# What Hillary Clinton accomplishment are you most proud of? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [April 18, 2016, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547 "2016-04-18T11:34:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/41 "2016-04-19T01:41:03Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Us, as in conservatives who supported the war(which was most of us, except for some paleocons like Pat Buchanan). So it’s a good thing that she supported the worst decision in US history, just because you can spin it as a win for Team Red? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/42 "2016-04-19T02:11:42Z")
No. I just said that at the time, I was grateful for her support, and I can’t blame her for being wrong about the same thing I was wrong about. But it is fair to note that the most important things she ever did were in OUR service not yours. I expect that will continue as President. ---
**Author:** ![DerekMichaels00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f14d63/32.png) [@DerekMichaels00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DerekMichaels00)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/43 "2016-04-19T04:45:33Z")
given that I openly admit I like buy-one-get-one-free, Billary’s 1993-2001 presidency is the accomplishment I’m most proud of. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/44 "2016-04-19T11:18:20Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > No. I just said that at the time, I was grateful for her support, and I can’t blame her for being wrong about the same thing I was wrong about. But it is fair to note that the most important things she ever did were in OUR service not yours. I expect that will continue as President. So the Iraq war was in service to conservatives, not liberals? Sounds like tribalism to me. Back to the question, what has any president done before being president? Ike was famously asked what were Nixon’s accomplishments and he said he couldn’t think of any. What were W’s accomplishments? Trading Sammy Sosa? Mocking a woman on death row pleading for her life? What were Obama’s? Reagan’s? It’s a silly question- nobody (well, maybe George Washington) gets to the White House based on what they already did, it’s based on what we think they will do. ---
**Author:** ![Smitty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Smitty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smitty)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/45 "2016-04-19T12:15:02Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > Condi repeatedly lied about Iraq while she was the NSA. Her lack of personal integrity taints anything she did while SoS. You actually want to play the honesty card? When the topic is Hillary? Wow! And I guess you think Donald Trump is a paragon of quiet dignity? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/46 "2016-04-19T12:50:11Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > Back to the question, what has any president done before being president? Ike was famously asked what were Nixon’s accomplishments and he said he couldn’t think of any. What were W’s accomplishments? Trading Sammy Sosa? Mocking a woman on death row pleading for her life? What were Obama’s? Reagan’s? It’s a silly question- nobody (well, maybe George Washington) gets to the White House based on what they already did, it’s based on what we think they will do. Nixon was just a VP. A VP can easily go years without ever doing anything. W was a governor and a mediocre one, but as with Clinton his accomplishment was apparently his “brand”. he was a Bush and Bushes were automatically considered competent for some reason. Bill though was a very good governor of Arkansas and all Ike did was manage the Western front in WWII. His job also involved a lot of diplomacy so one could make a case that he was actually the most qualified President ever. Reagan was actually a quite successful governor of California. Most Presidents are actually quite accomplished before becoming President. We’ve kind of gotten away from that in recent years unfortunately, relying instead of celebrity and branding rather than accomplishments, which is why Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are beating John Kasich and why Clinton and Sanders beat Martin O’Malley. Boring competence and a great record of accomplishment doesn’t interest voters anymore. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/47 "2016-04-19T13:10:03Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Reagan was actually a quite successful governor of California. I have to admit it was good that he signed a bill legalizing abortion in California, signed what was at the time the biggest tax increase in California history, and state spending nearly doubled during his tenure. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/48 "2016-04-19T13:28:24Z")
Yeah, he never had a complete idea of what it meant to be a conservative. He did also return a lot of excess tax revenue to taxpayers, when California legislators wanted to spend it. That’s just unbelievable greed given that state spending was already rising at such a high rate. That’s pretty much the story of Reagan’s career: fighting to slow the growth of spending rather than actually rolling it back. ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/49 "2016-04-19T20:51:17Z")
