4 big differences among the leading Democratic candidates ahead of Tuesday's debate
'Hillary Rodham Clinton has taken the world of politics by surprise the past couple of weeks, giving her support to the most liberal members of her party on trade, climate change and Wall Street. She has now joined her foremost competitors for the Democratic presidential nomination -- Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Martin O'Malley, the former governor of Maryland -- in signing on to the same ambitiously progressive program.
That united front contrasts with the discord in the Republican Party, where internal divisions have been on display this week as GOP factions in the House dispute who will replace Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) as speaker.
This newly solidified Democratic agenda also contrasts with the situation in the party not all that long ago. After a catastrophic financial crisis and 15 years of declining incomes for typical American households, Democrats seem to have diminishing confidence in the potential of the free market to provide an improving standard of living.
"Bill Clinton said, 'The era of big government is over,' " recalled Ross Eisenbrey, the vice president of the liberal Economic Policy Institute, citing the former president's State of the Union address in 1996. "Democrats for a long time have run from the notion that government can be -- often is -- the only solution to certain problems."
Today, the Democratic candidates -- the people who will present the party's ideas on national television in next week's primary debate -- are in agreement on the need for strict regulation of the financial sector and an increase in the federal minimum wage. They're also wary of the invisible hand of international commerce. They oppose a trade agreement in the Pacific negotiated by President Obama along with the construction of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry Canadian tar to refineries on the Gulf Coast.
That Democrats are in agreement on these points can obscure the fact that they haven't yet come to a consensus on several important points. Viewers might hear more about these unanswered questions in the first Democratic debate on CNN Tuesday evening at 8:30 p.m. EDT. >>>
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/ct-democratic-debate-preview-20151012-story.html
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