How much damage do the Clintons have to do to the Democratic Party before Democrats finally realize that the Clintons are and have only ever been severe liabilities to the party? And will it be too late, as many of us suspect and fear is already the case?
Democrats are still loyal to the Clintons, a loyalty enforced largely by fear of reprisal from the Clintons' vast and deep political network for going off the reservation. Democrats, fearing the Clintons' wrath more than the wrath of their own constituents, vehemently and reflexively defend the Clintons and they desperately need an intervention.
Viewed objectively, the Clintons and their legacy have severely damaged the party and unmoored it from its traditional roots as the party of the people. And despite what the Clinton enforcers will tell you, it is not only OKAY to say the truth out loud, it is now mandatory.
The Clintons are neoliberals, they adhere ideologically to the economic doctrine of neoliberalism, and let's be clear about what neoliberalism is because the name is entirely misleading; neoliberalism is a corrupt and failed conservative ideology of right-wing, supply-side, "trickle down" (AKA "voodoo") economics with only the veneer of "liberalism" because of stances taken on social issues. Neoliberalism is what allowed Democrats to take big donations from corporate America that they could then use to "compete" electorally with the Republican Party's longstanding corruption (fighting the fire of GOP corruption with the fire of Democrats' corruption) while giving their base platitudes, empty rhetoric and substance-free claptrap about social issues to keep them on board. But this isn't sustainable because at some point, the base starts to figure out that despite all of the promises and pretty words, they are and have been getting nothing from the Democratic Party but lip service, which is where we are now.
Bill Clinton steered the party sharply to the right with his "triangulating" ways during his presidency: Welfare reform, a bill that criminalized the poor and for which then First Lady Hillary Clinton whipped votes, the 1994 crime bill, Democrats then got in bed with Wall Street with the Clinton-led repeal of Depression-era Glass-Steagall regulations that were put in place to prevent just the kind of economic meltdown we had that led to the Great Depression in the 1930's, which worked until it was repealed by one Bill Clinton in 1999 inevitably leading to the Great Recession in 2008, his secret deal with Newt Ginrich to do what Republicans have long salivated over and that Republican presidential successor George Bush would be unable to do: privatize Social Security and Medicare, a plan that was only derailed by the Lewinski scandal, mass incarceration, DOMA, NAFTA, expanding the war on drugs, fighting on the wrong side of the culture wars vis-a-vis Joycelyn Elders, Sister Souljah, et.al., Rwanda, etc. ad nauseum.
This is what triangulating neoliberalism looks like.
After Bill Clinton left the Oval Office, he cashed in on the speech circuit. Hillary Clinton rode her husband's name recognition and all of the privilege that it engenders all the way to eventually propel the Arkansas girl into a Senate seat in New York. This was a case of naked political ambition; someone with the name, the resources and all of the opportunities, privileges and advantages those thing afford, shopping around for a safe Senate district to move to and run in. And it worked, Hillary Clinton expanded her political network as senator and developed the bona fides necessary to run for president.
Obama was smart to give her the SoS job after she lost the primary to him in 2008 insuring that she wouldn't try to primary him in 2012. She used that position, as corrupt politicians do, to further build her political network and shake down foreigners for donations to her and her husband's foundation.
After leaving the SoS position, Hillary Clinton - who EVERYONE knew would be running for president in 2016 - seriously cashed in giving way-over-compensated speeches to big banks and other Wall Street-connected firms, a clear "quid" for the "pro quo" of serving those company's interests should she be elected president. Clear evidence of corruption and blatant conflicts of interest but because of the normalization of corruption that has taken place over the last several decades, Clinton was corrupt and we all knew it - her supporters included - but no one cared ("that's just the way politics is done") except for the few of us on the fringes who still maintained our integrity.
