Lessons learned
by digby
I wrote about why Hillary Clinton may be taking more liberal and populist positions in her campaign so far and how the media and the rest of us are reacting to it for Salon this morning. It’s quite interesting, although surely just a brief moment in what is likely to be a very tumultuous campaign:
Hillary Clinton’s campaign rollout so far has taken many people by surprise. All the silly folderol about emails and her unwillingness to talk to the press aside, what seems to have many reeling is the list of rather shockingly liberal agenda items she’s announced and the decidedly populist approach she’s taken to solving them. Apparently most observers thought she would run as if it were 1992 and the long-disbanded Democratic Leadership Council was in its heyday. But you have to admit that even by comparison to her run in 2008, she it taking a much more aggressively progressive stance on a number of issues from immigration to criminal justice reform to voting rights that just a short while ago would have been seen to be dangerous ground for a Democratic candidate for president.
For decades Democrats tried to finesse thorny racial issues (which is what many of those issues named above subconsciously relate to) while still being seen as the party friendly to racial minorities. It hasn’t bought them a white Southern vote in a national election in decades. It was always a fool’s errand but it took the victory of an African American president to finally show the party how to win without them.
And Clinton, not being a fool, can see that quite clearly as well. But she doesn’t seem to arrogantly believe that the coalition that elected President Obama twice should be taken for granted — and good for her. It shouldn’t be and if the Democratic party expects to win presidential elections it has an obligation to put the needs of those voters above the prejudices of voters who will never vote for them anyway. It’s hard to believe they ever thought that was a winning strategy in the first place.
I don’t write those headlines and I would argue that contrary to what this one says, my piece doesn’t make a case that progressives should “believe.” I simply point out that her history shows that many people once saw her as a liberal feminist, now she’s perceived as a centrist and her record shows that — it’s complicated. But what the piece is really about is her strategy, which would have once been considered somewhat dangerous for a serious presidential candidate. It says something about the political terrain and the lessons learned over the past few years that she is choosing a pretty liberal domestic agenda.
I would also add, as I have written many times, her foreign policy is much more opaque to me and I am anxious to see what she says about that. We have plenty of time for this campaign to unfold and I’m making no judgements at this point beyond the fact that I do give her an extra couple of points because I would really like see a woman president before I die — for which I offer no apologies.
But rest assured I’m not exhorting anyone to “believe”. I don’t “believe” in any politician and I wouldn’t expect anyone else to do that either.
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