I don’t dislike Bill and Hillary Clinton but I do strongly prefer a world in which different people control the Democratic Party. If you were around here in 2008, you know my arguments and few of them have changed in the intervening years. Yet, for many years now, I’ve been basically reconciled to the fact that power within the party would transfer back to the Clintons even before Obama’s presidency is over. Once I saw Obama make peace with the offer of the State Department, I took my queue to make peace myself. If the president wasn’t going to fight a restoration, maybe it was better to try to influence it rather than resist it.
Still, this wasn’t a pleasant process for me and I had to resort to certain devices to make the medicine go down easier. The main idea I comforted myself with is that House Clinton has a different set of historical allies and that they have the potential to hold on to House Obama’s coalition while retaining some of the alliances that are unique to them.
The countering argument has always been that the old Clinton coalition is gone and can not be brought back. There’s no way that Hillary Clinton can compete in states like Tennessee, Missouri, Kentucky, and West Virginia that formed a spine of her husband’s electoral college map. She probably can’t even hold their historical base in Arkansas.
We don’t know which scenario will prove correct, yet, but it matters less for the outcome of the presidential race than it does for what can be done with presidency if it is actually won. If Hillary can win all but a few Obama states, she’ll win the Electoral College. But she won’t be able to do much in office except make foreign policy decisions (that I definitely do not trust her to make) unless she gets a more cooperative Congress and a more united electorate than Obama has enjoyed over the latter part of his terms in office.
There are probably several Democrats other than Hillary who could win the Electoral College, but I don’t think anyone other than House Clinton has the potential to change the whole landscape of our Blue-Red divide and possibly win back control of the House of Representatives before the post-2020 Census redrawing of districts.
So, for me, the only real appeal to a House Clinton restoration is their potential to bring about this kind of landslide reordering of our gridlocked politics. It’s not that I’d confidently predict that Hillary will accomplish this, only that she’s the only one I think could do it.
But she won’t do it unless she tries, and Jonathan Martin and Maggie Haberman are reporting in the New York Times that she isn’t going to try:
Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to be dispensing with the nationwide electoral strategy that won her husband two terms in the White House and brought white working-class voters and great stretches of what is now red-state America back to Democrats.
Instead, she is poised to retrace Barack Obama’s far narrower path to the presidency: a campaign focused more on mobilizing supporters in the Great Lakes states and in parts of the West and South than on persuading undecided voters.
Mrs. Clinton’s aides say it is the only way to win in an era of heightened polarization, when a declining pool of voters is truly up for grabs. Her liberal policy positions, they say, will fire up Democrats, a less difficult task than trying to win over independents in more hostile territory — even though a broader strategy could help lift the party with her.
The article is filled with quotes from Obama campaign veterans like David Plouffe, Dan Pfeiffer and (Clinton campaign manager) Robby Mook. They definitely know how to win presidential elections are worth listening to. They’ll tell you how to do a lot of the nuts and bolts stuff that made Team Obama one of the most formidable and talented political teams ever assembled. But their presumption is that you simply can’t persuade people to vote for you anymore. Your job, therefore, is primarily to identify and excite people who, if they actually show up, prefer your candidate.
Let me be clear about one thing. They’re probably correct. And, if they’re correct, whoever wins the Democratic nomination is basically locked in as the winner for the simple reason that they have a lot more voters in the right states to carry the Electoral College. Therefore, the safe thing to do is to follow their strategy, mobilize your base, and get them to the polls. Do that, and you’re the president.
Except, what then?
If that’s really the task, if it’s really that simple and you can accomplish all your goals that way, then I have no use for Hillary Clinton. If any Democrat can win, I’ll take one that has foreign policy instincts that I trust. And, for Hillary, if success is so assured, well I guess that is great. But does she want to be as hamstrung in office as Obama has been since the 2010 midterms? If that’s what she’s going to be dealing with, what can she accomplish that Bernie Sanders couldn’t accomplish? They’d both appoint judges and make executive orders. They’d both veto the same asinine legislation coming out of the Republican-led Congress. They’d both have half the country committed to the idea that they’re the spawn of Satan.
