I've Been Had
or The Cult of Personality
I’ve been had. I mean fooled, bamboozled, conned, duped, hoodwinked, flimflammed, taken, suckered, hornswoggled, gulled, snookered, gaffed, buffaloed, outwitted, and led down the primrose path, at the end of which I was taken for a ride. This was a humiliating object lesson, a graduate-level course in the recklessly wrong-headed righteousness of judging books by their cover-ups.
What happened? It pains me to admit:
On May 8th, with all the cocksure confidence I could muster, I wrote and published this. I was convinced the Democrats — alarmed and infuriated by the threat of Erin Stewart, the seemingly successful, six-term mayor of New Britain, Connecticut, announcing her gubernatorial candidacy — had brought out the long knives and the big guns with all the desperation in their malicious hearts and all the malevolence in their sinister souls.
Then Stewart spontaneously combusted like the Human Torch.
And so it is that, still choking on the feathers from all the crow I’m still eating, I found myself confronted with this, “Erin Stewart received more than $120,000 in severance”, this, “Erin Stewart and the sound of trust breaking”, this, “With subpoena, feds confirm a criminal investigation of Erin Stewart”, and this from a weekly newsletter called The Debrief:
Erin Stewart may have dropped out of the race for governor nearly a month ago, but fallout from controversy over her spending and reimbursements as mayor of New Britain continues. On Tuesday, CT Mirror’s Mark Pazniokas reported that New Britain officials are demanding Stewart pay the city $241,560 to recover tuition reimbursements, severance payments and legal costs related to investigations into her spending. And on Thursday, we learned that the federal government is investigating that spending as well. A federal grand jury issued a subpoena demanding New Britain produce documents related to the former mayor’s spending, which a law firm hired by the city has described as fraudulent purchasing and reimbursements worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Everything I’ve just cited comes from just one source. But every other print, broadcast, and social medium in the state — and every gotcha-monger with a computer — is giving the story wall-to-wall, 24/7 coverage. And this may be my favorite quote from the story about the subpoena, emphasis mine:
Stewart was the front-runner for the Republican nomination of governor until quitting the race on May 14. She since has made no public statements.
Do tell.
Who Cares?
According to studies conducted by the O’Brien Center Researching Audacious Pilfering (OCRAP) there’s a positive correlation between longer time in political office and corruption. More specifically, tenure breeds elevated corruption risk, largely attributable to entrenchment, opportunity, shamelessness, stupidity, and faith in the indifferent gullibility of voters.
Longer tenure obviously gives politicians more experience, which, according to OCRAP, can be defined as more chances and more power to engage in corrupt activities. Over time, incumbents build networks, cultivate trust with collaborators, gain insider knowledge of systems, and face reduced electoral pressure due to the indifferent gullibility of voters.
OCRAP’s analyses of federal public corruption convictions revealed longer gubernatorial tenure correlates with higher-magnitude corruption. And while he hasn’t been convicted as of yet, Uncle Ned is a prime example of what’s possible with incumbency, a House and a Senate packed with lackeys, and the indifferent gullibility of voters.
Further, OCRAP’s investigations into incumbency indicate those already in office raise far more money for their campaigns than their challengers. This is attributable to access-oriented donors (lobbyists and other influencers) special-interest and identity groups seeking new rights and entitlements, and the indifferent gullibility of voters.
The consequences of all this, according to OCRAP’s research, is reduced competition and accountability, entrenched power, deterrence to challengers, and polarization, as illustrated in Connecticut, for example, by long-serving incumbents like Representative John “Flapjack” Larson (14+ terms) and Uncle Ned. In short, incumbency reduces competition, accountability, and turnover. And it depends heavily on increasing levels of corruption and the indifferent gullibility of voters.
Stop it Some More
Given what we’ve discovered so far, OCRAP plans to launch a series of related studies that include but likely won’t be limited to these:
The Inverse Correlation Between Money and Happiness. Preliminary data seems to indicate the more of people’s money is taken by the government, the happier they seem to be about it. We expect our research will show a direct correlation between profligacy and incumbency that will explain the tenures of skinners like Flapjack and Uncle Ned, to say nothing of pathological spendthrift lunatics like Chris Murphy, Rosa DeLauro, and Da Nang Dick Blumenthal.
Economic Stockholm Syndrome. Stockholm syndrome is a psychological coping mechanism in which hostages or abuse victims develop positive emotional bonds toward their captors or abusers, often sympathizing with them and resisting rescue. In the case of Connecticut in particular, indifferent, gullible voters seem to have developed positive emotions toward skinners like Flapjack and Uncle Ned, to say nothing of pathological spendthrift lunatics like Chris Murphy, Rosa DeLauro, and Da Nang Dick Blumenthal.
Pecuniary Unworthiness (PU). This is tangentially related to Imposter Syndrome, which describes a psychological phenomenon characterized by the inability to believe one's success is deserved or has been legitimately achieved. In cases of PU, people don’t believe they deserve to keep the money they’ve earned. So, they’re happy to give it to skinners like Flapjack and Uncle Ned, to say nothing of pathological spendthrift lunatics like Chris Murphy, Rosa DeLauro, and Da Nang Dick Blumenthal.
General Masochism. Masochism denotes the derivation of pleasure from experiencing pain, humiliation, or suffering, whether it self-inflicted or inflicted by another. It’s possible what appears to be an inverse correlation between money and happiness, Economic Stockholm Syndrome, or PU may just be garden-variety masochism. Perhaps voters are neither indifferent nor gullible after all. Maybe they just like pain, humiliation, and suffering and don’t care if it’s financial and inflicted by skinners like Flapjack and Uncle Ned, to say nothing of pathological spendthrift lunatics like Chris Murphy, Rosa DeLauro, Da Nang Dick Blumenthal, and now, Erin Stewart.
Fool Me Once ….
No matter what happens in November, we won’t have Erin Stewart to kick around anymore. And she apparently has no one to blame but herself, 12 years of the indifferent gullibility (or masochism) of New Britain’s voters, and her proclivity for being a pathologically spendthrift lunatic.
Because all that’s true, I’ve been had.
Shame on me.
Term limits do make sense!
I've been had, too. I thought she might have what it takes to defeat a Democrat, but I didn't know it was going to be an even stickier set of fingers than they seem to have. I'd advise you to gather all the crow feathers you've been trying to eat and send them to her. Perhaps she can try feathering her nest with those.