What Mailer teaches us about politics

By Lisa Mascaro (contact)

Sunday, Aug. 24, 2008 | 2 a.m.

Washington — In early pages of the political convention classic “Miami and the Siege of Chicago,” Norman Mailer warns against trying to interview politicians.

Unless you know the fellow well, or have studied him meticulously, you might want to abandon the whole affair, he says, because after having answered a million questions during a political career, his jaws are trained to easily respond to a few more.

It’s thoughtful advice as we turn to the national presidential nominating conventions. (It’s also a reminder of why Sen. Harry Reid, the majority leader, gets so much attention, as he did last week, for unabashedly blurting: “I can’t stand John McCain.”)

Democrats arrive in Denver today, and Republicans will head to St. Paul, Minn., a week later, for what in many ways feels like a political class reunion.

As the primary season all but seals the deal on the parties’ presidential picks, the conventions have become all-day (and night) schmooze fests.

Cocktail receptions paid for by lobbying interests will continue into the wee hours, showing the deep ties between the moneyed and political classes.

The conventions themselves are now sponsored by corporate America as if they were stadiums with naming rights.

A report out last week showed 173 organizations, from big companies to labor unions, have given a combined $112 million to the Democratic and Republican conventions. They are covering 80 percent of the costs.

History helps here. Mailer was writing about the 1968 conventions, but Miami played host to the Republicans again in 1972, though it wasn’t the party’s first choice.

San Diego was supposed to host the Republicans that year, until a scandal broke that would dog President Nixon until Watergate, good government advocate Craig Holman of Public Citizen said.

Early that year, The New York Times reported that industry giant International Telephone & Telegraph had won a favorable antitrust decision from the Nixon administration’s Justice Department and had donated $400,000 toward the costs of the San Diego convention.

To save face after that report, the Republican Party abruptly relocated to Miami, Holman said.

By 1974, Congress had approved the nation’s public financing system for presidential elections. A provision to fund the conventions was designed to remove the perception of corporate influence.

This year’s conventions each received $16 million in taxpayer money.

But corporate and organizational giving is nearly four times that much, according to the report by the Campaign Finance Institute and Center for Responsive Politics.

And that doesn’t count the after-parties. There is no readily available estimate of their costs.

Although ethics rules limit the amount of wining and dining allowed (only food that can fit on a toothpick), both will still be amply under way.

Nevada’s state Democratic Party will head off to daily breakfasts and luncheons paid for by some of the state’s industry giants, including Newmont Mining Corp., Sierra Pacific Resources (parent company of Nevada Power), and the American Gaming Association.

A week later, Republican Sen. John Ensign will be a featured speaker at a Beach Boys concert in St. Paul. (Ensign is deftly steering clear of events that honor a particular member of Congress, which are banned. All is well, provided you are speaking. “Two very different things,” his spokeswoman said by e-mail.)

Lawmakers are likely to assert they can still make tough decisions even if a company bought a platter of shrimp for the guests.

Besides, one lobbyist explained, conventions aren’t a time for lobbying. There’s a decorum here — it’s socializing. How much policy can you realistically discuss over hors d’oeuvres or between song sets?

Good government groups snicker at such distinctions: For a congressman, going to a fundraiser at a golf resort is just playing golf, one activist quipped last week, referring indirectly to jailed lobbyist Jack Abramoff’s famed golf junket. Lobbying is lobbying. It’s all part of the coziness of Washington.

Or, away from the talking points politicians are jawing onstage, it’s how business is done.