Now, I don’t want House Clinton to run some mealy-mouthed centrist campaign designed to warm the cockles of Sen. Joe Manchin’s heart, but I also don’t want Hillary to blow off efforts to organize in historic Clinton states and, especially, districts. I’d like to see her proceed on the assumption that she can win in places where other Democrats could not win rather than accept the common wisdom that this is an unnecessary risk and waste of resources.
Because if she can’t make the old Clinton districts and states competitive, there’s no reason for progressives to support her no matter how much she caters to us to get us to the polls. Why? Because she won’t be able to do anything more than Bernie Sanders once she gets in office, which is basically nothing.
If she would roll the dice on winning big with the risk that she might lose a sure thing, she might actually get a presidency worth having. And progressives might have a real reason to prefer her to the alternatives.
I do not agree. I think the best way to get more seats in Congress is to fire up Democrats with appeals to Democrats, there just are not enough true independents to be worth chasing.
In today’s environment, “independent” means “hasn’t been paying attention”. How useful are those people likely to be? I agree she needs to sound like a true Democrat. That’s what most Americans want.
Agreed. Obama had the House and 60 seats in the Senate for a short time, all of which came about by running a campaign that was electric with idealism. The downside was the extent to which that inevitably led to disappointment when he had to actually govern. And he made mistakes too. I still think not going after Wall Street was a huge mistake, though I get prioritizing the recovery and the narrow space he was in. I just think he could have accomplished both and an implosion that would have resulted in long-term deflation and depression were overstated. When one group of profiteers were handed their ass, another group would have been eager to step in. That’s the essence of capitalism, its great strength. He should have trusted it.
We agree Obama ran an excellent campaign. But let’s not overlook the extent to which the Democrats’ victory in 2008 (and 2006) was a rejection by the voters of the Bush administration and a reaction to the onset of the Great Recession.
Focusing only on friendly voters is not necessarily the same as focusing on friendly districts. Further, based on the 2008 primary and general results, Hillary does have some supporters in some winnable reddish states and districts that didn’t support Obama. The article doesn’t exclude the campaign she needs to run, although it certainly doesn’t herald it either.
What I would be hoping to see from the campaign is a recognition that a majority of Americans in most districts support Democratic positions (even some that call themselves Republicans) and what’s needed is to show them who’s really on their side and get them to the polls. So far, her campaign is doing it right. And don’t neglect another quote from the article.
Any Democrat elected president in 2016 with a hostile Congress is pretty much doomed to be labeled a “failed president”. I’m hoping Hillary recognizes that and isn’t willing to settle for a description in the history books of “first ineffective female president”.
What is Team Clinton going to do about that though? Clinton only stopped in Georgia to raise money. She didn’t hold any events open to the public there. That’s a state that should become Democratic sooner rather than later. If someone cared to make the case and spend some money there.
I am sure HRC is well aware she needs a friendlier Congress in order to get anything done – I think HRC campaign team collectively is smarter about how to get there than anyone fretting because of that NYT concern trolling.
There’s no way that Hillary Clinton can compete in states like Tennessee, Missouri, Kentucky, and West Virginia that formed a spine of her husband’s electoral college map. She probably can’t even hold their historical base in Arkansas.
Why can’t she compete in Missouri? Obama lost it in 2008 by the slimmest of margins. Has Ferguson shot that to hell? Why can’t she compete in KY or WV? Because Democrats have run on social issues and not on pokcet books ones? Also, did you hear about the Wisconsin Democratic Party meeting this weekend? It elected a new state party chair. Anyway, they did a poll of attendees. It was basically 50-50 Hillary and Bernie. You do know what’s going on, right? If Bernie can raise enough to run a decently staffed campaign, things are going to get very interesting.
I have trouble imagining Sanders rocking Clinton back on her heels the way Obama did in “08. I say this not just because of the extremely disparate access to resources of the two campaigns but also because Bernie labels himself a socialist. No matter how attractive his policies may be, it’s hard to see that label not scaring off all but the 20% of us who identify as liberal. His ideas are going to have to be carried by someone who cannot be so easily caricatured.
Yeah, right, but give Bernie a little credit for his superlative ability to not let himself be caricatured.
Sanders also has no real experience with or record of addressing the concerns of non-white voters…who make up a large (perhaps even majority) chunk of liberals/progressives.
