Clinton will not be a realignment Presidency: Corey Robin
Here at c99% I've been arguing that realignment is in the cards, and that the main hindrance to a real realignment, one that helps us, is the nice liberals' attachment to Clinton. (The likely outcome in this regard, I argued, was a uniparty, in which the Republicans vote to get what they want and the Democrats vote out of fear.)
In his most recent blog post, Corey Robin offers an opposing perspective. Clinton's disdain for the Democrats and her sallies at Republican support, he argues, are not an attempt at creating a realignment; rather, Clinton merely wishes to defeat Trump while retaining the political status quo. Robin:
This, incidentally, is how you know—one of the many ways you know—that Clinton’s is not going to be a realignment presidency. Realignment presidents run not against a candidate from the opposing party. They run against an entire political and social deformation. Lincoln against the slaveocracy, FDR against laissez-faire rule, Reagan against the New Deal. They run against decades and decades of rule and ruin. In working so hard to separate Trump not only from the Republican present but the Republican past, Clinton is deliberately announcing that her campaign is not against a political formation but is instead simply an effort to defeat one man.
Robin's argument is a pretty strong argument, so I'm not going to say I'm entirely unpersuaded. Yet I can think of an alternate explanation. His main evidence appears to be that the Clinton campaign is bad for Democrats running for downticket offices:
Miranda protests that the Clinton campaign wants to separate Trump from the GOP so that it can point to all the Republican officials who oppose Trump and support her. But as Miranda points out, what’s good for Clinton is bad for down-ballot Democrats. So long as down-ballot Republicans distance themselves from Trump, he says, Clinton is willing to give them an out, thereby hurting their Democratic opponents. (And as Carl points out, Clinton is keeping a lot of the money her organization raised for down-ballot Democrats, doubly hurting them.)
So why would she do this, why would Clinton hurt her own party in those ways, unless she just wanted to get rid of Trump and bring American politics back to what it was before his candidacy, with a Democrat President and a Republican Congress both firmly in tow to established financial interests? It's a persuasive argument.
Here is my counter-argument: Clinton wants to hurt the Democrats because she wants to purge them. The liberals must go, and all vestiges of liberal power within the Democratic Party must be removed so that the sort of election nonsense that had to insure Clinton's "victory" will not have to happen again. In order to make the liberal purge stick, the Democratic Party of today must become what the Republican Party was before Obama became President. The liberal rank-and-file is docile and can be made to apologize for the new order, and the dissenters can be made to shut up by sending out an army of trolls telling them they're never going to win. Once the new order is established, the Republican Party will be dismantled piece by piece to form the new Democratic Uniparty. Or at least that's my theory.
Okay, so in the words of the fictional character "Linda Richman":
NB: You may have noticed the newest pitch to the millennials in Rolling Stone magazine: "Hillary's New Deal: How a Clinton Presidency Could Transform America." What's the big deal here, at least for the author of this puff piece? Infrastructure improvements and putting in a lot of solar panels. I'll believe it when I see the quid pro quo deals that will make it possible.
Comments
Rolling Stone article - check out the author!!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/19/hillarys-historian-sean-wilentz...
Because every mainstream publication . . .
. . . should hand its pages over to the propagandist for a presidential candidate. That's only savvy
journalismbusiness!Realignment requires a sufficiently motivated minority
faction in a party to be willing to break off and form their own organization. There isn't going to be a realignment this time around.
The Democrats successfully destroyed that effort in that party with Bernie's loss and their successfully turning him into a sheepdog. A leaderless revolution will never succeed in this country.
On the other side, the Republican clownshow is just that: a show. The Republicans we see today are the same Republicans of the mid-90s, just with their masks off.
The realignment already happened with Bill's first election. The left was marginalized then, and it's attempted revival in Bernie's campaign was successfully destroyed for now. We'll see if it stays down. I'm not optimistic it will get back up in my lifetime (I'm in my late 30's).
If the realignment happened in 1992 --
then it's still not complete. The Republicans are still around -- they haven't yet been absorbed into the Democratic Party.
"The expansion of Israel and its proxies is an absolute fundamental necessity for the United States." - Tim Walz
Actually, the repub effort
to take over the dem party is now complete.
It was started by the likes of Al From and Clinton and the other DLC'rs years ago. Now, it's finishing up.
dfarrah
I still don't see a uniparty.
Which perhaps means there's more work to do.
