When I moved back to Seattle in 1990, I was scoping out the local political scene at about the time that the U.S. launched its Desert Storm attack on Kuwait and Iraq. I remember being deeply impressed with Seattle's Congressional rep., Jim McDermott, who actually took the time to put in an appearance at Seattle's Federal Building with anti-war protesters. His opposition to the war seemed heartfelt, and along with his staunch support of a single-payer health plan, it seemed like McDermott was on a trajectory that left him perhaps not one of the House's most influential members, but certainly among its most principled.

Fast forward eight and a half years. With a Democratic President in office, suddenly Jim McDermott, veteran of half a dozen or so essentially unopposed re-elections, is all for it when America decides to lethally bomb a civilian population--this time in Yugoslavia, and this time when nobody is even trying to fight back. Suddenly the man who is perhaps Congress's most articulate critic of for-profit health care is, in exchange for a mere $7,000 in campaign money, whoring for a major drug manufacturer by co-sponsoring a bill that would extend the patent for the antihistamine Claritin by three years. A generic drug manufacturer estimates that a similar drug could be marketed for $15 a month; at $87 a month, the monopoly enjoyed by Claritin is emblamatic of everything that's wrong with capitalist health care, and now Jim McDermott is all the way on board of this despicable game.

What has happened to the Jim McDermott Seattleites thought they were voting for?

At the behest of Bill Clinton's example and Boeing's money, McDermott has emerged as one of the Democrats' most ardent proponents of free trade. His sponsorship of the Sub-Saharan African Free Trade Bill would, according to critics, essentially re-colonize Africa by requiring IMF "structural adjustments" (that is, perpetual misery) for two dozen African governments in exchange for their participation in the global economy. Last week, McDermott endorsed the Forest Practices Agreement, an enormously destructive sub-agreement of the World Trade Organization that would lift tariffs on wood products. The FPA was opposed by virtually every environmental group in the land, but to McDermott "free" trade was more important than rainforest destruction, global climate change, or even lost jobs at home, as the Pacific Northwest converts its remaining commercial and old-growth trees into wood chips for Japan.

In a close vote two weeks ago, the House of Representatives passed an insane plan to use a projected federal budget surplus not to replace some of the money for social programs gutted over the past two decades--most recently on Clinton's watch--but to give a $792 billion tax cut--yet another transfer of federal money--to the wealthy. In Washington state, House reps voted along party lines--except for Jim McDermott, who failed to cast what could have been a deciding vote. He didn't vote at all.

The question has to be asked: what the hell is Jim McDermott up to?

Rumor has it he's considering a late entry into the race to challenge Slade Gorton for his Senate seat next year. If he is trying to position himself as more centrist for such a race, it's an idiotic move; he will always be seen, in a statewide race, as a Seattle liberal. He will never be seen by corporate America as more friendly or more able to deliver the goods than Gorton--even though he's apparently trying. And even though his short-term political gain means long-term problems for the victims of legislation like the Africa bill.

Or--we're just considering theories here--perhaps things like the opposition to the war in Iraq, or posturing over a single-payer plan that was never seriously in danger of being considered by Congress, were so much bullshit. Maybe McDermott is simply a party hack who goes wherever the leadership points him--most recently, to Clinton's corporate centrism. Support for this hypothesis: McDermott's sleazy taped incrimination of Newt Gingrich a couple years ago. Progressives tended to rejoice over Newt's being nailed--and not focus on the role of McDermott, which was less than honorable (and of questionable legality).

Maybe J.M. will simply do whatever it takes to get ahead, without regard to principle or long-term impact.

McDermott is no Jennifer Dunn; he has unquestionably done good things in Congress. But he doesn't deserve the free ride he gets from Seattle liberals, and increasingly he's exploiting it while he runs the other way. I want a Congressman like the 1990 Jim McDermott, who stands for something good. In 2000, Jim McDermott stands for the wisdom of term limits.