Leftists, especially self-described socialists, get the benefit of the doubt. Centrists like Hillary Clinton are the ones who have to prove themselves. Centrist Democrats are the ones who cheered on welfare reform and three strikes and the militarization of police and the myth of the superpredator and so-on.
Leftists were the ones who really looked out for racial minorities during the post-Reagan years. Not centrists. I’m not saying that I don’t appreciate centrist identity politics appeals because the alternative is, well, look at the above list.
But it’s extremely fucking irritating when centrists snivel that since Sanders et. al aren’t making those kinds of targeted appeals they don’t have racial minorities at heart. Sanders doesn’t have to prove his fealty to the black community or Latinos or Muslims because Democrats like him weren’t complicity in the fucking-over of said communities, unlike the ‘serious’ Democrats.
All I’m saying is that 1) like most northern New England politicians, Sanders has little direct experience representing anyone other than white folks, and 2) Sanders seems primarily, if not exclusively, focused on economic issues. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with that, but if that continues to be the case then his supporters shouldn’t be surprised if progressives who aren’t of European ancestry don’t flock to his campaign.
I know it’s convenient for centrists to think this is the case because it lets them believe that they can win without doing something as gut-wrenching as taking on corporate interests.
Nonetheless, the fact is that racial minority voters know what side their bread is buttered on. The post-Hoover, pre-Nixon Republican Party was less openly racist than the New Deal Democrats but the NDDs still saw blacks flock to their party.
You say that Sanders proposal for youth employment does not help black people when he said black youth unemployment was off the charts?
You should look up Sanders’ history. He’s been a DFH all his life. He did take part in the CRM back in the 1960’s. It’s not exactly a secret.
For the opposite view, see Steve M. at No More Mister Nice Blog.
YES!!
That NYT piece was just concern trolling, and helpful only to Republicans
You can now add Loomis at Lawyers, Guns and Money
Are there progressive policies that could help a Democrat win in currently-inhospitable states?
If there are, great. She should go for those. (As should her opponents.) If not, which you say is ‘probably correct,’ why bother?
My groundless suspicion is that there are such policies, but they’re beyond our imagination at the moment, as we talk about ‘wealth inequality’ and ‘minimum wage’ and ‘voting rights’ and think those things–all of which are of huge importance–will broaden our appeal.
“she isn’t going to try”
Say hello to President Walker.
Why? Is Walker going to try for the blue states? He can’t win the primary without being insane, and the blue states aren’t going to ignore that. If both sides pull all their voters to the booth, Democrats win. There are obvious side effects with that method, as Boo points out, but it is a winning strategy.
Only if everything works perfectly. Sorry I can’t give a citation for this quote (Art of War?) but it’s apt – “The essence of strategy is not finding a path to victory, but in so arraying your forces so that all paths lead to victory.”
And dumping money into Tennessee does that how?
If it helps Democrats pick up 1-2 seats in the House.
Or it takes money away from a state where she absolutely must win. Both are possible, it’s just a question of how much risk you are willing to accept.
Agreed. With the caveat that presidential campaigns are likely to raise more money than they can effectively spend in swing states.
Walker has already won a blue State, Wisconsin, three times. He can surely win Michigan and maybe Iowa, possibly Illinois and/or Ohio. Add the South and West, conceded from the beginning by HRC and what do you have?
You left out the footnotes.
One special election, involving a lot of voters who didn’t believe in recalls on principle.
And two elections in non-presidential years, where the state is reliably white.
See!! You don’t always have to be a snarky asshole!! And your comment is 100% correct. I bet Walker will be like Gore, if he’s the GOP nominee. Meaning he will not win his home state.
IMHO only candidates who will expand the map and hold that expansion by having coattails that elect downticket candidates are worth voting for. Period. Just winning without transforming the process is a loser for progressives after having been down that road repeatedly for the last 40 years.
This declaration from Camp Clinton just killed her prospects and proves that once again the consultants are clueless and want their win and their high pay and to hell with the country as they’ve got theirs.
With that sort of a setup why bother? There’s no payoff for voters in more of the same.
No payoff in keeping the White House out of the hands of lunatics? I suppose it would have made no difference if Gore had been president instead of Bush.
Even if Clinton just holds the White House for 8 years and accomplishes little else, that’s reason enough to support her.
“No payoff in keeping the White House out of the hands of lunatics?”