"The expansion of Israel and its proxies is an absolute fundamental necessity for the United States." - Tim Walz
I think that's purposeful. A complete realignment leaves a
vacuum for the other (formerly third) party to fill. It's better for the "uniparty" if it doesn't seem like there is a uniparty.
The dems
successfully destroyed any re-alignment by electing Obama.
dfarrah
Gee
Didn't Barack Obama run on infrastructure improvements eight years ago? Didn't Bill Clinton run on infrastructure improvements twenty four years ago?
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice, shame on me.
Fool me three times? Not fucking likely.
Do prisons count as infrastructure?
And solar panels? Andrew Cuomo just put the ratepayers of NY on the hook for $7.5 to $11 billion to bail out the nuclear industry in NY. How many solar panels could that have installed?
" In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry, and is generally considered to have been a bad move. -- Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy "
Here's Thomas Franks' take,
from the Guardian, With Trump certain to lose, you can forget about a progressive Clinton.
We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.
"Centrism", of course, being conservatism with patches of
reactionary ideas & goals here & there.
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
More from the same article
Thomas Frank:
"We've done the impossible, and that makes us mighty."
The Clintons are the new royalty
Enough people worship them as successful people that their policies are irrelevant, to the detriment of the rest of us. And then there's the Trump scare to seal the deal for those still in doubt, as well as a way to bludgeon those who resist and want to vote their conscience.
It's especially sad to see some of my Facebook friends attack Stein and the Greens, even though her policies would benefit them far more than those of the Clintons. This is how clever the Clintons are. The Biko quote about the mind of the oppressed being the most powerful weapon of the oppressors is more true than ever.
Note that Clinton's Republican strategy ...
... is worse for candidates that rely on establishment support.
Those relying on other avenues of support are not as affected by it.
Which means that this is an opportunity to increase the clout of the very same progressive populist wing of the party that the Clinton administration will be fighting against during what could very well be a fairly weak, single term administration.
https://www.voicesonthesquare.com/essays/2016/07/29/inside-out-strategy-...
-- Virtually, etc. B)
I suppose the effort could fail.
Still I doubt Clinton wants any of "her" party's money going to fund some liberal in Congress.
"The expansion of Israel and its proxies is an absolute fundamental necessity for the United States." - Tim Walz
Certainly not.
And it's been a longstanding trend for the Democratic party establishment to play it that way. Bernie's effort to support more progressive candidates than the DCCC tends to support will have less total fund raising ability than Hillary's campaign, because of the mess media dominance of the Presidential race ... but if Hillary is using all of the money for herself, that offsets what could have been a big year for electing new members to the Whig wing of the Corporate party.
-- Virtually, etc. B)
I am a liberal, neither nice nor complacent. So there.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
I am on the purge side of the argument.
I see a bigger effort to shame libs from voting for Stein than I do shaming rank and file rethugs from voting for Trump.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
And much less respectful attempts as well.
With Trump supporters, they just toss out the same tired SCOTUS arguments, which are thoroughly stupid, but plausible.
With Dr. Stein Supporters, it's always the worst kind of hippy bashing, complete with outright fabrications.
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
Every progressive/leftistish person
needs to include a jobs guarantee demand to their list of ideals.
A job guarantee intersects with other goals: A healthy planet (lots of those jobs could be aimed at saving the planet), infrastructure (lots of those jobs would be aimed at infrastructure), fair wages, poverty reduction, a more stable economy, etc....
How a job guarantee would work:
Video:
https://vimeo.com/83813741
Articles:
http://neweconomicperspectives.org/tag/job-guarantee
http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2014/01/16-reasons-matt-yglesias-wron...
http://heteconomist.com/job-or-income-guarantee-jig/
http://www.3spoken.co.uk/2015/11/job-guarantee-jobs-for-people.html
Neocon, warmongering and
Neocon, warmongering and environment destroying is not my definition of "centrist". The PNAC has a messianic overlay to standard neocon fare and Hillary is there to continue the unrolling of their agenda.
Goldwater Girl isn't a centrist.
That you can count on.
"The expansion of Israel and its proxies is an absolute fundamental necessity for the United States." - Tim Walz
A decoder ring is needed, of course.
"After tossing the left half of the spectrum out of the conversation, I believe you will find I am in the center of those remaining."
-- Virtually, etc. B)
Salient points here.
Interesting take on this shitstorm that is 2016 presidential politics. I agree with Corey Robin and with you, Cass.
