If Reagan was considered a warmonger, it wasn’t for his military interventions but rather his massive and unnecessary military buildup. Coupled with massive and unnecessary tax cuts, we can see the roots of a stock criticism of Republicans in general- it isn’t that they are warmongers per se, it is that they take steps to intentionally drive up the national debt for the purpose of manufacturing an excuse to undermine or destroy Social Security and Medicare. That is the big-picture, stupid Republican war.
Reagan started the massive debt buildup. It continued under HW (though frankly I am unsure of his intentions re: SS), paused only under Clinton, and then continued full-bore under W. Now we see this strategy coming to fruition with Trump, who is all but explicitly stating that the solution to the national debt is to slash Social Security. The current Speaker of the House also favors massive cuts to SS and Medicare, in the name of balanced budgets. So do nearly all high-level Republicans.
I’m not aware of any similar proposals out of Clinton. If we narrow things down to this one issue, it isn’t clear why middle class or poor people would favor Trump over Clinton- Trump wants to pay for all the fat military contracts W handed out (while handing out scads more of his own) with the public’s retirement benefits, and Clinton does not.
Yet there seems to be almost an hysteria in some quarters at the prospect of a Clinton presidency. It can’t be over the prospect of middle class people being stripped of their benefits for the sake of defense industry profits so… what is it?
ps. adaher, it is foolishness and blind partisanship to draw conclusions about democrats in general based on comparing reactions to the Iraq War vs. Obama’s drone strikes. The Iraq War was blatantly stupid and based on lies, while the drone strikes are (objectively, I’d say) merely controversial. People reacted strongly to W because his polices were stupid and harmful to the public, not because he was a Republican. Sorry if the reputation of the GOP remains tainted to this day- don’t blame Democrats, blame your own leaders.
Yes Hillary is a hawk. She went out of her way to promote false war crime accusations in order to gin up support for bombing Libya into chaos. This is past hawkishness and Ted Cruz, well into John Kasich, Marco Rubio, and Lindsey Graham territory.
She has criticized Obama for not instigating war with Russia, and also for not killing more Syrians earlier.
“In her appearance, Mrs. Clinton nevertheless sought to distinguish herself from the president on foreign policy, calling for a tough reassessment of American policy toward Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, and she seemed, by implication, to suggest that the Obama administration had not responded strongly enough to the annexation of Crimea and the continuing military action in Ukraine. She noted the recent reports of Russian troops in Syria and argued “we need a concerted effort to up the costs on Russia and Putin — I am in the camp that we have not done enough.””
Good gravy. Your reading comprehension skills appear to have deserted you: a “concerted effort to up the costs on Russia and Putin” is not remotely equivalent to “instigating war.”
You might spend a little time with the dictionary; as a starting point, look up “sanctions.”
Which naturally leads to the question: is Clint Eastwood scheduled to appear at the GOP convention this year? (I’m sure there are some chairs that could use a good talking-to…)
And again, if it was just about GWB and IRaq, that would be one thing. But Bush 41 and Reagan faced similar opposition, and even Nixon. See, even when the Democrats made a show of being principled, they had to throw it away by going after Nixon even harder than LBJ and even calling Vietnam “Nixon’s war”.
But it’s not just war. The Patriot Act and surveillance. Democrats were harshly critical of it and suddenly started talking like libertarians. Fast forward to 2013 and Rand Paul can’t get a single Democrat to help him out. And polls show that Democrats are fine with surveillance as long as Obama is the one doing the surveilling:
And Republicans’ support of the Patriot Act swung in the other direction by very nearly the same amount in the same poll. Hmm…think there was any partisanship there? Naah, they all of a sudden developed a conscience.
No, not nearly the same amount. Yes, the view of a lot of policies is going to be partisan. Republicans do support Democratic wars less than Republican wars. But the swings aren’t large enough to influence policy. Democrats can pursue diplomacy(and be supported by their base) and they can pursue war(and be supported by most Republicans while Democrats yawn). Republicans have to contend with public opinion problems on a much greater scale due to Democratic characterization of even their diplomacy as “warmongering”.
According to that article (and, granted, it’s the Daily Mail, but they’re quoting Pew Research, theoretically correctly) Democrats’ support for the Patriot Act increased by 27% and Republicans’ decreased by 23%, so yeah, nearly the same.
“Faced similar opposition”? What, there was opposition to invading Iraq the first time? There was opposition to selling illegal arms to Iran? Of course there was opposition. I don’t recall blind obstruction though.
I’m not quite sure what point you are making. My answer is 1) Nixon assumed proprietorship over the Vietnam War in a way Obama did not with the Iraq war. Nixon extended the war as part of his effort to get re-elected, exactly the kind of dick move everybody expects out of the GOP. Obama rolled up the Iraq war, which arguably has some associated shitty consequences but is clearly a whole 'nother thing. 2) Nixon was altogether worse than LBJ, don’t you agree? Of course he was criticized more.
What’s worse, surveillance plus eliminating Social Security, or surveillance without eliminating Social Security?
And, do you thing this congress could have repealed the Patriot Act? If we didn’t want presidents using this power, why did we allow it in the first place?
Is it better when Obama does it? Well, Bush was altogether worse than Obama, don’t you agree? Don’t you see a little trust gap between these two presidents? Beyond that, the question isn’t very good. The government reading e-mails to catch a terrorist is one thing. The government permanently storing every phone call in a database is another. The poll doesn’t make these distinctions.
But the question I really want answered is: what is the worst-case scenario of a Hillary Clinton presidency? Is “war-hawkishness” your answer?
That’s a feature, not a bug. And I like that if Clinton does feel we need to go to war, that opposition will be muted. She’ll lead a mostly united country into battle.
No, the worst outcome of a Clinton Presidency is… Well, I can’t actually think of much of a downside. Can’t think of much upside either other than that she’s strong on national security. Which I guess makes her a net positive.