The Democratic Crossroads: Stay With the Known or Accept a New Generation of Leadership

For the party of the status quo it is always easier. Who best represents "stay the course." The only complication this year is how to be the candidate of stay the course without mentioning the president from whom you are inheriting the course.

For the party of reform, it is always more complicated. If it really were about who best represents change it would be easier. But there is also the human factor of power. For better or worse not everyone gets into politics to carry out reform. Some seek power, what most people think politics is all about. For those who have had power and seek to keep it or recapture it, they can claim to be for change and reform but they cannot bring it about because there are too many old arrangements, too many deals, too many old networks. They all prevent transition to a new age.

The Democratic party is once again faced with a decision: whether to stay with the known, the familiar, and the "experienced" or whether to accept a new generation of leadership composed of those who have not had power or the experience of governing. If you believe, as I do, that the early 21st century is an age of huge transition -- of globalization, of information, of failed states, of climate change, of rising new powers, and so on -- then leadership hamstrung by old arrangements and commitments will not do.

The contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is further complicated by unusual factors. Her gender. His race. Many women will vote for her simply because she is a woman. Many minorities will support him simply because he is an unusual black-American. That is human nature and to a great degree understandable. But gender and race cannot and should not obscure the larger realities. America is stuck. Those of us who met in Oklahoma City (the "Ben-Gay forum") think we are stuck in large part because of bitter partisanship. But we are also stuck because our leaders cannot see over the horizon ("the vision thing"). They do not see that we are living in an age of huge revolutions. They refuse to understand that we cannot resolve complex security issues merely by changing America's character and making this Republic an empire of unilateral intervention and occupation.

I have personal experience of the Democratic party at a generational crossroads. In the mid-1980s the Democratic party could play it safe and stay with a candidate they knew and with whom they were comfortable and familiar. Or they could take a chance with a new generation of leadership with a new understanding of a new age and new policies and ideas. They chose the former and they lost.

Democrats and Americans are faced with a big decision. Will we play it safe? Or will we embrace the future? This is not a time to put gender or race above what is best for the country or to make superficial choices. We have huge debts and deficits. The climate is rapidly approaching a tipping point. We are stuck in the Middle East. Most of the people in the world do not like us or trust us. Our education system is declining. And the list goes on.

Only a new generation of leaders can solve these new challenges, because only a new generation of leaders is unbound by old policies, old commitments and arrangements, old deals and old friendships. This is a time when America must leave old politics behind. This election is about transition not power. We will either move forward or we will go back.

Comments

[cadawa]

The Democratic Party needs more than just new leadership. The Democratic Party doesn't stand for anything. They have abandoned their populist roots and are scrapping with the GOP over the spoils of graft, corruption and malignant corporatism.
Political parties are usurping power that should be ours. They do not serve the public. In fact they are standing between us and the candidates we want and the kind of government we need.
Dispensing with these dinosaurs and publicly funding elections would do more save our tattered republic than any other single issue.

[filmunas]

Hillary Clinton is a true American tragedy. She has so inundated herself with compromise on so many matters that her soul no longer belongs to her. And Hillary's insufferable husband is no help either.

[kfdan]

Gary I consider Hillary to fit in the following quote. " For those who have had power and seek to keep it or recapture it, they can claim to be for change and reform but they cannot bring it about because there are too many old arrangements, too many deals, too many old networks. They all prevent transition to a new age."
We really need to move away from the neo-con empire vision. We really need to end the elite control on both finances and Washington politics. End the federal reserve, diversify ownership of the media, bring the IRS into accord with the Constitution and bring the Constitution back into full swing. It's become "just a piece of paper" as GW said.

[nellie]

"Many minorities will support him simply because he is an unusual black-American."

Open your eyes, Gary, and look around. He's not that unusual. There have been black doctors, lawyers, professors, writers, thinkers, and orators long before Barack Obama came along. You left off one item in your long list of transitions. Perhaps the 21st century will be the end of tired stereotypes and foot-in-mouth insults from people who won't step outside their comfort zones... Today's posts are really ticking me off.

[GDritawil]

Attention should be given to Edwards. He isn't afraid to admit/correct mistakes...unlike some in the WH. He has the correct view on what is wrong in DC...get money out...maybe people will be heard. He understands Global Warming is REAL. If America wants to reclaim its leadership/strenght role, not "world bully", this is the way.

How many Katrina's, before we examine why she was so costly? Imagine losing your home & livelihood, but still no hope after 3 years!?! This is America? We ignored signs that fossil fuel WASN'T the way 30yrs ago, but we haven't improved that nor our infrastructure in nearly the same amount of time? Where did all that tax $$ go? corporations? How many more major bridges, damns, levees need to collapse? How many more ice storms, tornados, floods & fires do you need to convince you?
Don't let them pull the "wool over" with "non-issues" (i.e. abortion, same-sex marriage, etc.) Governments shouldn't set morality, parents/churchs should. That is why the Puritans left England, so they could believe what they wished to believe, and NO ONE could dictate to them what to believe.