But I think what's really intriguing is that Robin's argument leads naturally to yours. Clinton doesn't want to help down-ballot Democrats because the Clintons are only in it for themselves. They will bring you to the table and stab your right in the front, they don't give a fuck. They've only ever been in it for themselves, and while they make temporary allies, it's hard to think who Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea wouldn't sell out for a piece of more of the pie or as a way to dislodge blame.
And, as you so noted, Hillary Clinton hates liberals. So what better way to purge the party of liberals than to bring Republicans into the fold? It's a two birds and one stone scenario.
God, those people are vicious. Democrats are top-down, and where do you think those horrible TOP talking points come from? Hillary Clinton herself, no doubt. Both she and Obama have nothing but disdain for the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
I miss Colorado.
Well...
She's certainly bright enough to have invented all of them herself.
"The expansion of Israel and its proxies is an absolute fundamental necessity for the United States." - Tim Walz
This sentence says it all
I took a look at the Issa? diary on DK and apparently the DNC isn't bothering to support the candidate running against him.
I didn't read the diary as much as the comments and people were wondering where the DNC was and why they wouldn't be supporting this candidate if Issa was as vulnerable as they think he is.
Why? Duh, even I could figure that out.
It was the same reason DWS wasn't fired after she lost both houses during the midterms and letting the GOP block anything progressive Obama wanted to do during his second term.
Except for getting the TPP passed.
That is the results that was wanted.
I recently read an article where the Dems are telling Hillary to renominate Garland and the GOP are saying that they should confirm him because if they don't they Hillary 'might' nominate a more liberal judge.
I can understand the GOP's thinking, but why would so many dems want a centrist on the court?
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
Clinton will be a one term president
Why? Because with the country's mood as bad as it is, there is NO WAY the Democrats are getting sixteen years. They shouldn't even get twelve, but it looks like Trump's buffoonery will probably give them a pass this time. Since the nation perceives whichever party holds the White House to be the party "in power" (and the Democrats get so easily disillusioned) the Republicans--even if they still hold both houses of Congress--will make further gains in the 2018 midterms. Including at the state house level.
Then, in 2020, the Republicans won't make the same mistake twice. They'll come back with someone more "presentable" like Paul Ryan or Scott Walker. The media will have a collective orgasm, acting like the GOP has returned to "sanity"--or even that it has moved to the center--when as we all know, those guys are really, really, REALLY far to the right. And they'll clean Clinton's clock. So we're looking at a President Ryan or a President Walker taking office in 2020, quite possibly with a supermajority in Congress. And they'll be able to do far more damage than Trump ever could--Trump, who would be a lame duck from day one, unable to rely on even his own party for support.
And that's not even getting into the fact that after the GOP's near certain gains at the state house level in 2018--and likely ones in 2020--they'll be the ones who get to gerrymander the Democrats out of existence during the congressional reapportionment that follows the census. We're entering a period when, for demographic, political, and historical reasons, the Left should be ascendant, but instead it's likely to find itself getting ground into the dirt. There's your realignment for you.
Why? All because #I'mWithHer.
"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum." --Noam Chomsky
There is one other possibility
Hillary is impeached either right after the 2018 elections or right before (she will be so unpopular Dem senators may not only abandon her, they might actively denounce her) This would lead to president Kaine, and the Rs would have another neolib DINO, allowing them to punt for another election cycle by nominating another racist wacko to lose, if they need to keep purging the racist right so that the fascist hegemony could rule under the R banner rather than the D banner.
On to Biden since 1973
I believe what we are seeing
is the death of the Republican Party, as it was heretofore known. That has been in the process for decades now. But lest some begin to beam at the good fortune of the Democrats because of this, not so fast. The other occurrence which cannot help but to happen right along side it is the death of the Democratic Party. This has also been in the works for some decades, especially since Clinton I started the ball rolling. Very soon now, the ranks of the Republican Party will shrink and continue to do so for some time to come. However, many of those rats jumping off that ship will be welcomed into the Democratic Party which is becoming the Republican Party of the pre-Tea Party era. As some have stated, part of that process has to do with pushing out all real progressives and purifying the new Dem-Publican Party into the true home of Corporatism and rivers of money that flow up without so much as a trickle down, dressed up on an occasion with a Civil Rights bone tossed at a reviled minority group (as long as such bone tossing results in faithful voting but does not interfere with increased profits for party backers).
