ethical codes exist, in Washington and in the nation: One, perhaps semi-rigorous, which fells Repubs, both from within the party (as you observed above), with joyful piling-on by Dems; and the other, the Democratic– denials of psychotic dimensions coupled with compulsive lying, and punishment, whenever visited, with gentle and forgiving features.
September 17th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
Thanks for the Hot Air link, which links on further to a NYTimes 2003 story about Bush attemption to overhaul Freddie Mac regulation. I don’t know enough to sense whether that is as justifiably damning of the Democrats as it appears, but I imagine that will come out over the next few days.
Yes, different standards for different people. It makes those held to the higher standard better, perhaps, but resentful.
September 17th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
“All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible. Such people have a tendency to become drunk on violence, a condition to which they are quickly addicted.”
Missionaria Protectiva, Text QIV (decto)
“Good government never depends upon laws, but upon the personal qualities of those who govern. The machinery of government is always subordinate to the will of those who administer that machinery. The most important element of government, therefore, is the method of choosing leaders.”
Law and Governance The Spacing Guild Manual
(Frank Herbert)
September 17th, 2008 at 9:07 pm
What you of the CHOAM directorate seem unable to understand is that you seldom find real loyalties in commerce. When did you last hear of a clerk giving his life for the company? Perhaps your deficiency rests in the false assumption that you can order men to think and cooperate. This has been a failure of everything from religions to general staffs throughout history. General staffs have a long record of destroying their own nations. As to religions, I recommend a rereading of Thomas Aquinas. As to you of CHOAM, what nonsense you believe! Men must want to do things out of their own innermost drives. People, not commercial organizations or chains of command, are what make great civilizations work. Every civilization depends upon the quality of the individuals it produces. If you over-organize humans, over-legalize them, suppress their urge to greatness — they cannot work and their civilization collapses.
-A letter to CHOAM, Attributed to The Preacher
September 18th, 2008 at 3:16 am
I am not sure that the halls of power allow a choice regarding corruption. As with wealth and it’s associated corruption, the best a man may hope to do is… manage his corruption. Picking, as wisely as able, which things to draw the line regarding and which topics are a lost cause, so that one will go over that moral, ethical, or legal limit. I don’t like it, either. I just know, as a more humble and powerless man, I too, must pick my fights. And sometimes I must simply surrender to my failings.
I guess a yellow diamond is valuable for it’s particular flaws, just as coal is burned for it’s. Or, are they, indeed, flaws at all? Though I won’t quite go down the rabbit hole of relativism, as I do believe certain flaws are acceptable, others are not, and their is an objective difference. No buggery with honestly assessed action as a leader which does fundamentally allow men to know life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, the rest is secondary.
Only one candidate even offers any glimmer of that, if only in not going so fast in the wrong direction so as to prevent the hope of a real leader in the future. Mc *cough* Cain.
September 18th, 2008 at 4:20 am
That is why any administrative or party machine needs periodical infusion of fresh blood. If this became impossible, internal rot becames unstoppable, untill complete meltdown follows. It was exactly this process that doomed Communism, not any external pressure. I observed this for several decades, since early 70-es.