**adaher** , just out of curiosity, is “what have they accomplished” a major criteria for you in choosing a President? I ask because personally I care a lot more about what I think they _would_ do. Clinton has never had substantial power over U.S. domestic policy before (an individual Senator doesn’t really have that much power - way more than you or me, sure, but not _that_ much). As President she would, and it’s mainly because of the policies I expect her to support that I’d vote for her. (On foreign policy, I probably won’t be as much of a fan, but she’s still better than the Republican alternatives.) ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/50 "2016-04-19T20:58:29Z")
I’m not proud of anything Hillary Clinton’s done; she’s not my daughter. Like others have said, I support her because of what I think she will or won’t do as president. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/51 "2016-04-19T21:36:55Z")
> [@tim314](#): > > **adaher** , just out of curiosity, is “what have they accomplished” a major criteria for you in choosing a President? I ask because personally I care a lot more about what I think they _would_ do. Clinton has never had substantial power over U.S. domestic policy before (an individual Senator doesn’t really have that much power - way more than you or me, sure, but not _that_ much). As President she would, and it’s mainly because of the policies I expect her to support that I’d vote for her. (On foreign policy, I probably won’t be as much of a fan, but she’s still better than the Republican alternatives.) What you plan to do is of little relevance if you haven’t done anything. Getting things done as President is not a simple matter of what a President wants to do. John Kasich has actually done things and has excelled as a Congressman and a governor. That’s why I can be pretty comfortable with his ability to handle the Presidency. Clinton has never fallen flat on her face at anything she’s tried, but she was an average Senator and SecState, and what she did try to do more often than not didn’t work very well. When she did succeed, it was primarily by doing what conservatives would have done. ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2016, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/52 "2016-04-19T23:27:50Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > What you plan to do is of little relevance if you haven’t done anything. I don’t think I buy this. Sure, there are lots of things that are hard for the President to achieve. But there are also lots of things that are _easy_ for the President to do (and that are difficult or impossible for a Senator or Secretary of State). Changing the make-up of the Supreme Court, for example. I’m sure both Hilary Clinton and, say, Ted Cruz could easily find a qualified candidate, and even if it takes a few tries could eventually get one confirmed. But the ideology of that Justice would be dramatically different between the two, and that can impact the U.S. for decades. More generally, the President has tons of advisors, including experts in all areas of government. Probably what matters most is who they will listen to. I myself would be woefully unqualified to be POTUS by any reasonable measure, but I’m still quite sure that if given the job I’d leave the country in a state that progressives would prefer to anything they’d get from someone on the far right, just because of who I’d choose to listen to. (Admittedly most Presidential candidates are probably less humble than me when it comes to admitting they wouldn’t know how to run the country on their own.) > [@](#): > > John Kasich has actually done things and has excelled as a Congressman and a governor. Yeah, he’s done things like roll back abortion rights in his state. I’m sure many liberals would have rather had an ineffectual conservative governor than an effective one. (Many Republicans clearly feel the same way about the Presidency, as evidenced by the Republican Congressional strategy of “don’t let Obama achieve anything”.) I guess I find it hard to believe that “accomplishments” trumps politics for anyone who cares about the politics, except in cases where the two candidates are politically very similar. If John Kasich had been as effective at pursuing Bernie Sanders’ agenda as he has been at pursuing his own, would you still support him? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2016, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/53 "2016-04-20T04:08:42Z")
No better American woman could conceivably have gotten as far as Hillary has. That is American feminism’s triumph and tragedy both at once. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2016, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/54 "2016-04-20T11:59:39Z")