The good which will come of this is that, inevitably, the Used-to-be-Republican Party will become powerless and of little consequence at any level of government (except for some "enlightened" places such as Texas and Kansas) And a new party comprised of the progressives, liberals, socialists, working people, downtrodden, everyday Joes and Joans will emerge (this could happen even more rapidly if the few small parties of reason which are in any way similar in belief could agree to merge with a unified platform - takes a big, courageous adult rejection of personal want and elevation of what's-good-for-the-all). What ever it may finally come to be called, it will continue to drain the disaffected persons of Reason and Caring from the other two steaming piles until it, at the least, counter-balances, or at the most optimistic wrests power from, the Party of the Pigs at the Trough.
The world may never be perfect to the viewpoint of anyone, much less everyone, but that doesn't mean that we should not try to make it so to the best of our combined abilities.
I am a proponent of your
I am a proponent of your uniparty argument with a different perhaps more cynical variation. Hillary and Bill learned in 08 they could not win a traditional primary campaign, so they worked to control the DNC by getting their friends appointed to all leadership positions and then use fund raising to get a buy in from elected officials. Once this was completed the official position of the party was it was " her" turn for all she done in her life. With the Democratic deck clear they were ready to go until Sanders crashes the party. Small speed bump, we will use state party officials to tilt it in her direction, i.e. Hillary unity campaign.
Next step was to talk Trump into running a faux campaign on the Republican side with a campaign that plays to the fears of the Republican base. Due to their baggage they needed Trump to defeat the traditional candidates that Hillary could not due in the general election.
This was done with a buy in with the moderate Republican power base as it helps them divide and defeat their tea party base. So we have this uni pRty of the power brokers in both parties. I would suspect the decisions have been made on taxes, entitlements and military spending. There will be the typical staged show between Republicans and Democrats in the media. This time it will be different as sequestration will go away due the Hillary's magnificent leadership.
The who election will be a fraud, the only hope for democracy now and in the future will be voters turning to third parties
Yes. Plus the media supported Trump long enough
to knock out all the other repub candidates & have no air time left for dems. Any airtime for Hilary would have the danger of showing who she really is; same for Bernie. So Hilary would have lost the primary if Trump hadn't sucked up all the media attention. This is still true. Before the noms were sewn up, Trump was to laugh at, now he's to be aghast at. And Hilary just needs to deflect attention toward how dangerous Trump is. I actually read a comment that said Trump's ally (sorry that I forget who) shouldn't be allowed near the govt because he came from a communist country in the 60s! Never mind his decades of citizenship. The red-baiting is horrific on HuPo. Even if only a small fraction of the posters aren't paid by Dave Brock, we are definitely going to war with Russia right after the inauguration. It's very scary. And the media is totally complicit..
What will stop people from
What will stop people from voting their fears in 4 years from now? To get Hillary elected, the oligarchy will raise Hitler, himself, if that is what is needed. Hillary for 8, if her health holds out.
The death of the GOP
...seems inevitable. But more for the reason that Clinton and her ilk make Republicans superfluous. Outside of some lip service to progressiveness without actually delivering ANYTHING remotely progressive, she is a Republican and so is Obama. It's Democrats not Republicans that have saved private healthcare and they are locked and loaded on your Social Security. As for foreign policy, there never has been a difference.
Don't know about you but I am preparing for four more years of golly jeepers, those meany Republicans won't let us get anything done. All the while, the invisible hand of the market will continue to choke most of us to death.
A Clinton Republican, not even an Obama Republican,
gave us NAFTA, the Telecommunications Act, the end of welfare, and the economic crash of 2008. And Hillary thinks that means he was a genius about the economy and has promised he will play a great role in that sphere in the second Clinton administration. Whoopeeeee!
Gee, Robin is a little bit slow
on the uptake, isn't he?
dfarrah
I'm not sure.
If there's really any serious attempt to purge the Democrats, I would expect a "next stage" at some point, perhaps after the election.
"The expansion of Israel and its proxies is an absolute fundamental necessity for the United States." - Tim Walz
At this point,
why would the 'dems' even bother?
They kneecap liberals on a regular basis.
Liberal power is miniscule, and that is the way the dems like it.
dfarrah
Furthermore, thallium is not health food.
Who imagined that Hillary Clinton was going to be transformative?
Anyway, what's left to transform? Changing the name of the Democratic Party to Thing Two?
On edit-delayed reaction: Thing Two Party - TPP