Watching the LV Debate the other night as an undecided voter (and still undecided now), I was struck by the lack of response to Edwards' "the system is corrupt" charge. Although many of us progressives agree with the charge, it seemed that Edwards' repetition of it drew little response from the audience (admittedly a somewhat pro-Hillary audience). Reading the comments on dK about the debate, I read many who seemed to feel that Edwards' repetition of the phrase made little impact on them. Some comments were almost sneering, as if they were bored or blase about the corruption charge, or thought it naive of Edwards to raise it. It was as if Edwards' sounded like Chicken Little repeating "the sky is falling", only to be met with "ho hum" from his listeners.
Why has this argument failed to score BIG with Democratic voters? Last night, as I was pondering this question, I was flipping through channels and came to rest on PBS's weekly news show "NOW", which I had never viewed before.
NOW was examining the "mortgage meltdown" crisis. Because I'm a real estate junky, I watched as the reporter dug into the practices of predatory lending, including examining abuses at Ameriquest, one of the companies that has been investigated in 49 states. The mortgage crisis threatens to be bigger than the S&L crisis of the 80s, as more than 2,000,000 homes may face foreclosure in the next two years and we stand to lose 2 TRILLION dollars in house related wealth. See: www.pbs.org/now/shows/346/video.html
The pbs NOW reporter spoke with a former employee of Ameriquest, who detailed what he termed "arts and crafts" practices where employees fraudulently made up documentation to back the loan. He said they were instructed to "say anything, do anything to close the loan" and new employees were paired with "experienced" employees who showed them how to fraudulently make up the loan package.
So far, interesting, but doesn't show anything other than the usual corruption of greed and fraud, right?.
Then, as I watched, I heard something that just knocked me on my ass. Earlier, they had named the "founder" of Ameriquest as billionaire Roland Arnell. Ameriquest is now going out of business, after agreeing to pay a $325 million settlement (without any admission of guilt). But Roland Arnell, its founder, has landed quite nicely on his feet. Arnell apparently is a billionaire who has contributed MILLIONS to pro-Bush organizations. In October 2005 Arnell was appointed by George W. Bush to serve as U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands -- and confirmed by Congress. He's now happily in Holland representing our country.
And lest we put all the blame on Republicans, the program pointed out that the financial institutions have contributed something like 251 million to both Dems and Repubs, including big money to Senator Dodd (ah Chris, just as I was starting to like you), who sits on the Committee that oversees banking.
There was a lot more in the program that was pretty chilling, including a smarmy and smug interview with Kurt Pfotenhauer of the Mortgage Bankers' Association, who smiled and said that lobbyists for the mortgage industry are "fully employed" right now on Capitol Hill, where the industry will "see our value." www.pbs.org/now/shows/346/video.html (I originally had a typo and wrote "Capital Hill -- and maybe that's what it has become!)
Pfotenhauer also urged that the market should be allowed to self regulate, because to impose stringent regulations would be to remove the "freedom to fail" and therefore also the "freedom to succeed."
And then they showed a video clip of August 31, 2007, in which George Bush, in discussing the role of government in solving the crisis remarked that government has a role, but it is "a limited role." Was that Roland Arnell standing behind him, smiling? (I'd have to view the video again to make sure, and it makes me too sick to see it again.)
( To watch the program in its entirety, go here: http://www.pbs.org/...
I know probably many Kossacks already know all this, and it is just more of the same, But I had never seen the dots connected in quite this way before, and it really made me sit up and pay attention. It was a "lightbulb" moment for me. What it said to me was that Edwards is losing the debate even though he has an issue that should resonate BIG TIME with Democrats because he is using old examples that have lost their power to shock through endless repetition. He uses the examples of the failure to pass health care in the 1990s as the result of big insurance and big pharma money, and the influence of oil company lobbyists on energy policy. What he says is true, but it seems that those examples no longer resonate the way they used to.
The failure to pass health care under Clinton dates back 15 years. There are voters out there who don't remember or don't care what happened 15 years ago. Oil companies have been understood to be unscrupulous for so long that we don't even react when we hear about obscene profits as we fill our tanks with $3.59 cent regular gas.
But the mortgage crisis is something that has the potential to bring down our economy NOW, and to affect each of us -- existing homeowners and those who aspire to the American dream of home ownership. The "credit crunch" has and will ripple far beyond the mortgage market, and will affect jobs and economic growth in every sector of the economy. The system is rigged, and it is not just rigged in isolated areas like health care or oil company profits. It is rigged BIG TIME, EVERYWHERE -- and our legislators have very little incentive to fix the system, which is BROKEN for US but RIGGED for THEM.
I don't know why suddenly last night it all became clear to me, so that I experienced it not just on an intellectual level but on a gut level. I know there are many Americans who still wear the rose colored glasses or who have drunk the kool-aide and who still have faith in the system's ability to repair itself while still in the hands of those that profit from the status quo. But I have lost that faith. And it makes me very leery of voting for a candidate who supports the system status quo.
This doesn't mean I'll vote for Edwards in the primary, though I will rexamine his candidacy, which I had previously overlooked because of residual resentments left over from my 2004 support for Clark. What it does mean is that my reluctance to vote for Hillary is stronger than before. My interest in Dodd is waning. I will rexamine both Obama and Edwards to look at the totality of what they bring. But whoever gets my vote will have to acknowledge that the system is rigged, flawed, broken, corrupt -- whatever you want to call it.
The candidate that can eloquently make that case, using specific examples that resonate NOW, will be able to successfully persuade a lot of undecided voters, like me, who are looking for someone who will take on the corruption before it destroys us.