The Washington D.C. Establishment

Glenn Greenwald has another very interesting article posted today. His focus is the surprise that the Washington D.C. establishment has had as it tried to pass the FISA extension that contains retroactive immunity for the criminal actions of the telecoms who aided the incoming Bush administration in its effort to spy on American citizens without any warrant or legal justification.

Don't forget - the Bush administration started those spy actions in February 2001 at a time they were denying that there was any terrorist problem other than state-supported terrorists. Those illegal spying operations were obviously for internal American political use, not for American security, and both the telecoms and the Bush administration knew such actions were illegal. They just never expected to be exposed. First I'll summarize Glenn's discussion, then I want to focus on who belongs to the Washington establishment and how they operate.

The "establishment" has standards that describe "How things in Washington are done." The members of the establishment become upset when those standards aren't followed. The process of passing the FISA extension has violated those standards. As Glenn points out, the FISA extension with retroactive telecom immunity is an issue that is a highly technical one that the Washington establishment normally would get quietly passed through Congress. The public would probably never know it had happened. Even in the unlikely case the public did learn of it, it wouldn't matter. It would have been a done deal. Essentially the Congressional leadership of both parties, as members of the establishment, would quietly include the telecom immunity in the FISA extension as requested by Dick Cheney and pass it. The Press, also a part of the D.C. establishment, would never bother to write about the issue.

As Glenn says that's just the way "The Establishment" has always handled things in Washington. It hasn't mattered if the leadership in Washington was Republican or Democrat. These issues are handled quietly so that they go away. The public is not to know of them.

The establishment media has virtually ignored these matters from the beginning. Most establishment-serving pundits who have paid any attention — the David Ignatiuses and Joe Kleins and Fred Hiatts — have done so by advocating, as usual, the Establishment position: retroactive immunity and warrantless eavesdropping powers are the right thing to do. Although there is no citizen-constituency whatsoever crying out for telecom immunity or new warrantless eavesdropping powers, the forces behind those provisions are the ones which typically dictate what Congress does: namely, the largest corporations and their lobbyists, who have been working, as always, in the dark to ensure that the law they want is enacted.

That’s typically the way Washington works — the most significant laws are seamlessly enacted with little real debate or attention, driven by corporations and lobbyists working in secret with Senators, cheered on by the Serious media pundits, with bipartisan pools of lawmakers silently and obediently on board. And once those forces line up behind any measure, it is normally almost impossible to stop it — not just stop it, but even disrupt it at all. That’s the insulated Beltway parlor, virtually impervious to outside influences, least of all the opinions of the citizen-rabble.

Only this time it hasn't worked. Harry Reid has been prepared to do his job as expected by the Establishment, only to find that some Senators (particularly Chris Dodd) have been blocking him, and they are supported by a movement of concerned citizens outside of Washington.

Dodd himself has never been one to break with the establishment, and he's been a Senator for 24 years. Suddenly he is now going up against the wishes of the establishmentWhat happened? Dodd explained in a Senate floor speech:

I’ve promised to fight those scare tactics with all the power any one senator can muster. And I’m here today to keep that promise. For several months now, I’ve listened to the building frustration over this immunity and this administration’s campaign of lawlessness. I’ve seen it in person, in mail, online — the passion and eloquence of citizens who are just fed up. They’ve inspired me more than they know.

This is what's new, and it has clearly been a shock to Harry Reid. There is a counter establishment movement growing. It is aware of some of these secret establishment deals that are bad for the country, and that movement has begun to show some effectiveness in exposing them, and now even blocking the passage of telecom immunity (so far.)

Go read Glenn's article for the details. I want to focus on who belongs to the Washington Establishment. Who are they and how did they get there?

So who does that Establishment consist of? Let's recap. Clearly it includes all of the Congressional leadership of both parties. Then it includes the White House personnel and the top administrators in the various Cabinet offices. It also includes the main pundits, both Print and TV, who cover Washington. David Broder's unofficial title as "Dean of the Washington Press Corps" is recognition that he is a key member of the establishment. Arch Neo conservative William Krystol is also part of the establishment, which is why he recently got a sweetheart deal on the editorial page of the New York Times. So are the hosts of all the Sunday morning Talking Heads TV shows. After that the establisment includes many of the powerful lobbyists from K-Street as well as other former high bureaucrats and legislators. The most effective and highly paid lobbyists are establishment members who sell their ability to work their Washington establishment contacts. Corporations and other moneyed organizations that want something done in Washington are willing to pay a lot for such insider expertise. Additionally, certain individuals (like Sally Quinn) who give insider Washington parties are also part of the Establishment. If you want a list of who is part of the Washington Establishment, a good one could be compiled by seeing who was on the guest lists of the various Washington insider parties. A few establishment members wouldn't be on that list, but most would. Those parties are where a lot of their contacts are made.