> [@tim314](#): > > I don’t think I buy this. Sure, there are lots of things that are hard for the President to achieve. But there are also lots of things that are _easy_ for the President to do (and that are difficult or impossible for a Senator or Secretary of State). Changing the make-up of the Supreme Court, for example. I’m sure both Hilary Clinton and, say, Ted Cruz could easily find a qualified candidate, and even if it takes a few tries could eventually get one confirmed. But the ideology of that Justice would be dramatically different between the two, and that can impact the U.S. for decades. Even that’s not a sure thing. It hasn’t happened to Democrats yet, but eventually they’ll accidentally pick a conservative. Although I notice that it tended to happen mainly to Republican Presidents who didn’t have a legal background. Clinton probably won’t have that problem. However, other problems are much tougher to solve. Witness Obama and trying to get felons prioritized. He’s generally failed in his battles with the INS bureaucracy: > [@](#): > > Federal immigration enforcement has totally transformed over the past 20 years. More people are eligible for deportation than ever before. The growth of the unauthorized population pre–Great Recession meant there were more people to deport. After 9/11, the government got vastly more money and resources for deportation. And deportations escalated accordingly — from 183,000 in 1999 to a high of 400,000 during the first several years of the Obama administration. > > President Obama has spent most of his time in office trying to impose some sort of control on all of this — to make sure the government is choosing who’s most important to deport, rather than arbitrarily deporting anyone Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents get their hands on. His first attempts — setting high and low “priorities” for deportation and telling immigration agents to follow them — were something both sides in the current court case agree he could do but that rank-and-file immigration agents frequently ignored in favor of their own judgment. > **[United States v. Texas, the biggest immigration case in a century, explained](https://www.vox.com/2016/4/15/11424614/supreme-court-immigration-dapa-daca)** > > Vox is a general interest news site for the 21st century. Its mission: to help everyone understand our complicated world, so that we can all help shape it. In text, video and audio, our reporters explain politics, policy, world affairs, technology,... Being an effective leader requires of course the ability to lead, but also to understand management, something which has been a major challenge for the current President and may continue to be a challenge for Clinton in a way that it probably won’t be for someone like Kasich and wouldn’t have been had O’Malley been the Democratic nominee. Although I’d note that one advantage Clinton will have over Obama is superior legislative experience. Obama was never much of a dealmaker as a Senator. Clinton has experience making deals both as a Senator and as First Lady, as others have shown in this thread. So that will probably improve. > [@](#): > > I guess I find it hard to believe that “accomplishments” trumps politics for anyone who cares about the politics, except in cases where the two candidates are politically very similar. If John Kasich had been as effective at pursuing Bernie Sanders’ agenda as he has been at pursuing his own, would you still support him? Where it matters most of course is in primaries, which is why I’m kind of dismayed at how both parties’ voters seem to have just chucked resume in favor of celebrity. I think even the media has been a bit taken aback, because John Kasich and Martin O’Malley received reasonable amounts of coverage as Presidential prospects long before the process got started. It was just assumed that they’d be fairly competitive given their records. Maybe thiis is only temporary because the electorate is so pissed off. The problem is that it’s a vicious cycle. A pissed off electorate keeps choosing unprepared candidates, which makes them more pissed off. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2016, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547/55 "2016-04-20T23:01:20Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Even that’s not a sure thing. It hasn’t happened to Democrats yet, but eventually they’ll accidentally pick a conservative. Maybe one, or even two - but \*all \*picks for the foreseeable future will be made by Democratic Presidents, so the odds are still pretty damn good. > [@](#): > > Although I notice that it tended to happen mainly to Republican Presidents who didn’t have a legal background. Examples of Justices fundamentally shifting ideology once on the bench are predominantly (I’d say exclusively except somebody’s gonna come up with an example) have been toward liberal/progressive, not vice versa. > [@](#): > > Obama was never much of a dealmaker as a Senator. You’re shitting us, right? 😃 > [@](#): > > Clinton has experience making deals both as a Senator and as First Lady, as others have shown in this thread. So that will probably improve. It will improve, yes, but because the voters will have gotten sick of your party’s reflexive obstructionism and taken the Senate away from them, like you’d take a toy drum away from a toddler. > [@](#): > > Where it matters most of course is in primaries, which is why I’m kind of dismayed at how both parties’ voters seem to have just chucked resume in favor of celebrity. That \*right \*after you praised Clinton’s resume. The very next paragraph. > [@](#): > > Maybe thiis is only temporary because the electorate is so pissed off. The problem is that it’s a vicious cycle. A pissed off electorate keeps choosing unprepared candidates, which makes them more pissed off. Well, for your party, that’s true. But be careful about generalizing. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-hillary-clinton-accomplishment-are-you-most-proud-of/752547.md?page=2)