Two times in a row the Democratic establishment tried to foist a Philadelphia journalist on the Democratic Party of Pennsylvania’s Sixth District. The first was Larry Platt, the editor of Philadelphia Magazine, who wrote about his humiliating experience in GQ. It’s two years old, but well worth the read (hat tip to Adam Bonin for sending me the link). If you want some insight into what a lousy business running for Congress has become, you’ll love some of the vignettes.
STENY HOYER, the House Majority Leader, is a serious, formal man. He’s not the kind of guy you want to drink a beer with. He’s more the kind of guy who oversees the licensing of those who would serve you beer.
[Then Montgomery County party chairman Marcel] Groen and I had come down to D.C. to schmooze national party leaders. So here I was, sitting on a sofa in Hoyer’s spacious Capitol Hill office. After introductory pleasantries, there was an awkward silence. I decided to fill it with my by-now practiced routine. “When you’re a journalist,” I began, “you’re on the sidelines. At some point, you want to get in the game.”
I paused. Hoyer didn’t jump in.
I babbled on. I pulled out a Bobby Kennedy quote. Hoyer was impassive. I talked about how I knew the Sixth District to be politically moderate and yet populist. Nada. I said that if elected, I would refuse the House’s health coverage. Zip. I made the mistake of saying a local radio talk-show host, Michael Smerconish, a well-known Republican, has his finger on the pulse of my district: fiscally conservative, tough on terror, libertarian on social issues. At which point my chaperone, Groen, interrupted: “Well, he’s a bit conservative to our liking, but what Larry’s saying is there’s an opening against Gerlach in terms of the war on terror.” With this, Groen saved me from appearing to actually like a Republican. (Little did I know that inside the way-too-partisan Beltway, that’s a capital offense.)
When I was done, Hoyer leaned forward and dispensed his words of wisdom. “If Bob Brady vouches for you, that’s good enough for me,” he said.
That was it?
Platt wisely decided to drop out of the race once he realized he was losing his soul. In 2010, it was Doug Pike’s turn to give it a go. A longtime member of the Philadelphia Inquirer editorial board and the son of Rep. Otis Pike of Long Island, Doug got the same bug to get off the sidelines and into the game. The party loved him because he could self-fund into the millions, but he had no political skills, hated the retail aspects of campaigning, and ultimately saved his money, running only a few ads in the last days of the campaign. He never should have run. He lost the primary by 672 votes to Manan Trivedi, a man who did not run a single television ad in one of the most expensive media markets in the country. Instead, he won over the Montgomery and Chester County Democrats and received their endorsements. He ran a small budget grassroots campaign and simply outhustled Pike.
Platt detailed the extraordinary cynicism he encountered from political consultants, elected officials, and party bigwigs as they provided him with their professional advice.
So there I was, late at night, reading [Jimmy Carter’s malaise speech] about one of the last times a politician tried to tell the truth. I thought of the congressman who told me, during my visit to D.C.: “You don’t think there are actually votes of conscience down here, do you?” I thought of the response one congressional aide had when I said I favored gay marriage instead of the calculated position of “civil unions”; gay marriage, I argued—borrowing from Andrew Sullivan—was consistent with conservative principles because society ought to support loving, committed relationships. The response? “Oh, so you want to lose”
Because Trivedi ran as an outsider and an underdog, he probably hasn’t been exposed to this kind of cynicism…yet. Actually, check that, he’s probably on the phone right now with some party bigwigs who are explaining how he’ll need to raise $3 million dollars if he wants the DCCC to invest a similar amount in his campaign. He’s probably being sold on a “superstar call-time manager” who will make sure he spends three hours a day on the phone begging for money. He might even be getting told to shut his damn mouth, that he’s a fucking retard and dilettante, to sell his foreign car (if he has one), and to buy schlubby suits. Larry Platt was told all of those things by Neil Oxman, the man responsible for Joe Sestak’s brilliant “re-e-LECT-ed” commercial.
Politics is a dirty business, but I, for one, am more hopeful about a man like Trivedi who got this far without Bob Brady’s help or abasing himself before Steny Hoyer. Those fools will do their best to destroy Trivedi’s idealism. But I think he’s got a good shot at disappointing them.