When Obama ran he ran as the progressive alternative to Clinton. That was disappointing in many ways. He is a good president, but he didn’t really push hard for progressive legilsation or use the powers of the executive branch to push a progressive agenda.
Clinton is generally seen as a centrist, corporate candidate who will say whatever voters want to say.
What are the odds that if she actually gets to be president she will be a competent progressive? Someone who can use the executive branch, or who will work with congress to get quality legislation passed that angers the right and the wealthy?
I’m not too worried about 2016 because 2020 is the big election. However is there a chance that the general view of Clinton is wrong? It would be ironic if so, but I have no idea.
Neither Obama nor Clinton have ever claimed to be progressives. Expecting them to be progressive once they get elected is being unreasonable. That said, Obama, while still being more conservative than I am, has accomplished quite a number of important progressive goals - not least, in appointing liberals (well, liberal-ishes) to the supreme court. I feel confident that Clinton, if elected, will also accomplish a number of important progressive goals, even though she will never be a progressive. She doesn’t have “anger the wealthy” as a campaign promise, and frankly, I’m glad about that becase think it would be a losing strategy if she did. (Although my heart actually pumps warm piss for the wealthy.)
At the same time, while I’m certain that Clinton is not a progressive, I am equally certain that her main opponent won’t be a progressive either.
The only option is going to be the person who will do some progressive things or the person who will actively stifle progressive things. The choice for progressives is clear.
Is there any viable candidate for the Democratic nomination other than Hillary? Check.
Is there any candidate in the Republican field who isn’t a raving loon? Check.
If the OP’s question is a mere matter of curiosity, I’d point out that Hillary as First Lady did push for health care reform, and she’s smart and politically astute. Whether she’ll end up being more liberal than Obama I have no idea. Does it matter?
The fact that she may be instrumental in appointing rational justices to the Supreme Court in her one or two terms should alone be an overwhelmingly decisive factor in her favor. Imagine if Obama had lost to McCain (and Palin!!) or to Romney! What would the Supreme Court look like? Here’s an other-worldly scenario: McCain wins in 2008. The ACA is never enacted, but he appoints wingnuts to the Court such that it would be overturned in the future even if it was ever enacted. Supreme Court rules against SSM – wingnuts and homophobes across the nation rejoice. McCain drops dead from the stress of the presidency – Sarah Palin becomes President of the United States. Does anyone realize how close things were to a true apocalypse? It’s enough to make anyone get religious!
So, really, I say stop worrying about how “liberal” Hillary is!
I think Clinton might make another push for health care reform.
Clinton pushed for a significant health care package when she was First Lady and got shut down. Pushing it through as President would be vindication.
There’s also the legacy of her 2008 loss to Obama. Most progressives feel Obamacare is only a partial program. If Clinton can enact a serious health care program, then history will say she was a more effective President then Obama was.
But other than health care, on which she has a personal stake, I don’t think Clinton is seeking to be a progressive or liberal. I think she’s looking to be a moderate centrist and will be willing to work with Republicans. That said, I think the Republicans will make a major mistake if they don’t work with her. If the Republicans treat Clinton the way they’ve treated Obama, I think Clinton will make a war out of it. If the Republicans don’t work with Clinton in the middle, she’ll swing off to the left just to spite them.
Hillary will be a triangulator just like Bill. She may not start that way but she’ll turn immediately after her first failure. That’s for domestic issues. I think she’ll try to be a foreign policy president, she’ll be better liked overseas, but she won’t accomplish anything.
I’m not sure what progressive changes can be effected in the near future. Hillary won’t do campaign finance reform, she can’t do any more about immigration reform than anyone else. She doesn’t really care about the environment and she’ll shy away from culture war issues which are mostly being fought on the state level. Wage fairness won’t fly with her corporate sponsors. Federal voting rights could be improved by a skillful politician taking the issue to the people, so I’ll rule that out also.
Hillary was ALWAYS more progressive than Bill. Look at her history; you don’t start your career helping to nail Nixon because you’re planning your life as another schlub machine politician.
