Sadly, if you read Newsweek this week (linked below), you'll see that my letter was ignored. In a giant piece, the magazine transcribes Rep. Rahm Emanuel's diarrhea of the mouth, where he gushes about how great he's been at leveraging the prospect of him as a chief lawmaker on a powerful committee to rake in cash from special interests. Here's just one of the key excerpts:
"As a member of the Ways and Means Committee, Emanuel teamed with Senate campaign chair Chuck Schumer to tap uncharted donor fields in the financial industry. 'We're working outside of traditional banks,' he says proudly, 'into the private-equity world, the hedge-fund world, the distressed-debt world.' These 'worlds' know they are talking to a guy who not only runs the campaign committee, but who could be in the majority of the key financial committeeï ¿ ½"and maybe even majority leader."
Not surprisingly, Newsweek drinks up the Rahm-is-such-a-tough-guy act, never bothering to question whether his self-aggrandizing poses any dangers to Democratic candidates across the country who are trying to make corruption and the GOP's pay-to-play behavior a key election issue. But the question remains: why are there Democrats in key campaign positions who are willing to jeopardize their party's message by bragging to reporters about Democratic Party corruption? Why are there no consequences for Democrats like Emanuel when he runs to his good buddy Howard Fineman and screams at the top of his lungs about how great a corporate shakedown artist he is?
The truth is, the problem is more likely just the selfish, self-serving behavior of a few primadonnas. Either way, it is a huge problem. Whether Democrats win in 2006 or not, the acceptance of behavior like Emanuel's by other Democrats in Congress foreshadows real trouble for a party seeking to define itself for the long-term.
Newsweek article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14141515/site/newsweek/
Originally published at WorkingforChange