For me, Terry McAuliffe is kind of a distilled, pure form of Clintonism. He basically represents the crystalline heart of Clintonism. Terry McAuliffe got his ass handed to him today in the Virginia governor’s Democratic primary. This is a total repudiation. He didn’t just lose. He got beat two-to-one in a three-way race. He was obliterated.
This is a guy who had the best rolodex of big-money donors on the planet. And he failed, utterly. If only more Democrats like him could be rejected, we might actually get some positive change in this country.
That is change that I can believe in!
Which didn’t you like, was it the peace or the prosperity?
By a brisk accounting, Blacks got the crime bill, women got “welfare reform,” labor got NAFTA, gays and lesbians got DOMA.
q.v. Rainbow’s Gravity
Brisk indeed, Oscar! Don’t forget the phony anti-terrorist actions (Sudanese aspirin factory, anyone?) timed to draw attention away from his domestic troubles?
And yes, that pun was intended. 😉
Let’s also not forget the DMCA, numerous extensions of police powers, handing control of Congress to the GOP, and so damaging the Democratic Party that we ended up with Dubya. NAFTA? Try the repeal of Glass-Steagall. Then there was the discreet non-stop bombing campaign in Iraq, Dubya-esque inaction on the I/P conflict (barring the traditional presidential eleventh-hour legacy-saving Hail Mary pass), and… well, I could go on all day.
The worst thing he did, IMHO, was welfare “reform”. He reinforced the vicious Republican myths about the poor and hurt millions of the most vulnerable American families for political gain, instead of standing up to Gingrich and his fellow fascists and pointing out that 80% of welfare recipients were a) in the system for less than two years, and b) children.
Peace and prosperity, my ass. The only reason Clinton doesn’t stand out as one of the worst presidents of the 20th century is that he was bookended by even worse presidents. Considering how low the GOP sets the bar, being better than a Republican really doesn’t count for much.
Bill Clinton was the first black Republican President.
Sadly, I disagree with you on a couple of points.
First, welfare reform was nowhere near the worst of Clinton’s domestic policies. I opposed it at the time, but I do not believe most of my fears were realized. He was a coward to sign it because of its draconian measures towards resident aliens, but the war on drugs was far worse, as was bank consolidation.
Second, our presidents have been epically bad. The last president we had other than Clinton that could be considered halfway decent was LBJ and he gave us Vietnam escalation. Kennedy’s tenure was too brief to fairly judge, but he made some rather glaring errors. Truman gets rehabilitated by some, but I don’t buy most of it. He left office as unpopular as Dubya for a reason.
Skipping FDR, the three preceding Republican presidents were absolutely dreadful. And Woodrow Wilson was an incredibly flawed president that gave us the Palmer Raids, and thought Birth of a Nation was a splendid film. Taft sucked. McKinley was the like a Dubya for his century.
In the entire twentieth-century, the only presidents I would elect again for a second chance are Teddy and Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, Kennedy (to give his a full-term), and Clinton. I’d take LBJ over the rest of him for his moral courage. I’d take Carter after that because he was a decent fellow.
As frustrating and disappointing as Clinton was, he was actually one of our better presidents. That’s mainly because he was smart, curious, and genuinely interested in policy. He was also a mater politician, which helps.
You realize that all reads like a condemnation of democracy, or one of those resigned acceptances of democracy as the least awful of the available alternatives.
Of course, I’d have to agree with that. After two terms of Dubya, the only excuse I can come up with for democracy is that the alternatives all suck more, not because democracy doesn’t suck in every imaginable way.
Unfortunately, until we come up with a reliable way to manufacture benign and enlightened philosopher-kings, I’m going to be stuck in the bleachers waving my pro-democracy pennant with a distinct lack of enthusiasm.
Meh.
I think we did alright considering.
Our country is rather fucked up, but we compare pretty favorably with other countries.
The good thing is that Obama can probably earn a spot in Mt. Rushmore simply by not getting caught with his penis in someone not-his-wife’s mouth.
Which did you prefer, his policy towards Iran, or Guatamala? Or was it the 4 recessions we had under his administration?
The Iran and Guatemala coups are among Ike’s biggest blunders. Along with them, I’d say the general glide-path of the early CIA were the biggest blots on his presidency. And the Bay of Pigs is really the legacy of that.
So, yeah, Ike made some errors, some of which really came back to bite us in the ass.
But, you know, FDR gave us the Japanese Internment camps, and Teddy gave us some rather muscular imperialism, and Woodrow flubbed the League of Nations and gave us the Palmer Raids.
No president is flawless and most of them have been terrible. Eisenhower’s record is near the very top of 20th century presidents. I don’t think it is really debatable, but I’m willing to debate it.
what Oscar said…
Maybe he shoulda done an Arlen and crossed to the other side. /snark
Thanks for your continuing coverage of this story. Very interesting. And satisfying!
maybe you should draw up a list of all of the democrats that should be removed from office.
How about starting with ………..
Crystal McAuliffe. Nice. Synthesized in the McAuliffe labs of the Clintonista cartel.
Shall we call this a shining example of harm reduction?
Ya mean the voters would not let McAuliffe buy the nomination? They are becoming more literate? Praise the Lord, as they say in Rural Virginia.
This just in, Terry has declared that Virginia doesn’t matter.
some hard working Americans, white Americans, voted for him, I’m sure.
Was busy getting 15 minutes hate on for Booman. Otherwise they would have ROARED!
Looks like once they purge Alegre it will be 100% cranks, crackpots and GOP astro-turfers.
Frankly, the bigger news is that Creigh Deeds won two-to-one over both NOVA candidates. No surprise there.
But what is important is that Creigh Deeds will probably win as governor. Now, the question for Democrats in Virginia is how to increase the number of progressive Democrats in the Virginia legislature.
Most Virginia Democrats are confident that the blue wave will continue and into the 2010 Congressional elections.
Clintonism is over; it briefly saved the Democratic Party’s bacon but as a fleeting blip in an otherwise bleak 30 years. All you can say is that it was less bad than the alternatives.
there’s been a strange misreading of this post in the intertubes. I didn’t say Clintonism is dead. I said that Clintonism got hammered last night and that things would improve if more Clintonites got hammered in the future.