Hillary Clinton's Ghosts: A Legacy of Pushing the Democratic Party to the Right

[stupidicus]

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/33869-hillary-clinton-s-ghosts-a-legacy-of-pushing-the-democratic-party-to-the-right

which makes most of her supporters supporters of rightwingery-lite, doesn't it?

When Bill Clinton left the White House, Hillary Clinton entered the Senate. She quickly became a major player for the DLC, serving as a prominent member of the New Democratic Caucus in the Senate, speaking at conferences on multiple occasions and serving as chair of a key initiative for the 2006 and 2008 elections.

She was even promoted as the DLC's "New Dem of the Week" on its website. (It would be remiss not to note that Martin O'Malley also served as a "New Dem of the Week," and even co-wrote an op-ed on behalf of the DLC with its then-chair, Harold Ford Jr.)
New Democrats were never really about popular support; they were about bringing together big business and the Democrats.

More importantly, Clinton adopted the DLC strategy in the way she governed. She tried to portray herself as a crusader for family values when she introduced legislation to ban violent video games and flag burning in 2005. She also adopted the DLC's hawkish military stance. The DLC was feverishly in favor of Bush's "war on terror" and his invasion of Iraq. Will Marshall, one of the group's founders, was a signatory of many of the now infamous documents from the Project for the New American Century, which urged the United States to radically increase its use of force in Iraq and beyond.

And if you factor in her rightwing religious buddies http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2007/09/hillarys-prayer-hillary-clintons-religion-and-politics , well, it's kinda like putting the fox in charge of the lefty henhouse, no?

[tularetom]

1. The facts are there but you have to look for them yourself

The liberal media will never tell you about them.

[lewebley3]

2. Wrong Hillary has been loyal Dem liberal:before there was the word progressive

This poster has to use the word Ghost: because they don't
have evidence to support the posting.

[stupidicus]

5. so she's actually one of the undead, animated before the word "progressive" was found by Webster?

who knew?

[lewebley3]

8. It still stands that Hillary is a progressive, she has helped lead the Dem party

[Ikonoklast]

30. rightward.

Finished that for you.

[lewebley3]

31. No, she has lead the party with to largest progressive caucus in House; She is a real leader

[Ikonoklast]

32. Jamie Dimon agrees with you.

[lewebley3]

49. Hillary's progressive credentials are on the Web today: It demonstrates that

support have been pushing propaganda that Hillary
is not a progressive.

[ViseGrip]

64. Jamie Dimon is a great example!!!

[cui bono]

27. Hillary is not a liberal.

.

[lewebley3]

29. Hillary very much a liberal, and liberal who just doen't talk; She works

[cui bono]

35. A lot of people work, doesn't make them liberal. She's not a liberal.

Liberals don't cozy up to Wall Street, favor free trade agreements, only change their minds to somewhat liberal positions because they are forced to by public opinion.

She's centrist. She's a DLCer, a Third Wayer. She is not liberal. If you care so much that someone is liberal then back the person who actually is liberal, Bernie. But don't try to sell me centrist with a liberal label on it. I can see through that.

.

[lewebley3]

50. Yes, Sanders didn't work for the party: He didn't get things done: He's a talker

[cui bono]

51. Complete bullshit. And Hillary is not a liberal.

[lewebley3]

52. Hillary has been a liberal, and the Clintons presented liberal buggget

when they were in office: So you cannot just right your own
history for the Clintons or Hillary, we all now her and her
work for people.

[cui bono]

53. Hillary is not a liberal.

No liberal would vote for the IWR - which was a vote for war and a vote to abdicate her constitutional responsibility as a member of congress to hold the power to declare war.

No liberal would be so cozy with Wall Street.

Here, here's a whole list of things no liberal would do that she did:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251887987

Enjoy!

.

[lewebley3]

54. Hillary very much a liberal, most of the Progressive Senators are supporting her

Sherri Brown from Ohio just to name one very important progressive

[cui bono]

55. That does not make her a liberal. Hillary is not a liberal.

Thanks for continually kicking the OP that shows she is not a liberal.

.

[brooklynite]

56. So I guess someone who SUPPORTS Clinton isn't a liberal either?

Alan Grayson

John Lewis

Sherrod Brown

Howard Dean

[cui bono]

57. Who said that?

[lewebley3]

58. What makes Hillary a liberal is her work, and her history

[cui bono]

60. No. That is exactly what makes her a centrist.

[lewebley3]

62. Sanders supporters are the only ones telling this falsehood: HIllary is a Dem

[cui bono]

65. Being a Dem has nothing to do with being liberal. Hillary is not a liberal.

Her being a centrist is not a falsehood. She is a moderate Republican at this point, just like Obama.

