Clinton nearly had a balanced budget.
Obama has been running huge deficits of over $1 trillion.
Right, that’s another way that Obama is a rightwinger, closer to Reagan and GWB, than Clinton. Thanks!
The President isn’t responsible for the budget, that’s Congress. Moreover the deficits were inherited by Obama and a result of the heavily depressed economy. Had Obama been President during the tech-boom of the 90s things would be dramatically different.
Already pointed out, but comparable to Infinite Reach.
No, Clinton was significantly rightward of Reagan, who wanted free movement of labour from Canada and Mexico - Clinton beefed up border security at the same time as passing NAFTA, which put a lot of Mexican rice farmers out of work.
Huh? isn’t a laissez-faire republican right of a centralist democratic?
The only reason Obama is perceived as left of Clinton is the Republican Party is farther right than ever on social issues. So naturally they paint the black man with a socialist. brush. Anybody with moderate views is a socialist or uninvited to the party.
What you’ve got to look at is not the actual political beliefs of Clinton and Obama, but their image in the minds of the leaders of the Republican party. At some point during the Reagan administration, these leaders decided that it was obvious that henceforth they would control American national politics. There would always be a significant amount of Democrats elected, but Democrats would never henceforth be able to get a President elected and would always be in the minority in the House and Senate.
Now this view was insane. They surely knew that in some ways that the demographics were against them. They could only believe this by pretending that the 1960’s and 1970’s were a blip and they were still in the 1950’s. In fact, the proportion of blacks in the U.S. was up somewhat, the proportion of them that voted was up greatly, and the proportion that voted Democratic was up even more. The proportion of Hispanics was up also, the proportion who voted was up greatly, and the proportion who voted Democratic was up too. The proportion of women who voted was up, and the proportion who voted Democratic was up too. They were losing on many cultural issues too. The proportion of the American public that believed that homosexuality shouldn’t be a crime, that homosexuals shouldn’t be barred from many jobs, and that same-sex marriage should be legal had been growing and continues to grow. The proportion who use birth control had been growing and continues to grow. The proportion who believe abortion should be legal isn’t decreasing. The proportion that believes that some sort of Protestant fundamentalist church should be considered the “real” American religion (in some odd fashion) isn’t increasing. The acceptance of racially mixed marriage is increasing, and the proportion of whites willing to vote for a black is increasing.
This is why the election of Clinton stunned them, and the election of Obama completely enraged them. They argued to themselves that Democrats were cheating by having President/Vice President ticket in 1992 that were both white Southern males (and a President that was in some ways a good old boy). They told themselves, “Doesn’t the voting public know that the Democrats are cheating by putting them up for President and Vice-President? Don’t they know that nearly all Democratic leaders are really Northeastern radicals, mostly women, a lot black or Hispanic, mostly atheists, mostly gay? Don’t the voters realize that the Democrats cheated by putting a couple of straight good old boy Southern white males as their candidates?” They could thus argue to themselves that Democrats won in 1992 only by having Presidental and Vice-Presidental candidates that didn’t fit their image of what Democrats were.
The election of 2008 was far more shocking to them. Obama is approximately as liberal as Clilnton, and the bills he’s tried to get passed are approximately as liberal. What shocks the Republican leaders is that he’s someone that they figured never could be elected. How, they ask themselves, could the American public have elected someone who was black, who was the child of a white mother and a black father, who grew up in a state where the majority population was Asian and who spent time as a child in an Asian country, whose last name was almost the same as a famous terrorist, whose middle name was almost the same as a famous dictator of an unfriendly country, whose father was never even an American citizen and who was an atheist brought up as a Moslem, whose mother was a Ph.D. whose religious beliefs were similar to those people who call themselves “spiritual but not religious,” and who didn’t himself join a Christian church till his mid-twenties.
This is why Obama angers them so much and why they are willing to say the vilest things about him. He differs so greatly from their view of who could elected on a national scale that it drives them crazy. They can’t understand why the American public would elect someone that far from their own image of what an American national leader should be.
Not sure it proves anything, really. Obama’s Congresses have been to the right of him, of course.
If Obama had raised deficits in a time of prosperity, we could say he was in the tradition of Nixon, Reagan, and GWB. But I think any President would run large deficits in an acute depression.
You could argue that the proper right-wing answer would be austerity, but I don’t think Reagan would agree. And in any case, considering the stimulus was half tax cuts, and Obama has most certainly not increased federal hiring at Reagan or GWB levels, let alone FDR levels, it looks like Obama is to the right of the putative right-wingers here.
Good post, **Wendell Wagner. **I don’t think I’d seen it all tied together like that before.
Right, sorry, may have snipped too much context: Reagan was also lassez-faire on immigration issues, making him more liberal than nationalistic.
Not sure it is a left/right thing but rather the prior experience in government of both Clinton and Obama that shaped views on the balance of the roles of the various branches of government.
Clinton came to the office having been in the executive branch of state government. Obama came with legislative branch experience at both the state and federal levels.
It may be the fuzziness of my memory about the Clinton era but I recall him working with Congress to push his priorities but maintaining a separation of powers. After all Clinton had to deal with a Republican majority Congress. I’ve seen Obama using the executive branch to take a rule making role on things that I think really should be more in the realm of legislative prerogative.
Example:
Congress failed to pass the DREAM Act (versions of which have been introduced since 2001 with bipartisan support) which would have offered a legal immigration status and a path to citizenship. Per Janet Napolitano herself, “Only the Congress, acting through its legislative authority, can confer these rights.”
Foreign citizens need a legal immigration status to be able to legally work in the US. There are numerous different categories of visas covering many different statuses: refugees, business owners, skilled workers, relatives of Americans, and so on.
Nevertheless, Obama issues an executive order to implement provisions of the DREAM Act to the extent he feels the executive branch can exert control. But Obama went beyond changing enforcement provisions and included offering work permits for the class of persons deemed eligible for deferred action by the executive order.
So the executive brand, under Obama, unilaterally took over a legislative branch role - deciding what the qualifications for a work visa should be.
Arguably there was another instance of Obama taking unilateral action that usurped legislative authority.
Each house of Congress has sole rule making authority over its own operations. (US Constitution, Article I, Section 5, Clause 2) with a restriction that each house must gain consent of the other house to adjourn for more than 3 days (US Constitution, Article I, Section 5, Clause 4).
However Obama made recess appointments while the Senate had not adjourned. The Senate continued in the controversial practice of pro forma sessions, but would have had to receive consent from the House to formally adjourn.
Again, this points out the difficulties inherent in comparing administrations that operate under different political climates. The Republican controlled Congress during the Clinton era was much less obstructive than the no-compromise congress Obama was had to work with.
Also, the executive branch was drastically changed by 9/11 and the rise of executive power under the Bush administration.
What happened in between?
he hasn’t. move on.