Dissecting the Political Machine
BTW, I use "machine" singular because ultimately, the two parties work together when confronted by real opposition from the people.
The machine thrives on human weakness. Four main items:
need for money
low self-esteem
ego
general fear and anxiety
There is great fear out there that if you do anything to change things, you will be targeted and they will make your life difficult.
And it's true! But I'm still alive and kicking and the more people who join the fight, the less chance any individual will be attacked.
The truth is, the machine is a lot smaller and weaker than we might imagine.
Look at Jim Domagalski, for example, who only got a few hundred more signatures than DiPietro even though he has a machine and Dave doesn't. (I'm on Dave's staff.)
The tea party movement actually has more people than the machine does but the machine's hacks are more experienced and more disciplined.
The real advantage the machine has is not troops but money. As I said at the first meeting of Free Buffalo, the machine monetizes their control of $20 billion of government spending each year re Erie County. As I say in my book, let's assume the machine peels off about one percent of government spending for its political operation. That translates into millions to beat any change candidate.
There's no real answer to the money edge other than to make up for it in small donations, volunteers and intelligent use of the web.
Dave beat Volker in Erie Co. last time even though he was outspent 20-1 at least, so money is not always decisive.
The machine also wants us all to think it's hopeless to fight them. It's not true! Throughout history, regimes far more powerful than these creeps were overthrown.
But alleged hopelessness plays into our natural laziness and gives us a nice excuse to do nothing. After all, its hopeless anyway.
Long story short, the battle ground of the tea party movement in terms of local races is DiPietro versus two machine hacks, Domagalski and Gallivan.
