Post 3:

The second portion of the book highlights (as I predicted) less economic forms of corruption in the American political system. Drew shifts emphasis from the exploitation of the partisan system with PACs and soft money to such scandals as those of former President Clinton and that of the Nixon administration. In addition to analyzing these scandals, Drew attacks the Clinton administration as being “poll-driven”. She quotes a Democratic political consultant (whose name is not given) saying, “Reagan used polling to figure out how to sell his beliefs. Clinton uses polling to figure out what to believe.” (152). At this point Drew seems to almost be in a fury of assaulting the Clinton presidency, further claiming that “…even into his second term, Clinton had given the country no sense of direction.” She even provides some form of proof: at the beginning of his second term, Clinton apparently formed a “legacy committee” of his staff designed solely to determine what his legacy would be. Suffice to say, I and many others would agree that a President shouldn’t have to use his staff to figure out what he should be passionate enough about for the country to remember him for it. Drew’s point now becomes quite clear: the quality of our politicians has declined and is declining. While our first president, George Washington was instrumental in leading our country to freedom, not seeking fame but seeking justice, presidents such as Clinton now, unfortunately, hire people to figure how to make them more famous. To assure the reader knows this, Drew outright states that “…the last great presidential leader was Lyndon Johnson…” to finalize her view that standard of our leaders has plummeted.

Curiously, Drew’s review of the Clinton impeachment trials has surprisingly little to do with Clinton himself. Instead, she stresses another source of corruption of American politics: extreme partisanship. Drew points out that the Senators’ opinions on Clinton’s impeachment had a tremendous tendency to be partisan in nature. One needs only examine the results of the vote to see this: almost every Republican senator voted guilty on both Articles (a perjury charge and an obstruction of justice charge), and the opposite holds true for every Democratic senator. Perhaps fortunately for Clinton, a handful of Republican senators voted not guilty on both or not guilty on one charge, which hence turned the tides in Clinton’s favor. It is, however, highly unlikely that the opinion of every Democratic senator was, without regard to Clinton’s party affiliation, not guilty on both counts, and that the verdict of almost every Republican senator was the opposite. This exemplifies the partisanship displayed in the impeachment trial of Bill Clinton.

To shift the focus away from Clinton from a bit and back to the world of money, Drew points out another attention-catching flaw in our political donation system: Senatorial sabotage. Particularly in the case of campaign finance reform advocates, certain senators have donated money to campaigns in an effort to defeat these advocates. One example Drew uses features Senators McConnell and Feingold. According to Drew, “…McConnell poured money into Wisconsin in an effort to defeat Russell Feingold, a leading backer of campaign finance reform.” It would appear, then, that McConnell could not rely on his own advocacy to defeat campaign finance reform, but instead felt it would be easier to get someone, anyone, into the Senate who wouldn’t support campaign finance reform. This almost-petty behavior demonstrates the continued decline in the quality of politicians.

My prediction from the last post was correct. The second portion of the book did focus on less-economic aspects of the corruption of the American political system.