Neoliberal Hillary Clinton then secretly took over the DNC (I won't even get into her email server or the fact that she was under active investigation by the FBI during her run) corrupting it and tilting the playing field to insure she became the party's nominee. It was her turn after all. What's more, she is the first nominee in American history that didn't actually campaign for votes believing ostensibly that she was simply entitled to a majority of vote simply by dint of being the Democratic nominee.
The Clintons and the infestation of their corrupt, insidious neoliberal ideology deep into the Democratic Party sold out the party and transformed it from being a party of the people to being another corrupt party on the payroll of corporate America such that we now have two of them and they're the only two political parties that we have. They are two sides of the same coin.
Democrats went from being the party of labor to the party of Wall Street, whose interests are DIAMETRICALLY opposed to labor. Democrats naturally became anti-labor as a result thus enabling the rapid decline of labor's influence politically thanks to the Democrats' paid-for, purposeful weak opposition to the GOP's efforts to kill unions.
This corruption of both of our only two political parties and hence the corruption of our entire political system means that there is now no longer any political party to represent the people, the people have been completely disenfranchised from our system of government. It is no wonder that our election turnouts are so low.
The Clintons in their naked political ambition have corrupted and destroyed the Democratic Party and the DNC. They gave us President Donald Fucking Trump.
Unless and until the Democratic Party emphatically rejects neoliberal Clintonism, ceremoniously casts the Clintons aside and embraces their roots again as the party of the people, their downward spiral will continue unabated.
The American people can see it clearly. They came together and voted for change in 2008, 2010, 2012, and 2014 but all that promised change never came. So in 2016, they voted to throw a goddamned wrench into the political establishment vis-a-vis the candidacy of Donald Trump.
The writing is on the wall, Democrats and Democratic partisans, yet you still purposefully avert your gaze. You are in denial. You've been led right to the water's edge but it is now up to you to drink before you die of thirst, taking the rest of us down with you.
FDR put it much more succinctly, and is a lesson that the Clintons, other neoliberal Democrats and Democratic partisans apparently never learned even after it was empirically proven in 2016:
"The Democratic Party has received the support of the electorate only when the party, with absolute clarity, has been the champion of progressive and liberal policies and principles of government."
Democrats are still loyal to the Clintons, a loyalty enforced largely by fear of reprisal from the Clintons' vast and deep political network for going off the reservation. Democrats, fearing the Clintons' wrath more than the wrath of their own constituents, vehemently and reflexively defend the Clintons and they desperately need an intervention.
Viewed objectively, the Clintons and their legacy have severely damaged the party and unmoored it from its traditional roots as the party of the people. And despite what the Clinton enforcers will tell you, it is not only OKAY to say the truth out loud, it is now mandatory.
The Clintons are neoliberals, they adhere ideologically to the economic doctrine of neoliberalism, and let's be clear about what neoliberalism is because the name is entirely misleading; neoliberalism is a corrupt and failed conservative ideology of right-wing, supply-side, "trickle down" (AKA "voodoo") economics with only the veneer of "liberalism" because of stances taken on social issues. Neoliberalism is what allowed Democrats to take big donations from corporate America that they could then use to "compete" electorally with the Republican Party's longstanding corruption (fighting the fire of GOP corruption with the fire of Democrats' corruption) while giving their base platitudes, empty rhetoric and substance-free claptrap about social issues to keep them on board. But this isn't sustainable because at some point, the base starts to figure out that despite all of the promises and pretty words, they are and have been getting nothing from the Democratic Party but lip service, which is where we are now.
Bill Clinton steered the party sharply to the right with his "triangulating" ways during his presidency: Welfare reform, a bill that criminalized the poor and for which then First Lady Hillary Clinton whipped votes, the 1994 crime bill, Democrats then got in bed with Wall Street with the Clinton-led repeal of Depression-era Glass-Steagall regulations that were put in place to prevent just the kind of economic meltdown we had that led to the Great Depression in the 1930's, which worked until it was repealed by one Bill Clinton in 1999 inevitably leading to the Great Recession in 2008, his secret deal with Newt Ginrich to do what Republicans have long salivated over and that Republican presidential successor George Bush would be unable to do: privatize Social Security and Medicare, a plan that was only derailed by the Lewinski scandal, mass incarceration, DOMA, NAFTA, expanding the war on drugs, fighting on the wrong side of the culture wars vis-a-vis Joycelyn Elders, Sister Souljah, et.al., Rwanda, etc. ad nauseum.
