Perfumed From an Unseen Censer

File under: "With friends like these."

Cross-reference under: "There is a Club..."

From, God help us, the "Wall Street Journal":

The Five Million Dollar Man
How government unions rip off the taxpayer.

The Chicago Tribune reports that an investigation it conducted with WGN-TV found "23 retired union officials from Chicago stand to collect about $56 million from two ailing city pension funds."

That's an average of $2.4 million each, and some will rake in even more. Dennis Gannon, a former president of the Chicago Federation of Labor, stands to collect some $5 million. In line for $4 million apiece are Liberato "Al" Naimoli, president of the Cement Workers Union Local 76, and James McNally, vice president of the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 150.

"Since the 1950s," the Trib explains, "city workers who take leaves of absence to work full time for unions have been able to remain in city pension funds if they choose. The time they spend at their union jobs counts toward their city pensions."

Union jobs, however, are far more lucrative than city jobs. Gannon's city salary was $56,000 a year; his union salary, $200,000. But he retired from his city job in 2004--at age 50, and 13 years after beginning a leave of absence. Between then and 2010, when he retired from the union, he collected both the $200,000 union salary and a $150,000 city pension.

How did the city end up paying him a pension nearly three times his salary? That's where things get interesting.
...

Thanks, Mr. Gannon!

For a minute there I was worried that the fuel tanks full of endlessly recycled "union thug", "Chicago-way corruption" and "Tony Rezko" nonsense that have powered the Right's relentlessly venomous rhetoric for the last couple of years were juuuust about down to fumes.

And just maybe that the brutal, hostage-taking anti-labor, anti-middle class, anti-American agenda the GOP rolled out over the last 12-months might actually be sufficient to, y’know, get enough people to stop voting to cut their own economic throats to turn back that dark tide.

But you, sir, have now managed to almost singlehandedly top those tanks right off.

And with jet fuel no less!

And now, thanks to you, for the next God-knows-how-many-months, the refutation to every reasonable Liberal argument about every issue from wage inequality to the GOP-created deficit to tax fairness is going to boil down to two words:

"Dennis. Gannon."

Oh, they're gonna to make you famous, pal.

Famous beyond your capacity to imagine, because this story has all the elements of a Frank Luntz/Karl Rove wet-dream: hog-trough-greedy Chicago union bosses and back-room Chicago political deals, all set against the backdrop of President's home town and campaign HQ, in a city that has been crying poormouth, slashes services and laying people off by the thousands.

Hey, did I mention this all happened in Chicago?

Where da brudder of da last Mare is da current White House Chief-of-Staff?
And dis Mare is da previous White House House Chief-of-Staff?

Extra-scrutiny? You're soaking in it!

From (Oh dear Lord) John Kass:

...
The mayor of Chicago in 1991 was Richard M. Daley. He'd rule for years. He not only had labor peace, he could send out union muscle to elect his candidates, from judges to governors and even then-U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel, who has since received a promotion. In his new job, no longer the union beneficiary but the antagonist, Emanuel realizes that all the money is gone.

But during those decades of labor peace, Daley was boss and his brothers prospered, becoming wealthy in banking, insurance and zoning law.

The speaker of the Illinois House was Michael Madigan. He's still speaker. He's been speaker for most, if not all, of your lifetime, as he's built up his own fortune reducing taxes for downtown real estate barons. He wants organized labor to help his daughter become governor someday.

The governor who signed the bill was Big Jim Thompson on his last day in office. A Republican, Thompson has always gotten along splendidly with Democrats. So who says there's no bipartisan Combine?
...

This story has more legs than an army of Rockettes, more angles than a tesseract, ergo it has more staying power than Ron Jeremy at the top of his game.

Shit, all that's really missing is a dead hooker and a vial of coke.

Or an inconveniently stained blue dress.

As a matter of background and strictly FYI, the people I know who work at the city are mostly of the non-clout-protected variety, and they are positively punch-drunk these days.

Like dogs that have been beaten with no rhyme or reason for years.