What do all the establishment members have in common? They have all been in Washington D.C. and closely associated with politics at a high level for a long time. They all know each other, and they all have reputations as being "Serious People."

They also all want to work hard to remain members of the Establishment. Having been there a long time, they have been socialized and vetted by other in the Establishment, and they each know that as long as they remain as part of the Establishment they protected against personal error - as long as they act as expected.

This is the Washington D.C. establishment, and its members are proud that, as a group, they run American government. These are the people that Harry Reid and Sen. Jay Rockefeller have been trying to please as they worked to pass the FISA extension with telecom immunity included.

These are also the people who are afraid of political populists like both John Edwards and Mike Huckabee. The establishment members have no interest in real democracy since they do not control it. The members of the establishment consider the political netroots to be extremists because they are non-establishment people who make demands that are not establishment approved, and they are beginning to have an effect on Washington politics that "serious people" don't like. Outsiders are automatically rejected by the insiders of the establishment.

It is this establishment, both members and wannabee members, who have neutered media coverage of the federal government even before the Bush administration cut off intrusive reporters from normal handouts and leaks. Establishment reporters and editors don't rat out the handshake deals of other establishment members, not if they want to remain in the establishment. They do want to remain in the establishment because that's where their sources are. Their careers depend on being inside and in good graces of the establishment.

The reason why the Press is harder on Hillary, Obama and Edwards is that none of them are part of the establishment. Hillary rejected the party circuit back in 1993, and has never joined, while neither Obama nor Edwards have become sufficiently powerful in Congress to become "establishment-accepted."

It is this current establishment that is going to have to be converted, because they currently have accepted the ideas behind the Reagan Revolution as the way things are to be done. Conservative "free market, small government, low taxes and strong military" rhetoric is the core of current establishment rhetoric. Such conversion of establishment members will largely occur by turnover once the new administration gets in, but such turnover and conversion will be strongly resisted, just as it was when Bill Clinton took office in 1993. The Republican takeover of Congress in 1994 saved the old Reagan/Bush 41 establishment. That establishment was still in place in 2001 and was passed off to the Bush 43 period. So the current Washington establishment has been in place nearly thirty years. They cannot imagine any other way things in Washington could operate.

This is going to be interesting. Watch for complaints from the "serious people" when the new Democratic administration comes in. It's going to happen, as sure as God make little green apples. The changeover is going to be a rough time for them members. The old establishment will find itself being pushed out of the limelight, and they will hate it.

But that's the Washington establishment. Even if its membership changes, the establishment itself will remain. That's where the handshake deals of government are done.

Bloggers win on retroactive telecom immunity!

Bloggers and Chris Dodd win a really big fight. Open Left has the story. Harry Reid has caved and is ready to protect the Rule of Law instead of the conservative Bush administration and the corporations who currently run and exploit America.

When Bush first took office in January 2001, eight months before 9/11, one of the first actions of his administration did in February was to go to the telephone companies and ask them to begin illegally wiretapping American citizens without warrants. This was criminal behavior on the part of both the Bush administration and of the telephone companies who acted as the new administration instructed them. Nothing in the FISA Act, which was the primary wiretapping law at the time, permitted that action. The phone companies who conducted the illegal telephone wiretaps can be sued for damages because they conducted those illegal wiretaps. Their lawyers knew that no law permitted their action.

The Bush administration pushed through the Protect America Act of 2007 that, among other things, provides immunity against lawsuits to phone companies who act illegally at the request of the government. What the Protect America Act did not do was make that immunity retroactive to relieve the phone companies from liability for their earlier clearly illegal actions.

