A shadow covers the Valley. It is in the shape of a fat, blue pig with its fronttrotter outstretched to receive cash from the rich to stuff it where the sun never shines.

Historically, the Blue Dogs were the logical outgrowth of the career of former Rep. Tony Coelho, D-Merced, who preceded Gary Condit and, more importantly, who was in the go-go Eighties the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the campaign slush fund for the Party's candidates and incumbents in the House of Representatives. Coelho got nailed for his involvement with Michael Millken, Wall Street's junk-bond king, later convicted for felonies and sent to prison. Coelho resigned rather than face an investigation and went into investment banking. When, in the course of managing Al Gore's 2000 presidential campaign, Coelho's "colorful" career was getting more media attention than his candidate's speeches, he resigned. An excellent study of Coelho's political career is Honest Graft, by Brooks Jackson.

The Blue Dogs have never stood for anything but money. They are no more than vultures feeding off the corpse of the Democratic Party. Coelho was at the funeral. Through the years, as the economy has grown steadily more concentrated in fewer hands, Blue Dogs dug deeper into the pockets of finance, insurance and real estate than ever, hiding as best they could from the people.