They are mostly still plugging away below decks, doing their job in windowless cubicles, trying to hang onto some ghost of the call to public service that originally put their feet on the path they now walk. But after years of continuous and arbitrary layoffs, reorganizations, mandatory, weeks-long unpaid furloughs, months of "Fuck you, I don't care if your kid is in daycare"-style implicitly mandatory unpaid overtime, they're just barely hanging in there.

And by all accounts, the Emanuel Administration has done little in the way of changing the day-to-day management style of the Hall beyond adopting the Daley Method ("You're One Microscopic Cog in His Catastrophic Plan"):

"...investing his own band of perky Janissaries – 12-year-old interns fresh from the Harris School and loyal only to Hizzonner -- with imperial authority and cycling them through the system every year or so, ...giving his department heads conflicting mandates and then pitting them against each other, ...picking aldermen like Bozo the Clown picking out a pair of floppy shoes and a bright, red nose… Da Mare’s entire Administration has been a brilliant study in preemptively obliterating anything that even vaguely resembles a power-base outside of the 5th floor of City Hall."

and cranking the asshole factor up to 11.

Most of the people I know who toil in the vineyards of public service work hard at their jobs -- jobs they believe in that serve causes larger than themselves.

Jobs that are made harder than they need to be every single fucking day by the relentless shrieks of contempt from every Fox News goon and Hate Radio gasbag in America.

Jobs that are made harder still under the burden of the knowledge that, however hard they work they may be kicked to the curb at any time for no particular reason at all, while members of the Clout Club still enjoy absolute protection from on high by the Prince of Darkness.

And now this. This...utterly indefensible shitwagon full of Union Goon Caricature confirmation, hand-delivered to the anti-union crew with a fucking bow around it, and which is running like a rash all over the Conservative blogs and media outlets.

And, frankly, deservedly so.

Expect to hear your name in tonight’s GOP debate, Mr. Gannon. And if not tonight then virtually every day thereafter.

They're going to picnic off you until next November, so enjoy your 30 pieces of silver, and your sweet new gig as a (God help you) hedge fund manager.

Because this one will cost the Good Guys dearly.

As for the rest of us, struggling every day just to slog one inch further through the ugly, reeking, chest-deep ordure of realpolitik towards a slightly better tomorrow, take this as one more timely and cautionary tale from Your Man in Chicago about how deeply political culture here remains in the thrall of clout and dirty money:

There is still a Club.

You are still not in it.

Privilege Has Its Memberships, Ctd.

International Edition

There is no Class War.
There was a Class War.
Your side lost.

From the New York Times:

A Hefty Price for Entry to Davos
By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN

What’s the price tag to be a Davos Man?

Chief executives, government leaders and academics around the world are headed to Davos, Switzerland, for the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting this week — a heady power gathering that mixes business, politics and Champagne in the Swiss Alps. It is an event that draws a wide range of decision makers, from Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase to Prime Minister George A. Papandreou of Greece to U2’s Bono, ostensibly to contemplate how to solve the world’s problems.

Of course, much of the week is really about one thing: networking. As the “Black Swan” author Nassim N. Taleb described it to Tom Keene of Bloomberg Television, the event is “chasing successful people who want to be seen with other successful people. That’s the game.”

An invitation to the meeting is supposed to be considered an exclusive honor. But for corporate executives, the cost of being a Davos Man, or, yes, a Davos Woman, even for just a couple of days, doesn’t come cheap.
...

But before we get to the fees for private planes, hotels, and a car and driver, there’s the all-important ticket. And it isn’t free.

Just to have the opportunity to be invited to Davos, you must be invited to be a member of the World Economic Forum, a Swiss nonprofit that was founded by Klaus Schwab, a German-born academic who managed to build a global conference in the snow.

There are several levels of membership: the basic level, which will get you one invitation to Davos, costs 50,000 Swiss francs, or about $52,000. The ticket itself is another 18,000 Swiss francs ($19,000), plus tax, bringing the total cost of membership and entrance fee to $71,000.

But that fee just gets you in the door with the masses at Davos, with entry to all the general sessions. If you want to be invited behind the velvet rope to participate in private sessions among your industry’s peers, you need to step up to the “Industry Associate” level. That costs $137,000, plus the price of the ticket, bringing the total to about $156,000.