If I read him right, Booman was pointing out that there are other Democratic candidates who could do this. It’s the coattails he was thinking about. And apparently, Hilary doesn’t want to be bothered about her coattails.
Or maybe, like some of us, she think winning the White House is so absolutely vital that nothing should be done that might risk that. Hillary isn’t my first choice, but I can absolutely respect the belief that winning is the primary concern.
Or maybe, like some of us, she think winning the White House is so absolutely vital that nothing should be done that might risk that.
Seriously? Risking what? What is there to risk saying that we need to retake the House, and make it part of Clinton’s campaign? Is the status quo acceptable to you? It isn’t to me!!
I agree.
I think that this is just concern-trolling by NYT. Even if our most delusionally cynical interpretation of her running is true, that she only wants to be President to be President and doesn’t care what happens once she’s in office, she still needs to run for re-election. And nothing will destroy her re-election chances quite like 4 years in office of being completely ineffective during a difficult governing period due to not having all chambers of Congress.
I mean, there’s cynicism and then there’s conspiracy theories. I’m extremely cynical about Hillary Clinton’s (along with other Democrats from her generation) chances to govern effectively, but I don’t doubt that she wants to become a powerful and well-loved President. Nor do I think that she’d rather go down in flames while dragging the hippies with her instead of pulling the party left.
By the time the North Carolina primary gets here on Feb 23, I think we’ll know whether this is concern trolling or not. Probably by the time of the New Hampshire primary we’ll know.
Where there are on-the-ground preparations will be the tell. Where there are candidate recruitment efforts to expand the map down-ticket will be a tell. And the alignment of those down-ticket candidates who stand with Hillary.
Could have fooled me.
Dems can go lose the white vote 40-60 for another 50 years and be fine. It’s not the 20th century anymore. If the GOP wants to blow off a third of the country forever, that’s their problem.
Hillary can’t square white populism with a fundamentally nonwhite party. Nobody’s going to buy that. Nobody ever buys anything she says about anything, so yeah, she and her people would do well to hew to the path of least resistance.
You’re pretending like there aren’t already ripples of black dissatisfaction with no political outlet all because Barack Obama will one day, very soon, no longer be president. She’s running against Bernie Sanders, aka the Whitest Man running. He’s so white he can be a socialist and everyone just shrugs. He’s so white he doesn’t even need to be a Democrat to stay in office or be in the primary. He’s the senator from Whiteystan.
Best thing to do is plant her flag in the most demonstrative way possible covering all the bases with non-white Democrats and dare them to mutiny over stuff that has nothing to do with policy. They’re her base in this election. Not Appalachia.
The problem is that the Democratic Party has to capture some portion of the white working class in order to make a 2016 victory anything but a death sentence. Both to capture the House and to ameliorate the midterm losses we saw in 2010 and 2014.
If Hillary Clinton doesn’t capture the House and keep the Senate, then the Republican Party can just run a strategy of gridlock and leave her helpless to do anything if/while a recession or financial crisis or whatever hits.
If she just captures the Presidency, all she’s doing is making the Democratic Party a huge, helpless target for any discontent that brews in between 2016-2020.
“The problem is that the Democratic Party has to capture some portion of the white working class “
Not according to the racial purists.
I can understand a lot of peoples’ frustration with the white working class because a lot of what they want is stupid and contradictory. I also know that if we give them what they think they want, we’ll be punished by the political blowback and/or by their petulant denial that the coin rarely lands and stays on the edge. We’re familiar with all of the whines: get your government hands off of my Medicare; give us services, low taxes, no deficits, and cheap overseas goods; cut welfare spending but make damn sure those fossil fuel and agribusiness subsidies make it on time; make America permanently dominant overseas while being a lone wolf. And judging by the latest Democratic establishment pet rock, we can throw ‘make government more efficient, not like that Reinventing Government bullshit’ onto the pile.
I understand their frustration and contempt. But we gotta find some way to get their votes. The establishment Dems think that we can somehow do this through government reform. The more leftist Dems think that we can do this through economic populism. I’m willing to try both. Because we gotta try something. The fate of America and humanity at large depends upon how the Democratic Party proceeds in the next 8-12 years.
