Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives was grilled last night…
What a great interview it was!
At first Pelosi looked like she was expecting to be entertained by Jon Stewart during the interview. But pretty soon it got hotter. Raising the issue of government's incompetence was just the beginning. US federal government’s incompetence myth is a disguise to conceal greater problems that have besieged ordinary Americans.
The US government works for big corporations. The US corrupt politicians are basically busy making it easier for the corporate businesses to grab more opportunity and political power. It was nice to see though how even against her own will Jon Stewart has managed to make that Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives demonstrate through her nervousness, stammering, obvious lack of sincerity and composure, as well as through her lame responses, and -- by the end of the conversation -- her literally biting her nails in bewilderment and finally admitting it in her own words that there is indeed a systemic, foundational problem, a systemic corruption in the system of US governance.
Initially, the mere mention of the words ‘corruption in the system’ made Pelosi visibly terrified. She tried to steer the conversation out of the dangerous waters. But she failed. Jon Stewart was to say something that evening and it was through her that he would do it. He did not mince his words.
‘The people within the system don’t have enough distance from it to see the way that people in Congressional offices end up going to become lobbyists for these corporations. These corporations lobby to get all kinds of arcane things put into regulation that makes it harder for these small businesses. Is it that may be Congress cannot see the corruption inherent in that?’
It was not about complaining. There had to be a way out. ‘There must be a way for the government to get back the trust of the people who want desperately to believe and help make that argument that this can fixed.’
The Minority Leader of the United States House of Representative had nothing to say to that. Pelosi seemed to have made it a point to be vocal on denying that the system is corrupt to begin with. Visibly scared, probably that if she had failed to make her public stance at being loyal to the system and the status quo convincing enough she might suffer the consequences later on, Pelosi had only managed to make a couple confusing remarks before the end of the first part of the conversation. And it was with that confusion and bewilderment of the Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives that the first part of the interview ended.
Things became interesting during the second part of the interview. Pelosi rather quickly fell into pieces, going out of her way trying to vocalize in as many ways as possible her allegiance to the notion that there is no systemic corruption in Washington.
Resorting mainly to populist platitudes, the Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives increasingly looked and sounded like a drowning dog. She eventually went bonkers trying to demonstrate through her mumbling her own loyalty to the existing political system in Washington to the point that Jon Stewart had to comfort the poor scared and confused lady by pressing his head to her wrist. But Jon Stewart was very kind and chivalrous.
‘Do you to understand? My point is this: when I talk about how all these rules get expanded, a lot of that expansion is purposeful from these much larger corporations that can afford the legal counsel and lobbyists to add in things that carve out exceptions that allow them to continue to do what they do and corrupt the original intent. We used to have that law Glass–Steagall Act . It was simple. It was incorruptible. Now, it is 300 pages long. You say that’s the process. That’s my point: the process is somewhat corrupted!’
Jon Stewart was great!
‘The democrats do themselves no favors when the programs that they implement are not efficient and agile and when they themselves suggest that they are unimpeachable and pristine and are not corrupted by the same money that we know flows through those halls. Green knows no party. It is blue and red but green is the thing that is affecting us!’
Prophetic words! That was a direct challenge by Jon to which Pelosi as the Democratic Leader responded with… another handy platitude. Trying to divert conversation, she said exactly this: "Since you use the color of green… let me say that we are the green party of protecting the environment"...
It was hilarious and unwittingly sarcastic… Even if she was a professional comedian, she could not have come up with a better retort. The audience laughed. Everybody in America who watched it laughed. The world laughed… Jon Stewart laughed, too.
‘I think you are painting my criticisms with a broad brush by suggesting that this particular criticism is somehow then saying Democrats are no different from Republicans. I am not saying that. I am saying that Democrats believe in regulation, strong and effective regulation, efficient regulation, a role for government. If that is what they believe when they create those laws that in some ways are an amplification of what they believe they should work harder and focus more on doing it efficiently and correctly and that there is also within the Democratic Party a problem with lobbyists and corruption and the revolving door to corporations back and forth and to suggest that it isn’t, I think, is to not live in reality.’
Jon Stewart had managed to make Pelosi agree that both Democrats and Republicans were (somewhat) corrupted, although Republicans were certainly guilty of some greater sins. Gradually, the Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives was being cornered into admission that corruption was a systemic problem in Washington, though. And that was really dangerous.
Usually, when cornered up, a rat is said to turn onto you and attack you and try to bite you back. Having being pushed to the wall, Pelosi suddenly resorted to the last refuge of a scoundrel demagogue - the issue of patriotism. But Jon was too seasoned a debater to let himself be set up like that. And it was not that easy to lead him astray in that conversation, either.
‘You heard that and you thought that I was saying our public employees aren't patriotic? That’s what you heard?’ he asked.
Having found herself in a stupid situation, Pelosi did not know what to say in response but let Jon Stewart finish her sentence: ‘I heard that you were saying...’
‘That Congress has a problem with money and corporate interests’, said Jon Stewart.
Pelosi was a pity to look at. A stark contrast to her flamboyant countenance at the beginning of the interview. During the interview, Pelosi occasionally appealed to the audience, whose polite enthusiasm she met with a suppressed smirk. But people in the studio did not seem to fully qualify for a perfectly uninformed gullible public that night, either. Meanwhile, Jon Stewart continued to drive the nails into the coffin of the US government system’s infallibility.
‘But I do think that public’s discontent is an earned one. And I do not think that it is in any way based on cynicism, based on broad brush. I think it is earned. And the government has in many ways worked hard for it.’
As Jon Stewart was saying those words, Pelosi was sitting there visibly terrified and dark-faced, literally biting her fingernails like a schoolgirl at an exam, struggling to come up with something to say… It was an unbelievable sight indeed. The Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives was beaten up.
As she stammered and stuttered through her words, Pelosi’s responses were getting uglier and uglier. She was getting increasingly less in control of her own emotions and facial expression, let alone the mindset of the present audience, to the point that it was almost terrible to look at her. Jon Stewart helped her out though by gracefully suggesting reasonable solutions to the problems he had just mentioned, steering the conversation back into a civilized route.
‘May I just steal my message tonight? What I am telling you tonight is enough with the fighting. The things that you’re in control of, make them work. Let them work unassailably so. So that you have tangible results. So that you can say to people, our argument about government is such and efficient. And here is what we did. And here is how we did it. And here are the tangible results of that. … They’ve so embarrassed themselves with their knuckleheads that the Democrats have an opportunity to establish themselves in a much more… with a much more authority than ever before. But they continue, I would like to call it, with a fear of success. So that they prevent themselves... It is not about messaging. It is not about anything other than showing the American people you are serious about reforming the mechanism of government and bureaucracy of government and the efficiency of government. And I think that would be a big deal… for people.’
With those words Jon Stewart had finally managed to convince Nancy Pelosi. That is, at least to stop her pitiful histrionics of abject fearful protestations. For the time was up.