Of course, most C.E.O.’s don’t like going anywhere alone, so they might ask a colleague along. Well, the World Economic Forum doesn’t just let you buy an additional ticket for $19,000. Instead, you need to upgrade your annual membership to the “Industry Partner” level. That will set you back about $263,000, plus the cost of two tickets, bringing the total to $301,000.

And if you want to take an entourage, say, five people? Now you’re talking about the “Strategic Partner” level. The price tag: $527,000. (That’s just the annual membership entitling you to as many as five invitations. Each invitation is still $19,000 each, so if five people come, that’s $95,000, making the total $622,000.) This year, all “Strategic Partners” are required to invite at least one woman along as part of an effort to diversify the attendee list.

As part of the strategic partner level, you get access to the private sessions as well as special conference rooms to hold meetings. And perhaps the biggest perk of all, your car and driver are given a sticker allowing door-to-door pick up service.

At the moment, the forum says they are not accepting applications to become “strategic partners” unless the company is from China or India and must be one of the 250 largest companies in the world.

In fairness, it is worth pointing out that membership at all levels doesn’t just get you access to the meeting in Davos, but also to at least a half-dozen other meetings held around the world. Membership also gives you access to the forum’s various research projects as well.

All those costs, of course, don’t include the travel-related costs of getting to Switzerland, schlepping around and perhaps holding a dinner or a cocktail party for clients (which is where the real action happens anyway.).

One large investor is renting a five-bedroom chalet this year just outside of Davos for himself and his staff. The cost? $140,000 for the week. A car and driver, which the World Economic Forum will organize for you, is about $10,000 a week for a Mercedes S Class.
...

And so forth.

By way of contrast, this month I am trying to figure out how to put together enough nickels and sack lunches to get to Netroots Nation 2011.

And back.

Writing about life on Capitalism's Olympus in 1998, Richard Sennett had this to say about how the New Ruling Class views us little, shire-folk:

The dizzy life of Davos man

Yet I had an epiphany of sorts in Davos, listening to the rulers of the flexible realm. "We" is also a dangerous pronoun to them. They dwell comfortably in entrepreneurial disorder, but fear organised confrontation. They of course fear the resurgence of unions, but become acutely and personally uncomfortable, fidgeting or breaking eye contact or retreating into taking notes, if forced to discuss the people who, in their jargon, are "left behind." They know that the great majority of those who toil in the flexible regime are left behind, and of course they regret it. But the flexibility they celebrate does not give, it cannot give, any guidance for the conduct of an ordinary life. The new masters have rejected careers in the old English sense of the word, as pathways along which people can travel; durable and sustained paths of action are foreign territories.

As a reminder to those who do not already know them, here are the Two Commandments:

1. There is a Club.
2. You are not in it.

Seems We've Been Going About This

All wrong.

Reading? Writing? Re-writing? Research? Thinkin'?

Dumbass.

If you want to leave your footprints upon the sands of time, next time just fire up a fizzy FaceBook page about celebrities you've almost never met, and whose self-inflicted fall from grace is the empty scrim onto which you can project your innermost desires (h/t Beachwood Reporter.)

Or Desirees.

From the Chicago Tribune:

Desiree Rogers has lots of friends on Facebook

"Devastated" when Chicagoan Desiree Rogers stepped down as White House social secretary, blogger Monica Mingo of Montgomery County, Md., started an online support group to mark the departure of a woman she regards as smart, elegant, accomplished and more.

"She is flyness — the epitome of flyness," Mingo, 40, judges.

Within minutes of Rogers' "astonishing" resignation Friday, Mingo and a friend created a Facebook group, "Toast to Ms. Desiree Rogers, White House Social Secretary."

It had 225 members as of Wednesday night.

Mingo has never met Rogers — she saw her once at a trendy restaurant in Georgetown — but laments that too few women of color are lauded for entertaining or interior decorating, naming B. Smith and Sheila Bridges as exceptions.
...

No one should lose to much sleep over the fate of Ms. Rogers.

Everyone in Chicago knows she's in the Club and, for the rest of her life, she will never want for a hundred, wonderful options from which to choose.

You're not familiar with the Club?

Well then, I guess you're not in it.