Why do you want so bad for her to be thought of as a liberal? If you want a real liberal, vote for Bernie. If you want to deceive people by saying she's a liberal when she's not, why?

Thanks for kicking this OP again!

.

[lewebley3]

70. The Dem party is the liberal party; If Hillary were a GOP person she would right wring

Hillary is been working toward a better life for most if not all
American since college.

[cui bono]

72. No, the Dem Party is no longer liberal. Hillary is not a liberal.

If you want a liberal so bad, vote for Bernie. He is the only true liberal running for president.

!

[lewebley3]

73. According to whom: is the Dem party not liberal: Bernie is a loser like Mondale

[cui bono]

75. According to everyone who pays attention to politics. Both parties have shifted rightward.

Hillary is not a liberal.

Why are you adding insults to Bernie in this exchange that has nothing to do with him? Grow up.

!

[lewebley3]

79. Hillary is still working for all the American people: She not like the GOP

Last edited Tue Dec 22, 2015, 12:41 PM - Edit history (1)

[cui bono]

80. Exactly. "She like the GOP". n/t

[Hepburn]

67. Yes, but he IS a true liberal whereas Hillary is not.

Look at her history. She is no liberal and it is an insult to those of us who are to try and shove her down our throats and demand that we accept that she is one of us. She isn't and never has been.

JMHO

[Hepburn]

66. Hillary is only loyal to Hillary.

And she is NOT under any realistic definition either a liberal and/or progressive. At best, she is a moderate and a hawk. She favors corporations over the middle class. She thought DOMA was OK and favored DADT. She is not even a social liberal.

Sheesh...take a poli sci class and learn the definitions of the different political labels, OK. The evidence is her history...and her past is her past: She ain't no liberal based on the FACTS of her past conduct and statements.

[lewebley3]

69. Hillary is loyal to the American people and the Dem party

[Hepburn]

71. When donkeys fly.

She is Hillary, first, last and foremost.

JMHO

[840high]

77. Yep.

[stupidicus]

3. no doubt

that liberal media myth needs to die a protracted and agonizing death.

[ibegurpard]

4. yup. any progressive rhetoric she's engaged in

Is completely undercut by both her past record and her increasingly frequent about-faces on almost every important issue.

[stupidicus]

6. you know it

and as was argued by some of us prior to BHO"s last win -- the time to hold his feet to the fire as he requested is before he is hired, not afterwards when he can more easily ignore it.

[LongTomH]

7. Her current stance on the TPP and other 'Progressive' positions do not bear close examination:

From the Truth-Out article:

Of course, the New Democrats' preference for Clinton shouldn't surprise anyone. She has been an ally for years. And while they have expressed concern over her leftward tilt, they are confident, as the Post reported, that "she'll tack back their way in a general election." For instance, her recent opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership - which Third Way is supporting aggressively - has centrists "disappointed" but not worried.

"Everyone knew where she was on that and where she will be, but given the necessities of the moment and a tough Democratic primary, she felt she needed to go there initially," New Democratic Coalition chairman Rep. Ron Kind (D-Wisconsin) told the Guardian (emphasis added).

If New Democrats aren't worried that Clinton's populist rhetoric is sincere, progressives probably should be worried that it isn't. As DLC founder Al From told the Guardian: "Hillary will bend a little bit but not so much that she can't get herself back on course in the general [election] and when she is governing."

[stupidicus]

10. so very true

unless you have the blinders her campaign has issued...lol

[Betty Karlson]

9. Clinton's worldview is stuck in the 1990-ies. eom

[stupidicus]

11. and the failed experiment it was

eom

[MisterP]

12. her friends in The Family include Gustavo Alvarez Martinez

he's not around no more, his former employees mowed him down in 1989 thinking he'd blab

[MaggieD]

13. Do facts even matter to Bernie supporters?

She was the 11th most liberal in the senate.

http://americablog.com/2015/04/hillary-clinton-was-the-11th-most-liberal-senator-why-that-does-and-doesnt-matter.html

"But numbers don’t lie and, as phenry at the Daily Kos has noted, Hillary Clinton was, in quantitative terms, quite liberal relative to her Democratic peers during her time as a senator from New York.

