Class politics in Tedisco-Murphy race

My sainted and humorous Aunt Mary Gaffney, who was a schoolteacher from Brooklyn, told me once she knew the world had turned upside down where there was a violent conflict on the streets of New York resulting from a political demonstration in which the working class took on the bourgeoisie. But this wasn't leftist workers versus the bosses, as in the traditional Marxist model. The hard-hatted construction workers were breaking up an anti-Vietnam War protest held by bourgeois college students.

Which brings us to the 20th Congressional District. Today The Poughkeepsie Journal put up a live Webcast of a debate between Republican candidate Jim Tedisco and Democrat Scott Murphy, which PlanetAlbany watched so you don't have to. (Actually, it was better than last week's excruciating first debate.) Tedisco opened with his shtick about being from a blue-collar family, the son of a foundry worker, and then returned to it later in the debate, at which point it struck me that he really means it. His father died of stomach cancer after 40 years on the job, Tedisco said, and his widowed mother didn't qualify for pension benefits, and so has had to live on her Social Security income. Tedisco has also called that foundry "hell on earth," and I wonder how his attitude went over with General Electric Co., which employed Tedisco's father, as it has employed and laid off many thousands of other people in Tedisco's home town of Schenectady. Tedisco used that background to defend his position of ruling out Social Security benefit cuts. Murphy, in saying he was open to "minor tweaks" in the system, sounded more fiscally responsible. On the other hand, Tedisco gave some support to Gov. Paterson's sensible proposal to create a Tier 5 in the state pension system, to try to restrain future costs. He was weak on specific citations of federal budget cuts he could live with, mentioning a couple of very minor items (one costing $2 million and another $1.7 million) along with passing a line-item veto that President Obama could use (Murphy also backed a line-item veto. Neither candidate mentioned potential constitutional problems with that.). Tedisco did say he would propose legislation to claw back about $18 billion inappropriately spent on bonuses and junkets by companies benefiting from the federal bailouts. That's a populist, unRepublican proposal, which doesn't make it a bad idea.

Murphy also claimed blue-collar roots. He's the son of a postal worker, and his wife comes from a big dairy farming family, he keeps telling us. But Murphy also let slip in his closing statement that he went to Harvard (Tedisco's alma mater, which he didn't mention, is Union College). Murphy sought to come across as the sensible bourgeois technocrat. He also had some good local material, about organic farms in Columbia County and so forth, that could play well. Another line in his closing statement -- "You've got to fight hard but you've also got to work together" -- struck me as a jab against Tedisco's fight-for-you persona, and an appeal to moderates who may be turned off by harsh rhetoric and want constructive solutions to grave problems.

The newspaper deserves credit for hosting the event, but I thought some of the questions were slanted against Tedisco -- on one occasion for good reason,  when they put him on the spot about his opposition to tax increases on the rich. In other exchanges, though, such as on the stimulus and the similarity between earmarks (which Tedisco called for reducing) and state member items, the hostile questioning worked in the Republican's favor. He was able to respond effectively when knocked off his stride (which may something about the shortcomings of the strategy he went in with; there are a lot of moderate, bourgeois votes he needs to win). Sometimes the questioners weren't so much biased against Tedisco as pompously condescending and phonily populist, as when someone asked the candidates -- and pressed the point -- the old chestnut about whether they knew the price of bread and milk. Way to play gotcha, guys. See you in the unemployment line.

Comments

[Brian]

"Sometimes the questioners weren't so much biased against Tedisco as pompously condescending and phonily populist"

Sometimes truth is more ironic than fiction.

[Matthew]

It may help in providing a link to webcast in question or its transcript. It can serve for your readers to verify what your intrepretations but also provide access in helping them become a better informed citizen, possiblely influencing their vote.

[Drew]

Watch tedisco for Congress on youtube
Tedisco for Congress