Why is HRC Stooping So Low?

I'm becoming increasingly concerned about the stridency and inaccuracy of charges in Iowa -- especially coming from my old friend. While I'm as hard-boiled as they come about what's said in campaigns, I just don't think Dems should stoop to this. First, HRC attacked O's plan for keep Social Security solvent. Social Security doesn't need a whole lot to keep it going -- it's in far better shape than Medicare -- but everyone who's looked at it agrees it will need bolstering (I was a trustee of the Social Security Trust Fund 10 years ago, and I can vouch for this). Obama wants to do it by lifting the cap on the percent of income subject to Social Security payroll taxes, which strikes me as sensible. That cap is now close to $98,000 (it's indexed), and the result is highly regressive. (Bill Gates satisfies his yearly Social Security obligations a few minutes past midnight on January 1 every year.) The cap doesn't have to be lifted all that much to keep Social Security solvent -- maybe to $115,00. That's a progressive solution to the problem. HRC wants to refer Social Security to a commission. That's avoiding the issue, and it's irresponsible: a commission will likely call either for raising the retirement age (that's what Greenspan's Social Security commission came up with in the 1980s) or increasing the payroll tax on all Americans. So when HRC charges that Obama's plan would "raise taxes" and her plan wouldn't, she's simply not telling the truth.

I'm equally concerned about her attack on his health care plan. She says his would insure fewer people than hers. I've compared the two plans in detail. Both of them are big advances over what we have now. But in my view Obama's would insure more people, not fewer, than HRC's. That's because Obama's puts more money up front and contains sufficient subsidies to insure everyone who's likely to need help -- including all children and young adults up to 25 years old. Hers requires that everyone insure themselves. Yet we know from experience with mandated auto insurance -- and we're learning from what's happening in Massachusetts where health insurance is now being mandated -- that mandates still leave out a lot of people at the lower end who can't afford to insure themselves even when they're required to do so. HRC doesn't indicate how she'd enforce her mandate, and I can't find enough money in HRC's plan to help all those who won't be able to afford to buy it. I'm also impressed by the up-front investments in information technology in O's plan, and the reinsurance mechanism for coping with the costs of catastrophic illness. HRC is far less specific on both counts. In short: They're both advances, but O's is the better of the two. HRC has no grounds for alleging that O's would leave out 15 million people.

Yesterday, HRC suggested O lacks courage. "There's a big difference between our courage and our convictions, what we believe and what we're willing to fight for," she told reporters in Iowa, saying Iowa voters will have a choice "between someone who talks the talk, and somebody who's walked the walk." Then asked whether she intended to raise questions about O's character, she said: "It's beginning to look a lot like that."

I just don't get it. If there's anyone in the race whose history shows unique courage and character, it's Barack Obama. HRC's campaign, by contrast, is singularly lacking in conviction about anything. Her pollster, Mark Penn, has advised her to take no bold positions and continuously seek the political center, which is exactly what she's been doing.

All is fair in love, war, and politics. But this series of slurs doesn't serve HRC well. It will turn off voters in Iowa, as in the rest of the country. If she's worried her polls are dropping, this is not the way to build them back up.

This post first appeared on Robert Reich's blog.

Comments

[daveny]

Amen. Glad to have you and your wits back in the public discourse. I never agreed with you about the "new economy" and the benefit of people being independent contractor­s... but you were always one of the most thoughtful and intelligent voices to come to those conclusions!

[jakibaez]

Robert, I read your article and even if I have agreed with you in the past, this time I don't. When Hillary sits back and don't say anything, she is accused by voters and media of being too conceited, if she fights back, she is considered to mean. What is she to do? Obama is not the shining knight that most people see, he reminds me of a young man who uses his color to advance his cause. To override "don't tell and don't ask" is dangerous for our children. The override of our immigrations laws by promising license to illegal is not only dumb but dangerous. The public is seeing a new face with a new message, but, they don't see that it is a Liberal that is being elected. I, am a moderate Democratic and I will never vote for a man who will give us "vices and vile" behaviors back in our country again. I am black so it is not that I see color in this election. It is experience and values that will win this election. When "the dress crossers" which are planning a match in April down the street of LA and New York come out in numbers with Obama's face on the banners, the Republicans will have enough ammonition to win this election.

[sonofloud]

well gee....may­be because she's been attacked by fellow democrats for the last couple of months?