As measured by DW-Nominate, a standard metric for measuring partisanship/ideology based on Congressional voting record, Hillary Clinton was the 11th most-liberal member of the Senate in each of her four sessions in Congress. In her last term, that placed her just to the left of Pat Leahy and well to the left of Barack Obama (23rd) and Joe Biden (30th — Biden was the median Democrat in the 110th Congress).

DW-Nominate isn’t a perfect metric, the reasons for which I’ll get to in a moment, but it remains one of the best tools we have available to dispassionately place members of Congress on the ideological spectrum. Rather than relying on subjective evaluations and tea leaf-reading as to her true motives, it takes actual votes cast and compares them to the votes cast by other members of the Senate."

Enough with the lying smears.

[Juicy_Bellows]

14. Why can't they see it? Honestly, I really would like to know.

I know some crapped on her in '08 only to embrace her now but others have seemingly been around for years. You don't wait for years to become a troll or paid shill - so what the hell do you think it is?

I have a few theories but to believe them is to set humans back further than I'd like to imagine.

My leading hypothesis is they are either quite wealthy (yeah I know, 250k is totally middle-class) and fear taxes, basically socially liberal and hard core fiscally conservative or they are some sort of other bastardization of 'Democrat'.

[MaggieD]

15. Um, because many people are intelligent and know it's not true

See my post above. She was the 11th most liberal senator in the senate. The OP is baloney.

[Juicy_Bellows]

16. From your link -

"Liberals are skeptical of Hillary Clinton. She’s corporate, she’s calculated and she’s the wrong kind of religious. As the primary season rolls on, even if she doesn’t have an opponent, she’ll be pressured to answer a lot of questions from her base about just how far her views have evolved since she last ran for office.

But numbers don’t lie and, as phenry at the Daily Kos has noted, Hillary Clinton was, in quantitative terms, quite liberal relative to her Democratic peers during her time as a senator from New York.

As measured by DW-Nominate, a standard metric for measuring partisanship/ideology based on Congressional voting record, Hillary Clinton was the 11th most-liberal member of the Senate in each of her four sessions in Congress. In her last term, that placed her just to the left of Pat Leahy and well to the left of Barack Obama (23rd) and Joe Biden (30th — Biden was the median Democrat in the 110th Congress)."

bold emphasis mine.

With company like congress and being 11th...... well, that ain't too hot considering MOST of congress is fucking insane.

[MaggieD]

17. So you agree the OP is objectively untrue?

Numbers don't lie. And neither does her voting record. She is one of the most liberal democrats in recent history. Fact.

[Juicy_Bellows]

18. No, I don't. Perhaps pushing isn't the right word?

Refusing to push back may be more apt.

Banning violent video games and horsehit like the PMRC with Tipper ain't no liberal value and that is some serious low hanging fruit I went for there (because it was mentioned in the OP). So I guess what I am saying is that we haven't seen any real liberal politicians on the national level since I've drawn breath (40 years).

[MaggieD]

19. That has nothing to do with Hillary

A "real liberal" to this current crowd would be a government filled with socialists. Sadly for you we're a democracy and the people do not want a government full of socialists.

[Juicy_Bellows]

20. Well, you don't have to be socialist to think this is nuts:

"More importantly, Clinton adopted the DLC strategy in the way she governed. She tried to portray herself as a crusader for family values when she introduced legislation to ban violent video games and flag burning in 2005. "

Care to explain?

[MaggieD]

21. You want me to explain some idiot at Truthouts opinion?

Sorry, there is no explaining the garbage that comes out of their opinion pieces. I will say the site name is ironic since they don't seem to have much of any regard for the truth at all.

As I pointed out in the previous post.

[Juicy_Bellows]

22. Nevermind Truthout - Care to explain?

Proposed legislation:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/arts/hillary-clinton-promotes-law-to-ban-violent-video-games-1.550126

Crazy video raging on games - again because of the OP and our subthread - there are more pressing issues but this is in context:

and this about flag burning -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_Protection_Act_of_2005

"The Flag Protection Act of 2005 was a proposed United States federal law introduced by Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Robert Bennett. The law would have outlawed flag burning, and called for a punishment of one year in jail and a fine of $100,000. "

[MaggieD]

23. Who cares?

Seriously, this is an important issue to you but Bernie's gun votes aren't? No one gives a shit what she said about video games a decade ago. Really. Trust me.

[Juicy_Bellows]

24. And there ya have it - I tried.

Don't start arguing a sub point only to end up going 'Who Cares?'

Well, do what you want, shame we couldn't have a dialog.

