I’m a realist in all things, but that isn’t why I support Hillary over Bernie (and I’m a lifelong Republican and have no designs on changing that, but I’ve voted Democrat before and will this year, and probably few a few more years until the party has worked the crazy out of itself). I think it’s because I’m one who views the Presidency not as a “box to be filled with ideals” but an administrative role, the Chief Magistrate of the country, the commander in chief, the chief diplomat and the holder of a “sacred trust” to execute the laws and work vigorously for the American interest.
To be frank, the ideals a President holds are important–but most of his/her job isn’t about ideals, it’s about execution. That doesn’t mean I’d vote for a crazy monster who had really good management chops, but it does mean that the President’s most important role aren’t the policy positions he holds, but how he runs the country. Now, those policy positions are important because they can inform a voter as to how the President will run the country. For example is this President a foreign policy interventionist or an isolationist? Somewhere in between?
How often have Obama’s “policy positions” been the most important thing going on? To be frank, pretty rarely. Especially domestic policy. The President’s role is constitutionally limited in domestic policy. Because domestic policy requires work with Congress. Further, to be frank, domestic policy almost always changes gradually and incrementally. I think Hillary has said some smart stuff on reform of the healthcare system that sounds a lot more to me like how our country works–and that shows me she’s more knowledgeable about just that thing, how the country works, and more suited to run it.
Plus, I’m not liberal, I’m centrist/conservative generally, so I don’t necessarily want the same things Bernie does. I do agree with more overhaul of the healthcare system, but I think Obamacare has started us along the path to the “German style” of healthcare, which works great. Bernie is advocating for more of an NHS style system, which is fine–but it’s not the only system they use in Bernie’s beloved Europe and it isn’t the only system that works, either. I don’t share Bernie’s issues with Wall Street at all.
Bernie wants to come in as a revolutionary–but revolutionary Presidents have no power without Congressional support. So that leaves him in the Obama role–a President who promised dramatic changes and then couldn’t do much (and he’ll do less than Obama because he won’t have a two year honeymoon period where the Democrats control both houses of Congress) and Obama to be frank has always been a lackluster administrator. Obama was an ideology President, that I think on some levels was frankly depressed when he learned that without a compliant Congress most of those ideologies aren’t going to be much reflected in legislation, so he was left running the country–a task I don’t feel Obama ever approached with vigor.
Now, I don’t buy into HRC being able to work any better with Congress than Obama or Sanders. I do think she is probably a better negotiator, but negotiating takes two sides, and even though Ryan has done a little better at getting bills to the floor than Boehner, I still think there just isn’t any real negotiation to be had with the current crop of Republicans who run Congress, regardless of which Democrat is in the White House. But again–most of a President’s job is not passing legislation, a President’s job is administrative, diplomatic, and military first and foremost. On all those fronts I have little faith in Sanders interest in, or ability to, execute those roles successfully.
Revolutionary candidates like Sanders can work, but they require grave conditions in the country that allow for dramatic changes in Congress. We’ve arguably had three such revolutionary candidates–FDR who obviously was elected during the Great Depression and had a Congress and a people demanding bold and unprecedented action, Lincoln who came to office right after the Southern states had seceded and who was largely given a blank check of authority to do any thing and everything to preserve the Union (and when Congress was sometimes hesitant with the blank check he largely ignored Congress, and the Supreme Court, for that matter–Lincoln was at times a necessary tyrant), and Andrew Jackson, the first “populist” President, who came to office in a wave of discontent with the established system of the day and responses to various structural issues that had been plaguing early America.
We don’t sit before an election like that. While unfortunately a portion of Americans have seen wage stagnation and poor economic prospects, the economy as a whole is strong. Unemployment is low, GDP growth isn’t great, but it’s not recessionary yet and certainly not depression levels. We don’t have any existential foreign policy or military threats. There is thus no reason to expect Sanders represents the tip of a time of revolutionary change, and thus there is no real place for him in the White House. Revolutionary Presidents elected in mundane times don’t have a lot of levers to pull and don’t usually do very well.