This is what triangulating neoliberalism looks like.
After Bill Clinton left the Oval Office, he cashed in on the speech circuit. Hillary Clinton rode her husband's name recognition and all of the privilege that it engenders all the way to eventually propel the Arkansas girl into a Senate seat in New York. This was a case of naked political ambition; someone with the name, the resources and all of the opportunities, privileges and advantages those thing afford, shopping around for a safe Senate district to move to and run in. And it worked, Hillary Clinton expanded her political network as senator and developed the bona fides necessary to run for president.
Obama was smart to give her the SoS job after she lost the primary to him in 2008 insuring that she wouldn't try to primary him in 2012. She used that position, as corrupt politicians do, to further build her political network and shake down foreigners for donations to her and her husband's foundation.
After leaving the SoS position, Hillary Clinton - who EVERYONE knew would be running for president in 2016 - seriously cashed in giving way-over-compensated speeches to big banks and other Wall Street-connected firms, a clear "quid" for the "pro quo" of serving those company's interests should she be elected president. Clear evidence of corruption and blatant conflicts of interest but because of the normalization of corruption that has taken place over the last several decades, Clinton was corrupt and we all knew it - her supporters included - but no one cared ("that's just the way politics is done") except for the few of us on the fringes who still maintained our integrity.
Neoliberal Hillary Clinton then secretly took over the DNC (I won't even get into her email server or the fact that she was under active investigation by the FBI during her run) corrupting it and tilting the playing field to insure she became the party's nominee. It was her turn after all. What's more, she is the first nominee in American history that didn't actually campaign for votes believing ostensibly that she was simply entitled to a majority of vote simply by dint of being the Democratic nominee.
The Clintons and the infestation of their corrupt, insidious neoliberal ideology deep into the Democratic Party sold out the party and transformed it from being a party of the people to being another corrupt party on the payroll of corporate America such that we now have two of them and they're the only two political parties that we have. They are two sides of the same coin.
Democrats went from being the party of labor to the party of Wall Street, whose interests are DIAMETRICALLY opposed to labor. Democrats naturally became anti-labor as a result thus enabling the rapid decline of labor's influence politically thanks to the Democrats' paid-for, purposeful weak opposition to the GOP's efforts to kill unions.
This corruption of both of our only two political parties and hence the corruption of our entire political system means that there is now no longer any political party to represent the people, the people have been completely disenfranchised from our system of government. It is no wonder that our election turnouts are so low.
The Clintons in their naked political ambition have corrupted and destroyed the Democratic Party and the DNC. They gave us President Donald Fucking Trump.
Unless and until the Democratic Party emphatically rejects neoliberal Clintonism, ceremoniously casts the Clintons aside and embraces their roots again as the party of the people, their downward spiral will continue unabated.
The American people can see it clearly. They came together and voted for change in 2008, 2010, 2012, and 2014 but all that promised change never came. So in 2016, they voted to throw a goddamned wrench into the political establishment vis-a-vis the candidacy of Donald Trump.
The writing is on the wall, Democrats and Democratic partisans, yet you still purposefully avert your gaze. You are in denial. You've been led right to the water's edge but it is now up to you to drink before you die of thirst, taking the rest of us down with you.
FDR put it much more succinctly, and is a lesson that the Clintons, other neoliberal Democrats and Democratic partisans apparently never learned even after it was empirically proven in 2016:
"The Democratic Party has received the support of the electorate only when the party, with absolute clarity, has been the champion of progressive and liberal policies and principles of government."