Actually, you are citing conservatives. At the very least, a significant majority does not agree with the conservative agenda. Only a small majority of true believers listen to the likes of Rush Limbaugh and believe in trickle down economics. They used to be Democrats but between big city corruption and the Left’s demonizing of white skin, they turned to the only alternative.
WTF does that even mean? There doesn’t seem to be any connection between what you quoted and what you said
Jim, there is a rising meme that white votes aren’t necessary and that white people are the cause of all the nation’s ills. This is especially virulent at Dkos, but I hear it here too.
they’re not necessary to win the presidency but will be to win back the House
In very general terms the majority of white men are the problem and I fit that general description but I realize I’m not in the majority of that group. I wouldn’t feel persecuted if I were you, most people know that it’s the majority everyone is talking about not specifically you.
There is no realistic way to capture,the House.
The answer is as obvious as the nose on your feet.
435 seats.
435 sufficiently-left candidates.
435 Bernies.
20-40 million voters who now abstain because no sufficiently-left candidate is ever presented to them, vote.
Bingo. 100+ seat House majority.
Because we’re really a social democracy.
We’re just waiting to become Denmark with nukes.
But Democrats don’t actually want to win, so they never do it.
Sheesh, it’s as if there were no internet.
Thank you. In the sea of the blind someone gets it. If you want people to vote you have to give them something to vote for.
The only way to win the House is to increase turnout
This isn’t true. Boo estimated we need a swing of about 7% from 2012 to get the House. We can expect about 3% from racism no longer being an issue, and 2% from demographic shifts. So Hillary only needs a swing of 2% on top of what she’s already likely to get. This is very doable.
Uniform swings don’t deliver seats.
Ask any UK voter.
It depends on the electoral system. In Israel, uniform swings deliver seats in the Knesset. Great Britain has a different system in which, as you correctly note and especially in this year’s elections, uniform swings don’t necessarily deliver seats. The US has a system different from both those countries in which uniform swings don’t necessarily deliver seats…but sometimes do.
As I’ve said before I just don’t think the racism thing is going to be that different. Being a nigger lover instead of a nigger is not going to count for much anymore.
Relying on demography especially when it involves getting sporadic voters to the polls by way a campaign that has evidenced limited ability to do so in the past is risky too.
That’s ignoring increased voting restrictions.
That said I do operate under the assumption that dens need about a 7 point lead to take the house. Here’s hoping!
I thought Sanders was a Jew.
Jews are white. This isn’t the 19th Century.
Are they this white? “the Whitest Man running. He’s so white he can be a socialist and everyone just shrugs. He’s so white he doesn’t even need to be a Democrat to stay in office or be in the primary. He’s the senator from Whiteystan.”
Jews are crafty. Despite their lack of numbers, they’re actually in the majority. That’s why Bernie Sanders’ ethnicity doesn’t count as diversity.
Maybe she should divorce Bill and marry a black man. That will cause heads to explode in your “Whitestan”.
I think this depends in part on how paranoid you are. If you believe that many in the GOP are actively trying to bring about Armageddon, or at least undue every advance of the last century, then winning the Presidency is of prime concern. It doesn’t matter if she can get much done. It matters that she can keep them from destroying us.
If you risk winning the Presidency for the possibility of making the President more effective, you are creating an all or nothing situation. Some of us are more comfortable making sure we can survive, even if things are only improving slowly.
The problem is that a failed Hillary Clinton Presidency from, say, a foreign policy blunder or being unable to avert economic gottdammerung due to gridlock, will enable the Republican Party as well. Just in time for another 10 years of restricting as well.
If I knew that a Hillary Clinton Presidency was going to fail ahead of time and give the Republicans an ‘in’ for 2020, I’d have no problem stabbing her in the back and taking a dive for 2016. The big questions of course are:
A.) Will a Hillary Clinton Presidency fail? I think that unless the economy has a roaring recovery (doubtful with the falling federal deficit + increasing trade deficit, Europe, and high household debt) and/or she captures Congress she’s going to fail.
B.) Would the Republican Party be able to capitalize on Hillary Clinton’s missteps in 2016 to avert their own demographic collapse? I’m not sure. It’d depend on how strongly the Democrats otherwise performed in 2016, the Democratic Part’s taste for gridlock, and whether the nominee is a dyed-in-the-wool crazy like Walker or a transparent shill like Romney or Bush.
