Los Angeles Times
September 26, 2004
It is news to no one who pays the slightest attention to American politics that
Congress is no longer responsive to the people. Incumbency is so well
institutionalized that elections generally don't mean much. Take the case of
guns: House Majority Leader Tom DeLay approves of the private ownership of
assault weapons and machine guns, despite complaints from police across the
country that they're outgunned by criminals, despite the 65% of the public that
wants them banned, despite pleas from the relatives of murdered Americans. On
this issue, the National Rifle Assn. seems to own the Congress.
A
similar situation exists with regard to munitions makers. In one district after
another, the weapons industry has bought the incumbent, and would-be challengers
are unable to overcome the advantage of incumbency. On really big projects like
the B2 Stealth bomber, contracts for different parts of the airplane are placed
in as many congressional districts as possible. This is done to spread the pork
(in the form of jobs) around. But it also ensures that a wide swath of
congressional representatives have a disincentive to ever ask whether we really
need another weapon of massive destruction. It's part of the reason we have
defense budgets of $425 billion per year (plus that extra $87 billion for Iraq
and Afghanistan, $20 billion for nuclear weapons and $200 billion more for
veterans and the wounded), leading to the highest governmental deficits in
postwar history. It seems likely that only bankruptcy will stop the American
imperial juggernaut.
California's 50th Congressional District in
northern San Diego County where I live is a good example of exactly how this
plays out at the local level. The constituents of the 50th have been
misrepresented in Washington for the last 14 years by a wholly paid-for tool of
the military-industrial complex, the Republican incumbent, Randy "Duke"
Cunningham. The heavily populated 50th District has changed in recent years
from the wealthy Republican stronghold it once was to a m uch more politically
diverse mix, and that should spell trouble for Cunningham, whose record on such
things as abortion, school vouchers and the environment are increasingly out of
step with a wide swath of his constituents.
This year, Cunningham is
opposed by Francine Busby, a well-qualified Democrat whose views are probably
much closer to a majority of voters in the 50th. But a look at the candidates'
fundraising and expenditures demonstrates why Busby faces an uphill fight.
Incumbents have an advantage that's almost impossible to overcome, as races
throughout the nation will demonstrate this fall. The Cunningham-Busby race
illustrates why.
Let's start with money. As of June 30, campaign
records show, Cunningham had raised $608,977, or nearly 10 times the amount
Busby had raised. About 46% of Cunningham's money comes from political action
committees, or PACs, compared with 2% of Busby's. Nearly a third of
Cunningham's money comes from out of state, compared with only 3% of Busby's.
What kind of people like to give to an incumbent like Cunningham?
Based on Federal Election Commission data released in August, his top
contributors by industry/occupation are defense electronics ($66,550), defense
aerospace ($39,000), lobbyists ($32,500), miscellaneous defense ($29,200), air
transport ($26,500), health professionals ($24,700) and real estate ($23,001).
Cunningham's No. 1 financial backer is the Titan Corp. of San Diego, which
gave him $15,000. It has recently been in the news because an Arabic translator
it supplied under a contract with the U.S. Army has been implicated in the Abu
Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq.
Now it may be that these donors
contribute to Cunningham instead of Busby just because they like the guy. But
Titan's $657-million Pentagon contract had to be approved by the House
Appropriations Committee's national defense subcommittee, on which Cunningham
sits. Lockheed Martin, the world's largest weapons manufacturer, also gave
Cunningham a whopping $15,000. They too ca n't help but be interested in those
purse strings he holds. The list of Cunningham's top contributors reads like a
Who's Who among the nation's war suppliers: Raytheon (which makes the Tomahawk
cruise missile), Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics and on and on.
To
judge by Cunningham's voting record, their money was well spent. Not only has
he been a strong supporter of the war in Iraq — which directly benefits
many of his contributors — he also has embraced the causes of the
neconservative strategists in Washington who favor a more aggressive foreign
policy that would probably, down the road, benefit the defense contractors even
more.
In some sense, Cunningham comes by his support for the military
honestly. He cites as his most important lifetime achievement his 20 years as a
naval aviator, during which time he flew combat missions in Vietnam. During the
war, he shot down five communist jets (three of them in one day) and was himself
brought down by a surface-to-air missile. On M ay 10, 1972, he was rescued from
the South China Sea by a helicopter.
But Cunningham has exploited this
record into what one commentator calls "hero inflation" and Shakespeare's Henry
V called "remembering with advantages." He now claims to have been a military
hero deserving of the Medal of Honor (which he didn't get), even though he
acknowledges that his dog-fighting had little effect on the course of the war.
Cunningham has created a company called Top Gun Enterprises that sells
lithographs of himself in his pilot's outfit and a book he has written about his
Navy exploits. His company's website claims that the 1986 film "Top Gun,"
starring Tom Cruise, depicted many of Cunningham's "real-life experiences."
All of this wouldn't mean much in terms of his ability to represent his
district, but Cunningham is now using his war record as a cudgel with which to
hammer John F. Kerry, who is supported by many residents of the politically
divided 50th District. On April 22, for example, Cunningham s aid in the House
of Representatives: "Mr. Speaker, I was shot down over North Vietnam…. I
can remember the anger and the disparaging remarks that John Kerry made about
our service. I remember the rage in all of us from his slander…. Even
today, John Kerry votes against defense, the military, veterans and intelligence
bills that would enforce the safe return of our men and women. We do not need
someone that would vote like a Jane Fonda as commander in chief."
On
social issues too Cunningham is far out of step with many of his constituents.
In 1998, after Cunningham had been operated on for prostate cancer, he described
the procedure as "just not natural, unless maybe you're Barney Frank." Frank, a
fellow House member and a Massachusetts Democrat who is openly gay, replied that
Cunningham "seems to be more obsessed with homosexuality than most homosexuals."
In the end, though, Cunningham's failure to represent his district is
unlikely to cost him is job. Why? Because if he needs to, he can outspend
Busby 8 to 1. And in elections today, money talks.