Every religion asks good stewardship, we can agree. On that note we, Americans, have fallen short. We consume to the point that we are no longer people, but consumers. We are not told to prepare for bad times, but to covet every new gadget/trend that comes along, with no regard as to where that object might be in 5 years. Same people, who are baiting you to care about "non-issues", are the same people who are betting that you will become so fired up, you won't notice the true destruction by distraction....war, exploding gas prices, poor health care, lost pentions, exporting good jobs, importing illegals to work jobs you don't want, stealing your children's future (ie. education) for capital gains.

Choose the BEST. Look only at the surface (main stream media), you aren't going to get the picture. Forgo this week's NFL, spend 4hrs READING/choosing who WILL fix our REAL problems.

[fitCTmom]

Unfortunatley most democrats are masochistic and seem to want to go back for more. People say they want change, but they don't. What they really want is to go back to the past. The years have created a warm patina on the Clinton administration and has made them feel all warm and nostalgic. They don't want change, its too uncomfortable.

[Swift2]

Hillary is 60. Obama is 46. (Obama is still a boomer, by the way, just late in the curve.) So ageism is cool, according to the rabid Obamarians.

[Concerned1234]

Anyone but Hilliary will be President in 2009

[nyawker]

You neglect an important fact, Senator. Bill Clinton was forced to be a compromiser and conciliator because he worked six years with alockstep Republican congress. Hillary with a solid Democratic majority would be able to work for the things that both Clintons wanted.

Barack Obama is Mike Dukakis with oratory. He can win the nomination, but he'll get creamed in the general if McCain is the candidate for the GOP. Hillary will wipe the floor with McCain in October debates. Democrats always have a death wish in presidential elections and this year it's Obama.

Don't compare Hillary Clinton to Walter Mondale. Mondale was like a horse and buggy candidate who didn't realize he was living in an automobile age and he got buried with GOP newspeak.

I don't claim that Hillary is my ideal candidate, but she's a candidate who can win. Most of the hateful drivel I see in the comments section on Huffpost is from passionate neophytes who are getting sucked into repeating GOP talking points. I expect better analysis from you.

[Maxstar212]

Obama + McGluckin = Homophobia

In what is my most important issue, Gay Rights, I am unconvinced that he would make a possitive change. Change can be possitive, or it can be negative. It was illegal in New York to be Gay as recently as the 1980's. I am unconvinced that Obama would move my most imporant cause forward. I donate money to the Gay Rights committees, like the Human Rights campaign. Would they be considered illegal also?

[InformedMisery]

I have a tremendous amount of respect for Gary Hart. He's one of the most insightful, intellectual people in the political sphere. But when you talk about moving forward, not backward, it should be pointed out that electing a woman to be president is a definite step forward, even if her name is Clinton.

[mellene]

I'm over 60 and it's time for the baby-boomers to step aside. We need to also clean house in our Congress and across this country where cronyism and corruption with multi-national corporations is running rampant. It use to be sort of revealed what was happening and now it's out in the open for any American listening or looking to see what's happening to us. Let the new generation see if they can save us from our greed and selfishness.

[BourbonDemocrat]

Sounds great, but there is a huge problem: every time a "new generation" takes over, the problems only get worse. Nothing fundamental ever really changes.

Will Obama bring "change?" Probably on some superficial level he will, but (once again) it won't be the kind of change we need.

Will he bring the troops home from 100+ occupied countries and dismantle the empire? No. Will he address our inflationary monetary system, which is killing the poor and middle class while enriching bankers, big corporations, and the military-industrial complex? Of course not.

And then once again we will talk of the need for "change," until our government finally collapses, Soviet-style.

[ednadumpling]

So the Obama idea of no lobbyists is to have Tom Daschle
as a campaign advisor

every member of the Daschle family is a lobbyist

The Obama campaign is full of humorless gits. (and weak sisters Daschle and Kerry)

[rucognizant]

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/123107.html
The Bushes and the Clintons " who have held pieces of the nation"s executive power for more than a quarter century dating back to George H.W. Bush"s election as Vice President in 1980 " essentially would be keeping matters within the board rooms of the Washington Establishment.

In responding to Bill Clinton"s remark, George H.W. Bush issued a statement making clear he would not join in any slap at his son"s foreign policy. That also means Hillary Clinton"s "first thing" is unthinkable if her new administration were trying to exact any accountability from George W. Bush for his wrongdoing.

So, to get the senior Bush"s cooperation on the worldwide tour, there would have to be an implicit understanding that the second Clinton administration wouldn"t investigate the younger Bush"s crimes " from authorizing torture, ordering warrantless wiretaps, exposing CIA officer Valerie Plame"s identity, waging war under false pretenses and other abuses of executive powers.

If Hillary Clinton does get elected, you can expect to hear lots of talk about "leaving that one for the historians" or about the danger of increased partisanship if the Democrats were viewed as trying to "get even" by exposing Bush"s offenses.