C.) Would a Democratic Party that was routed in 2016 be able to recover in 2020? I don’t think it’s out of the question. It’d depend on how much credibility the centrist fuckups retained after 2016. And if Hillary Clinton loses an imminently winnable election due to an Obama scandal/recession and/or her own campaigning, I think that will give an ‘in’ for the leftists to further clean house.
To be fair, Hillary Clinton has been making the right noises lately that will convince me that she won’t fuck up 2016-2020. I mean, there’s no mea culpa on warhawkery or financial deregulation or the Clinton surpluses (the three big things that can fuck her over) but it’s not bad enough that I’m committed to taking a dive ahead of time.
Okay. But that’s a lot of “ifs”. And in the meantime there are, for example, 3-4 Supreme Court vacancies likely to occur in the next few years. Not to mention the degree to which a Republican president (and Congress) could undo many of Obama’s accomplishments.
The problem is the presidency is not enough to avoid destruction. On balance the Obama era has made things worse only more slowly. Some of that is down to Obama himself, but some us in spite if him.
The presidency is not enough.
I disagree. Take Obama’s signature legislation, the ACA. As a divorce attorney, I used to represent middle aged women with conditions like high blood pressure and diabetes that made them uninsurable once they fell off the husband’s plan. Those dark days are for the moment behind us. A Democrat in the White House will protect this enormous gain. And that’s just an example. Obama accomplished much more than the left gives him credit for.
The rich are richer, the government is more gridlocked, voters have less power than ever, spying is more rampant, open racism and police brutality are lauded, economic recovery is anemic, public responsibilities are continued to be neglected, internationally more countries ignore human rights and press freedom with impunity.
Obamacare is only better because the previous system was so bad. It puts a greater burden on under 30s and middle class with more limited benefits to them directly.
She has a little over a year to get it right. I think she has a plan to get that majority. Who cares what a beltway jerkoff thinks anyway?
The 50-state strategy is an ethical imperative, even though it is purely symbolic and would result in some amount of wasted resources.
The Republican strategy is — effectively, perhaps consciously — a strategy of partition. To abandon the 50-state strategy is to validate the emerging narrative that partition is inevitable.
Partition is not acceptable; but not for the obvious reasons.
If (if) it were possible to draw a clean line between Red America and Blue America, it ought to be done — under international supervision for seventy years.
Of course it is not possible; the divide between Red and Blue is between rural and urban. Red is the cheese, Blue is the holes.
Partition, once begun, would cascade. It would not stop at two political entities occupying the territory of the coterminous 48 states; it would not stop at six, or ten. It would progress to the county or township level. There would be a subsequent pendulum swing towards consolidation: think warlord China.
It may very well be that this is inevitable, but we cannot afford to acknowledge that; we have to treat it as absolutely unthinkable.
This is the rationale — the only, but dispositive, rationale — for the 50-state strategy.
Clinton is going to have to appeal to rural American in the states she can carry, but I don’t see a way to bring South Carolina into competitive territory (at the presidential level or elsewhere) in the foreseeable future. I don’t see Republicans working hard to be competitive in Maryland or California. If it were possible to go deep into red states and put the GOP on the defensive I’d be all for it. But for now I’d be thrilled if we could keep all Obama’s states in play and maybe make noise in those few states vulnerable to turning purple (say Arizona).
Georgia is another.
I object to calling them House Clinton. Unless Chelsea is doing something to eventually have political power, it’s just them too. It’s very different than generational power centers like the Kennedys or Bushes.
I believe “House Clinton” is a reference to Dune.
It’s a reference to Game of Thrones.
Thanks. I’ve never watched it. Did read part of one book.
Figured as much, wife is into it big time but despite being a big fantasy guy (because of it?) I’m not.
Anyhow unless they have an Heir I think calling them a house us incorrect.
She would have to tell the truth and not coddle those White working class voters that want to cling to the Whiteness. She would have to go to say, Kentucky, stand in a hall….Go something like this:
“Do you love your Kynect?”
When they scream back yes….
“Then, you love Obamacare. Without Obamacare, there is no My next.”
You know what happens next…..so, why waste time on them?
an opening for O’Malley? as a compromise nominee?
Totally agree. I’ll still vote for Clinton.