Are the Dem and Con parties playing BadCop/Worse Cop? And for how long have they been doing this?

[elehhhhna]

Your thoughts, please.

[Fumesucker]

1. Yes, at least ever since Reagan n/t

[cali]

2. It's so much more complicated than that.

there are dozens of entrenched money interest that have undue influence within both parties.

[natrat]

3. this is your new wh chief of staff, ugh:

"When it comes to Rahm Emanuel, there is more than one fish story. All of Washington knows the tale of the dead fish: how he delivered one, Corleone style, to a polltaker he didn't like. But few know the grilled-fish chronicles: the private, off-the-record dinners he has hosted in recent years for a bipartisan posse of his fellow congressmen.

Known primarily, but incompletely, as the Democratic Party's foulmouthed enforcer, Emanuel as a member of Congress also was a nonideological, convivial centrist, eager to trade backroom intelligence with like-minded Republicans. "The wine flowed, the food was good and we all talked candidly," says Rep. Fred Upton, a Republican from Michigan. "Everyone agreed that if things leaked, we'd disband it. Nothing ever did." The dinnertime ties paid off, Upton says, in support for legislation like the banking bailout. "Rahm works every angle," says Upton, "often in ways that people don't expect."

http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=10615


they are shitty crooks

[RC]

6. Obama never did say "Change for the better" did he?

[Enrique]

4. the worse cop is MUCH MUCH worse

the bad cop plays mind games with us and the worse cop tortures us to death.

[elehhhhna]

5. ...with the bad cops tacit approval.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

7. Lord Acton explained it in just a few words.

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

What we have is a group of power hungry narcissists who are inevitably corrupted by the power they attain and their desire to hold on to it.

They are, literally, given the power of life or death over the people they allegedly serve but, in reality, rule. In order to attain, and retain, that power they have to throw real people under the bus. Whether it's soldiers sent to fight in lost wars, workers "restructured" out of jobs or pensions, sick people denied health care, or people sacrificed for the "greater good" (trans: getting reelected).

Thinking of them as "good" or "bad" is almost beside the point. They are the powerful who wield their power with primary aim of keeping it.

[elehhhhna]

8. Truefact. But why does this Congress shirk its power so willingly?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

9. They're playing politics to keep their seats.

The delusion is that they actually do anything on their own. They're the ultimate in playing it safe. If the public attitude changes, and it becomes "safe" to back or oppose something then they become vociferous.

It isn't congress shirking it's power that's important. It's the public, shirking it's nascent power that is the real culprit.

The citizenry is averse to risk and responsibility. We give the politicians power and then "trust" them to "lead" us. The problem is that we have neglected our responsibility to NOT trust them and settle for whatever crimes, incompetence, pandering, and worse, with a shrug.

It is a vicious circle. The politicians need money to achieve power. To get the money, they have to promise to become corrupt (even if it's a "legal" form of corruption - they also get to decide what is "legal). Which effectively eliminates the people who won't be corrupted attaining office.

Power doesn't come from the barrel of a gun, as Mao said, but from the bank accounts of corporations.

[elehhhhna]

10. "... It's the public, shirking it's nascent power that is the real culprit. "

You said it all, TyD! Well put.