The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

    Don't like her don't trust her . . . but

    By HSG on Tue, 03/01/2016 - 9:08pm |

    she just gave her best most progressive speech ever.  She talked about jobs, the middle-class, and working class.  She was adamant that she will hold corporate bad actors accountable.  She called out job off-shorers.  If she wants to go back to the center, it'll be a lot tougher.  Bravo Hillary!

    Comments

    Honestly, man, I know you said "Bernie didn't win anything," but he really did.

    Hillary Clinton is better, from a liberal perspective, for having faced this challenge.

    For example, she now favors a financial transaction tax on high frequency trading.  She did not, when you and I started debating, mid-last year.

    She has also, during this primary season, challenged corporate interests by publicly criticizing huge proposed mergers in the health insurance industry.

    You say it will be hard for her to turn right after tonight's speech and I know that comes from your skepticism about her as a person but, you have to start considering... what if she doesn't want to turn right?  Remember, she was the liberal "Co-President" back in the 90s.  "Triangulation" might have been way more painful to her than it was to either of us but, ironically (given that she might well face Donald Trump in November) she may well have also mastered "The Art of the Deal."


    by Michael Maiello on Tue, 03/01/2016 - 9:56pm

    Thanks Mike.


    by HSG on Tue, 03/01/2016 - 10:08pm

    I think a huge, untold part of this story is (and I think I said this on your radio show) is that Bernie did this right. He mounted an honest, intellectual challenge without ever even trying to hit below the belt and he did it as a primary challenge, even though he was an independent before this election cycle.

    I am starting to think, after seeing this, that if Ralph Nader had challenged Al Gore in the Democratic primary in 2000, rather than in the general election, that we might have gotten a better Al Gore who had would have beaten George Bush and that we'd not be having a lot of the debates we're having now.

    What if Bernie has really changed the course of history in ways we'll never know?


    by Michael Maiello on Tue, 03/01/2016 - 10:28pm

    Perhaps but I don't think the party was ready for someone that liberal in 2000. We've been shifting left for years and Warren really primed the ground for Sanders. The election of a black president made people think anything was possible. If it could have happened in 2000 why didn't Kucinich take off? I'd take Kucinich over Sanders. He's just as left and much smarter. I think he gives a better speech. So why did he go nowhere? Too short, ears to big? Or was the party not ready yet?


    by ocean-kat on Tue, 03/01/2016 - 10:56pm

    Guys, we did have Bill Bradley in 2000, who though not as liberal as Bernie was playing roughly the same role. The biggest difference was the press was much more involved calling Gore a liar and robotic and insincere at every turn, and taking on "Clinton fatigue" out on him since the public wasn't that tired before the put their fingers on the scale for 2 straight years. (playing the Cupid with both Bradley and Bush). At least in 2008 Hillary made enough of her own mistakes and Obama ran a tougher game against her to not have the press such a part of the story, and this year despite "starting to lose" every two weeks since June she's a much more experienced candidate and did the needed regrouping along the way.

    So yeah, Gore got pushed to the left in the primaries and ran against his own successes but Nader in the primaries wouldn't have changed anything. However we had money for social programs in those balanced budget days and "welfare reform" went with a jobs boom of 5 years, and SCHIP had been successful and owning your own home was growing and still considered a great thing, including putting black families solidly into the middle class, while the Big 3 were still making cars people wanted. Quite a different era, and little need for a liberal blowback when social programs and popular well-being were moving in the right direction.


    by PeraclesPlease on Tue, 03/01/2016 - 11:13pm

    Naw, she will swing back to the right in the general if she gets the nomination. You won't hear a word from her about gun regulations now.  She is just pandering to the left.  I doubt if the Sanders supporters are buying much of what she says. 


    by trkingmomoe on Wed, 03/02/2016 - 7:46pm

    Nice attitude there. Grudge much?


    by PeraclesPlease on Thu, 03/03/2016 - 12:58am