el gato malo calls his analysis a hypothesis, but this looks to be pretty much the way politics actually works. From el gato malo at boriquagato.substack.com:
new adventures in tinfoil cattery: one gato’s theory on maintaining control of your political party
i had some tinfoil left over from thanksgiving, so i thought i might spread it around a bit and see if we could explore the interesting and oddly repetitive state of affairs where so many politicians seem fully corrupt and yet fully repercussion proof right up until they step out of line or become a liability at which instant it’s suddenly “scandal time” and they get run out of town on a rail.
obviously, what’s to follow tends toward the speculative, but it does not seem terribly far fetched to me, represents the clear low energy path to organize and sustain political machines, and all that you really need to believe to accept these ideas is that power corrupts, that corrupt people are attracted to power, and that many will happily trade their ethics for patronage and position.
i doubt we’re really debating ideas like “does this happen?” rather, it’s a debate about “to what extent?” and “to what degree of deliberation and sophistication?” with perhaps a side order of “and how many actors are in the game and what ends are they pursuing?”
foil on. let’s explore.
as our initial case study/exemplar, let’s examine the hyper corrupt machine politics of new york.
