Steel traiffs and politics (Re: Victories for instant runoff voting in SF & Vermont

[Peter K.]

>There is no doubt that the Dems are influenced by parts of
capital, but they
>are also influenced by their grassroots consistencies such as
labor.  Folks
>can argue that labor is not getting enough for their support,
but to not
>even try to include the concessions made to labor just makes for
unusuable
>analysis.
>
>And of course, we once again have the equation of the Presidency
with the
>Party, as if three-fourths of Dems in the House did not reject
Fast-Track
>trade authority for Clinton and nearly all rejected fast track
authority for
>Bush last fall.  What capital interests forced the Dems in
Congress to
>overwhelmingly reject fast track authority?
>
>Nathan Newman

Here on the north side of Chicago, in the 5th Congressional
district, the two wings
of the Democratic party are having it out in the primaries. Rahm
Emanuel, who was
an advisor in the Clinton administration, is neck in neck with
Nancy Kaszak, a former
state representative and grass-roots, community organizer. Most
unions, NOW and EMILY's List are backing Kaszak and da Mayor is
backing Emanuel. The mud is flying. A Polish community leader
made some vague, untoward remarks about Emanuel's ethnicity
during one of Kaszak's campaign stops, so she completely
dissociated herself from the guy after Emanuel's campaign played
it up. Emanuel describes passing NAFTA as one of his crowning
achievements and amazingly EMILY's List has been running TV ads
bashing him for it. Kaszak says the bill has "put 37,000
hard-working Illinoisans out of work" and that half a million
jobs were lost in manufacturing alone since NAFTA was passed. A
former Illinois Supreme Court judge is going to file a complaint
with the FEC about the TV ads, because EMILY's List calls them
issue advocacy ads whilst he says they're really campaign ads.

Peter