Back in 1992 me and my anarchist buddies were all “Screw Clinton, let’s elect his wife.”
I think she’s going to surprise you. And 2020 is going to be the “big election” because that’s when Hillary is gonna get re-elected.
She didn’t start her career helping to nail Nixon. She started her career as a Goldwater supporter.
I think Clinton’s early career indicates she was jumping around a lot in her politics before settling down. I feel that when she did settle into her own political identity, she did so as a moderate Democrat.
It certainly would have seemed astonishing, a few years ago, that Bernie Sanders could have gotten the traction he is getting now – and not because of who he is (a Northeastern Jew with wild hair who is arguably too old to be POTUS), but solely because of his leftist politics.
I suspect her positions will depend on what’s achievable, and what’s achievable will depend on what Congress looks like. I haven’t seen anything yet to suggest that she has specific proposals that are do-or-die for her like Obama on healthcare reform; she’ll do what she can do.
Perhaps. Obama used a basically Republican plan, and was still opposed. It would give them a chance to defeat the Affordable Care Act, poke Obama in the eye and appear to be responsible for a better health care system.
If Obamacare is the most progressive thing that could be got thru with Democratic control of Congress, nothing more progressive is going to get thru a Republican-controlled one.
And it remains to be seen if she will get the chance.
This is key. There is very little chance that the House will flip before the next reapportionment, which will be effective in the 2022 midterms. The Senate map looks about as bad for Republicans in 2016 as it did for Democrats in 2014, so there’s a reasonable chance of the Senate flipping back, but not to a filibuster-proof majority. Moreover, the map is bad again for Democrats in the 2018 midterms, so the Senate could be held by the GOP for the latter half of a Clinton first term.
Given that reality, I would expect a Clinton first term to be mainly hold-the-line on Obama’s policies. Not a disaster, but not a huge progressive win.
• Be more driven by pragmatic practicalities than ideology but
• Will, indeed, have an overall more progressive agenda than her critics on the left seem to anticipate, and
• Will say what she needs to say, will schmooze whoever she thinks she has to schmooze, will do deals, will trade away some progressive goals and goalposts, especially if more symbolic than realworld, if she thinks it will improve her overall success
Some of you won’t ever like her. She’s all politician; you’ll continue to feel that she will say or do anything to be elected and to be re-elected and to appease / appeal to the voters. And that she doesn’t stand for anything or believe in anything except Hillary Clinton. That’s not true. She will say or do almost anything to get into a position of power and to stay there (because if you’re not in poower you can’t do any of the rest of it) and then once in power will try to enact as much of her agenda as she can implement. That may not seem like much of a difference, but to me it’s a meaningful difference.
Also, I think I’ll like most of her agenda and I think she’ll be pretty effective in office.
But I think Clinton will have a very different style than Obama has. Obama wants to be liked; Clinton wants to win. Politicians like Obama or Kennedy or Bill Clinton have charisma and want to maintain their personal popularity. I think Hillary Clinton is a politician like Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon; they don’t have charisma. Their goals are to show that they can get things done so that in retrospect people will grudgingly respect them even if they still don’t like them. Charismatic presidents avoid battles because they don’t want to make enemies. Non-charismatic presidents expect to have enemies - so they seek out battles because they want to show they can defeat their enemies.
As Merneith noted, I don’t believe that was ever the case. I think that was the fervent hope of many of his supporters, especially those who were turned off by Hillary’s seeming bland corporatism and slight hawkishishness. But I was kinda baffled by all of my more lefty friends who were a little disappointed he didn’t turn out to be as progressive as they had wished. He never came off as remotely progressive to me. I voted for him and got pretty much exactly what I expected - another cautious, MOR, moderate Democrat. He’s the political equivalent of the band Bread. That’s not my preference exactly, but he was still better than the alternatives.
Not necessarily so. While the mainstream media went nuts covering the SCOTUS rulings on health care and marriage, they largely ignored another really important one: gerrymandering. That is all about to change. Feast:
