Blue America Chat
by digby
Join Howie and the rest of the Blue America gang today over at C&L at 1:30pst, 4:30est as he chats with Carol Mosely Braun, who is running for mayor of Chicago. Howie wrote this on Down with Tyranny earlier:
Blue America has had a running battle with Wall Street shill Rahm Emanuel for as long as we existed as a PAC. Our enthusiasm for Carol Moseley Braun is not about Rahm Emanuel though. Yes, electing him mayor is the worst thing that Chicago could possibly do to itself, but Carol Moseley Braun would be a formidable candidate no matter who the opposition was. Today she’s coming on to Crooks and Liars for a live blog session at 3:30pm (CST; 1:30 on the West Coast). When I spoke with her on the phone a few days ago and asked her about the sleazy, relentless and very effective way Emanuel has undermined her in the minds of so many voters, she was eager to talk about her own reasons for running, not about him. She did agree with me, however, and said she’s “had to deal with negative racial and gender narratives all through my career. They’re not about substance; just about slinging mud and hoping it sticks… In all my years in public service I have never leveraged my elected office or any political connections for private gain.” That, of course, is the exact polar opposite of the Rahm Emanuel model, an exemplar of a high level revolving door that has left him a multimillionaire many times over based on one thing and one thing alone: political access.
When Ambassador Braun left the Illinois House of Representatives, where she had been Assistant Majority Leader and an effective champion of progressive causes– even when it meant going up against powerful conservatives in her own party– she was dubbed “the conscience of the House.” In fact, when she ran for the U.S. Senate, the impetus was to hold conservative Democrat Alan Dixon accountable for an unconscionable and shortsighted vote to confirm Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court. In beating Dixon, and going on to win the general election, she became the first woman to defeat an incumbent senator in an election, the first and only female Senator from Illinois and the only African-American woman ever elected to the U.S. Senate. Those are incredible achievements and she has had to fight with some heavily armed opponents every step of the way.
And let’s not forget that as the first — and only — female African American Senator, she had to put up with hideous behavior like this:
Soon after the Senate vote on the Confederate flag insignia, which opponents saw as an overt symbol of racism, Helms ran into Moseley Braun in an elevator. [Jesse] Helms turned to Senator Orrin Hatch and said, “Watch me make her cry. I’m going to make her cry. I’m going to sing Dixie until she cries.” He then proceeded to sing the song about ‘the good life’ during slavery to Moseley Braun. In 1999, Helms attempted to block Moseley Braun’s nomination to be United States Ambassador to New Zealand.
She didn’t cry.
.