The new Gallup survey can't get much more galling. It shows that more Democrats would be more likely to vote for a Democratic candidate for office if Bill Clinton pitched the candidate than if President Obama did. Even more galling than that is that independents say that they would be far less likely to vote for a candidate that Obama pitched than one that Clinton pitched. So what does Bill have that Obama doesn't have for far too many Democrats and just about all independents?
To start with he's not a sitting president who has been pounded from pillar to post from the instant that he put his toe in the White House. Clinton has the luxury of not just the time and distance he's been removed from the White House, but the image and embrace as a wise, elder statesman who has much to offer Democrats on winning elections. That's just the start. The even tougher truth to swallow for the White House is that Clinton is still fondly even rapturously regarded as the Democrat who got things done. He was not embroiled in a major war, the economy hummed, he beat back every major political and legal challenge from the GOP Clinton loathers and baiters, he was a cash cow for Democratic candidates and incumbents, he did a course correction with the Democratic Party that transformed it from a party stigmatized as one that pandered to minorities and thumbed its nose at the White middle class, to one that championed their interests. He was and obviously is still seen by Democrats as the consummate professional, charismatic Democrat that can deliver the goods. It's the Clinton mystique all over again, and it hasn't lost one bit of allure.
There's one more thing that makes Clinton the one Democrat who's still most in demand and listened to by other Democrats and that thing is desperation. The GOP hatchet job on Obama has been so diabolically effective that Democrats have scattered to the hills in panic, despair and disillusionment. The mantra from virtually every political analyst, pundit, GOP echo box, and even many top Democrats, is that the midterms will be a colossal wipe out for Democrats. And the blame for that lay with one Democrat, and only one Democrat, President Obama. Many of the Democrats that rode Obama's coat tails to victory in November 2008 are avoiding him like the plague. Some have gone further and depicted themselves in ads and saber rattling speeches and interviews as the anti-Democrat Democrat. They brag that they have cut bait with Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at every turn. Clinton then is the shining light, their one beacon of hope if not to stem the alleged November massacre at least to dampen some of the worst effects.
There's a final galling note in the Gallup survey. It found that Obama's negative impact as recorded in its survey data showed that if he campaigned for a Democratic candidate or incumbent that it could rev up GOP voters to vote for the Democrat's GOP rival. Some of that is already seen in Nevada where Senate minority leader Harry Reid is in a race to the wire with Tea Party backed Loony Sharron Angle.
Obama has repeatedly gone to bat for Reid in campaign appearances in the state with Reid in tow. But Clinton pitched Reid in the state too. If Gallup is right then that didn't hurt Reid. The hurt though is in the thought that a former president can do more for his party than the man who heads the party.
Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts a nationally broadcast political affairs radio talk show on Pacifica and KTYM Radio Los Angeles. Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: www.twitter.com/earlhutchinson
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Obama doesn't really understand the nitty gritty of how things work. Hence his focus on soaring but ultimately contentless rhetoric.
Maybe, just maybe, it is because Obama won by bringing along a whole lot of independents with him, and that he abandoned the independents the day he got in the White House. The independents have since left Obama, and without their support he and the Democratic establishment on his coattails are going down.
We are a Center-Right country. Bill Clinton knew that, which is why he governed that way. NAFTA, Welfare Reform, Bank de-regulation - Bill was a Democrat in name (and questionable morality) only. That, and the man can lie and empathize better than anyone in politics. These qualities are what made him popular, for better or for worse.
Clinton was the first President from the Democratic Party to betray his base. Plus his betrayals were more limited in number.
The DLC even has a word for it -- triangulation.
The working class of America elected Clinton. What did he do? HIs major betrayals include signing NAFTA and later signing the law the repeal the protections of the Glass Steagall Act. He did so before leaving office and assisting the Emir of Dubai, Maktoum bin Mohammed Al Maktoum, in an effort to take over the major United States ports.
Some have selective amnesia. They say that it was all Lewinsky, or believe that it was. What's a little sex in the White House? Especially when the president has a big D after his name and the Republicans, the natural enemies of the working class, are showing so much glee from catching him? What's a little perjury from the president, especially when he is not a Republican and his lying was about events occurring in the White House involves sex?
Clinton's betrayal of his base and their economic future with NAFTA and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act was supposed to be a one-time event. No president from the Democratic Party had ever betrayed his base before. Surely no future president from the Democratic Party would do that again.
And then we got Obama.
Clinton is a fine example. People forget that the republicans pilloried him from the moment he took office as well, labeling him a "failed president" from the moment he took office. His approval ratings also dipped below fifty percent in the mid-terms, which was a big factor in enabling the GOP takeover of Congress in 1994. People also forget that he failed to get health care reform passed or that he adopted the now-hated DADT policy. All of that is forgotten and forgiven as he plays the wise elder statesman.
Every president is the worst president in history. Until he leaves office.
The only reason the press is ramping up over this election is because the Press and every Democrat with a soap box declared the GOP dead as of 2008. Now, two years later, the GOP has risen from the grave...and they have to make the story spectacular to sell ads. The media is still as left as ever, save for Fox News.
Ans: A better PR rep and White Skin.
Other than that.. they are the same guy.. both are extremely intelligent, committed, and charasmatic.
Clinton would not be so Clintonesk if he had a darker shade of skin, an economy in the tank, and two wars looming largely in the background. Which isn’t to minimize his presidency or his accomplishments but to not factor in the president’s skin color is to be largely missing the point of what’s been happening during this campaign season and what Republicans have been capitalizing on over the last two years.
Thinking that President Obama’s solution to his problems lay in some Clintonian formulae is incredibly naïve.
Obama needs to take a lesson from Joe Biden's mother and go out and FIGHT the bullies, even if they bloody his nose. That's the only way to gain respect and admiration.
NAFTA passed the House 234-200, with 132 R and 102 D (.http://clerk.house.gov/evs/1993/roll575.xml) , and passed the Senate 61 to 38 with a majority of Republican votes (34 R, 27 D ; http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=103&session=1&vote=00395)
NAFTA was a done deal whoever was president. Just like now, with the Chamber of Commerce and the multi-nationals and all their secret funding unleashed by the Republicans on the Supreme Court, control of US elections by corporations is a done deal. The only hope for America is that the Democrats can hold of the Chamber of Commerce this time and get so pissed of at the mis-matched funding that they slam the corporations in the next congress. It's a slim hope, but it's all America's got.
Get the facts and get informed before you vote to make the same mistakes that got America into this mess.