Be well.

[MaggieD]

25. I'm sorry - I just can't take that seriously

She's a DLC third way right winger because of something she said about video games a decade ago?

But the fact that she had the 11th most liberal voting record in the senate is irrelevant to you?

I can't even believe some of the stuff I see posted here. Smh.

[Juicy_Bellows]

26. Alrighty, the ol' college try -

11th most liberal "VOTING" record in the senate is a lot like saying 11th most popular bologna brand among vegans.

That make sense?

[cui bono]

36. On a spectrum that doesn't include many liberals so it is skewed.

11th most liberal does not a liberal make when the senate is filled with extreme right wingers and centrists and about two-4 actual liberals. That stat means nothing as far as her actually being a liberal -which she isn't, she's centrist - as has been pointed out countless times on here.

.

[MaggieD]

37. This is the senate - the "spectrum" is as wide as it is country-wide

Seems to me Bernie supporters just refuse to accept that not everyone within the Democratic party throughout the country is as far left as the socialist wing. That's why there is only ONE socialist senator in congress.

You can keep tilting at windmills but you're not going to turn even the blue states Dems into a party of socialists.

[cui bono]

38. You didn't address what I said at all.

A spectrum is a spectrum. She's not liberal just because she's the "11th most liberal" out a a group that includes a lot of tea baggers and extreme right wingers.

You can have 100 marbles. 4 of them could be blue and then the rest of them could be red with about 20 of them having a varying degrees of a purplish hue. Being the 11th most blue out of that group does not make that marble blue. It's still purple.

.

[MaggieD]

39. It included over 55 Dems.

So there goes your argument.

[cui bono]

40. How so? It's still a spectrum.

You really just don't want to face facts.

Go ahead and make 51 of the other marbles varying degrees of purple. Being 11th most blue still does not make that purple marble blue.

Seriously, this is very basic stuff, I'm sure you can understand it.

.

[MaggieD]

42. Pretty Simple - 89% of the Senate was LESS liberal than Hillary

And you are accusing her of being republican lite. It's absurd.

[cui bono]

44. Where do you think she stands compared to Obama? Would you agree very similar?

[MaggieD]

45. He was rated 23rd most liberal

But he wasn't there very long.

[cui bono]

61. Well that proves how wrong those ratings are.

Clinton and Obama are extremely close in policy except Obama might be more liberal than Clinton. And Obama is a moderate Republican. So, no, Hillary is not a liberal.

If you Hillary supporters want a liberal so badly just vote for Sanders. Then you won't have to twist yourself into pretzels trying to convince yourselves Hillary is a liberal.

.

[stupidicus]

34. I'd guess the reasons are many and vary

depending on the individual. I think most of it is attributable to and incomplete/distorted pov regarding her husbands admin as well as her own as a proud 3rdwayer.

Those that match your description of the troll should just have their old posts shoved up their internet ____, and that's about it. Why anyone would take them seriously likely closely matchy some of the stupid reasons those not of the 1% would vote like one.

[raouldukelives]

28. Trump is the natural extension of having no real left in this country.

Our ever rightward shift is now allowing full blown fascism to take root in our corporate conservative wonderland.

Just as shareholders have helped shape democracies around the world for a century, they are now using all they own to shape our own.

[stupidicus]

33. good points

I think that there's a "left" left though, and that's what Bernie's campaign is really all about -- waking that sleeping giant

[Agony]

48. _that_ truth hurts - be thankful that some small ($) force is pulling back… it's all we got for now.

cheers anyway, right?

[jalan48]

41. Ban flag burning? That's right out of the Richard Nixon play book.

[artislife]

59. Yup

If you just read what she has said at times and some of her actions. .you wouldn't think she is a Democrat. Or at Lleast what most of us think as a Democrat.

[AgingAmerican]

43. When they say 'pragmatism' they are talking about capitulation'

[stupidicus]

47. that would be a safe bet, or better descriptor

for sure

I always thought Bush did a good job of hiding his criminality behind the facade of incompetence too

[WillyT]

46. HUGE K & R !!! - Thank You !!!

[in_cog_ni_to]

68. kick! n/t

[ieoeja]

74. "adopted the DLC strategy"? She was DLC President! In that row she likely recruited neo-con Dems.nt

[Thinkingabout]

76. There are votes which line up with the RW such as gun issues and this is

A concern. It is hard to be left when one votes right.

[TIME TO PANIC]

78. K & R !

A center-right democrat through and through.