For the last year the Bush administration has been demanding that Congress include retroactive immunity for the phone companies for their already conducted crimes. This is an issue of whether the government and the phone companies should be subject to the Rule of Law, but it is sufficiently technical to glaze over the eyes of most voters. Only policy wonks and bloggers recognize how totally Unamerican the actions by both the Bush administration and the telecoms were. Sen. Reid (Democratic Majority Leader) was ready to pass a renewal of the FISA Act that included a "retroactive immunity for telecoms" provision. Sen. Chris Dodd had placed a hold on the bill which prevented it from being considered by the Senate until that provision was removed. Harry Reid is known to have said that as soon as Sen. Dodd drops out of the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination he would quit grandstanding and the updated FISA bill with immunity for the telecoms would be passed.

Well, Sen. Dodd has dropped out of the race for the Presidential nomination, and apparently he was not grandstanding. Chris Bowers of Open Left quotes the Wall Street Journal:

We're told that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is saying privately he now won't attempt to update the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) on the wiretapping of al Qaeda suspects. Instead, he'll merely support another 18-month extension of the six-month-old Protect America Act. Among other problems, the temporary bill includes no retroactive immunity for the telecom companies that cooperated with the feds after 9/11.

This is a big win for America, for the Rule of Law, for Sen. Chris Dodd, and for Sen. Dodd's supporters in the Blogosphere.

This win is probably the most significant "flexing of the political muscles" by the blogosphere. It is another step forward as the blogosphere becomes a significant player in American politics. Since the blogosphere is the only institution in American politics which is NOT controlled by some form of small group of leaders. It is a place where anyone can throw out ideas, complaints and proposals and not be subject to arbitrary control by some gatekeeper. Instead with the blogosphere we get significant groups coming together around various issues, and now we see that those groups are beginning to show real muscle politically.

While this may be a new form of mass democracy, as the blogosphere begins to demonstrate political power, there will be currently existing institutions that try to get control of the blogosphere. So we need to watch both the growth of effective power in the blogosphere, and then we need to watch to see who pushes back.

Welcome to Terra Incognita. At least at the moment the direction of movement is correct.

Reid - 'Harmony' preferred to stopping Bush extremism

We recently watched Sen. Chris Dodd go toe-to-toe with the Majority Leader, Harry Reid, about stopping the passage of the FISA bill that contains full immunity for the telecoms that illegally supported Bush's attack on the privacy of American citizens. This illegal action was in February 2001, well before Bush even admitted that non-sate terrorists were a real threat to Americans.

Reid gave in to Chris Dodd's threat to filibuster the bill and pulled it, with the statement that he would bring it back in January. Reid's spokesman says that Reid will pass the bill in January - along with the immunity for the crooked telecoms. As Glenn Greenwald says, Reid thinks that Sen. Dodd was just grandstanding and that as soon as his Presidential bid dies in January, Dodd will stop disrupting the harmony of the Senate.

Here's Glenn's take on what Reid is doing:

In the Beltway world, anyone who aggressively objects to the Bush administration's extremism, and especially its lawbreaking, is always guilty of (at least) one of two sins: they are either fringe, unSerious, overly earnest losers, or -- as in the case with the accusations against Dodd here -- simply pretending to be bothered by such things in order to rouse the rabble and exploit them for cynical political gain. Anyone who disrupts Beltway harmony in order to hold the Bush administration accountable -- anyone who seems actually bothered by the rampant lawbreaking -- is thus easily dismissed as an annoying radical or a self-promoting fraud.

After all, it can't possibly be the case that Dodd actually believes in what he's doing and saying. He can't really care if telecoms are protected from the consequences of their years of deliberate, highly profitable lawbreaking. Clearly, Dodd's just doing all of this to prop up his flagging presidential campaign, just a cynical ploy for attention, not because he has any actual convictions that there is something wrong with granting such an extraordinary and corrupt gift to lawbreaking telecoms. No Serious person would ever actually get riled up about anything like that.

As much as the Bush administration's push for an authoritarian corporatized, globalized America made up of the wealthy and the poor with no effective middle class disgusts me (and violates the Constitution) the problem with the minority Republican Party is only one portion of the difficulty America faces.

The other part is that the Democratic leadership inside the beltway has gone native. "Harmony" is more important than the Constitution and the Rule of Law, and a lot more important than the needs of the average American for affordable and reliable health care.

When the Republicans get their ass whupped in November, the next problem to be resolved is for the Americans to retake the Democratic Party back from the out-of-touch beltway leadership. The idiots in Washington either need to go or get retrained, one or the other.