[HypocrisyAlarm]

Robert Reich has plenty of credibility, in my eyes. I've never seen anything to make me doubt him. Please link to any evidence to the contrary, if you disagree.

In this piece, he gives examples and arguments to support his position. Given what I've seen as the results of "blue-ribbon" commissions and subsequent legislation (or lack thereof -- the 9/11 commission springs to mind), I tend to trust Obama's plan more than passing the issue off to a commission. Further, his plan strikes me as covering the needs and answering the questions. I also find more specifics in Obama's Social Security plan, and the comparisons Robert Reich makes appear logical and well-supported.

On healthcare, Obama's plan covers the bases better, and I really would like to see the competition between the private sector and the public sector Clinton's plan espouses. I'd like to compare results when one group is trying to please the shareholder while the other tries to please the patient. Perhaps we could then ALL see that capitalism and the marketplace do NOT always outperform public institutions. I find extremely distasteful the idea of profiting from the misfortune of others.

While I find that the slate of candidates running on the Democratic side both strong and interesting, I must admit to my discomfort at having yet another member of a political family dynasty in the White House, and that reduces my support for Clinton.

Lastly, for those who feel compelled to execute personal attacks like many I saw directed at the challenges that Robert Reich has succesfully overcome, please try not to be so petty. Writing such things weakens what you say, degrades YOU, and elevates Robert Reich. I don't think that is what you intend.

[SaintZak]

Politics is certainly a rough business, and you have to be prepared to mix it up, but Hillary Clinton's recent behavor does nothing but reinforce all of the negative notions of her...that she is a shrill, self-entitled, dishonest harpie. So far Barak Obama has behaved with considerable integrity. I hope he continues to do so. If this is any indication of the Hillary clinton we can expect (before the first primary vote has even been cast!) can you imagine her as President?! We certainly don't need that. What iis saad is that is a pretty historic election. We have a woman and an African American looking at the great possibility of becoming President. That Sen. Clinton has decended into an unattractive stereotype does no justice to all the strides women have made.

As far as the Reverend McClurkin goes, I think it was an unfortunate oversight on Obama's part. He could have and should have addressed it better, but he removed himself from it all pretty quickly, and McClurkin really has played no part in the campaign. It was blip in my (gay) eyes.

[JimK2]

Robert Reich is wrong, Obama's plan is a give away to the insurance companys. His $65 billion dollar a year plan will give us a second rate poor people health insurance. Obama says he will create a National Health Insurance Exchange to help individuals who wish to purchase private insurance.

Hillary's plan is modelled after the Germany style universal health care which 93% choose goverment run fund over private insurance.

Saint Obama does no wrong.

Obama's Idea of an 'Ethical' Campaign'

His media spinmeister-David Axelrod was tagged by the New Yokr Times as being the likely source behind leaks to the Chicago media regarding scandalous information about Obama's lead political opponent during his 2004 Senate run at a particulary opportune time during the Democratic primary for Senate.

So would the Obama campaign leak opposition "research" to be used against his opponents when running for the President?

Why not? Just politics as usual for the "candidate for change."
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2007/11/obamas_idea_of_an_ethical_camp.html
Ambinder: Obama campaign "helping to place" Hsu story.

Obama campaign staffers were “frustrated” because the press was not covering Clinton “in the way they expected it would.”

And at a campaign event in Iowa, one of Obama’s aides plopped down next to me and spoke even more bluntly. He wanted to know when reporters would begin to look into Bill Clinton’s postpresidential sex life,” Ambinder writes.
http://www.suntimes.com/news/sweet/641088,sweet110708A.article

[Spookcatcher]

Thank-you for not being a "one sider". I keep waitng for George Stephanopoulus to get tighter on his scrutiny also. Towing a strict party or candidate party line on either side of the isle is not working, it has been used for the last few decades to keep towing Our Republic closer towards over the cliff...

[Kane]

The Obama campaign has developed a website to "chronicle and rebut the increasingly desperate attacks and accusations being produced by the Clinton campaign"

http://hillaryattacks.barackobama.com/

[marbotty]

The ironic thing about Hillary's campaign is that she is easily the furthest to the Right of any Democratic candidate, yet she's easily the most despised candidate by anyone on the Right.

What's more odd is that she continues to get support from the left, when it's evident she's been wrong (and consistently wrong) on the biggest foreign policy issues of the day. She was wrong on Iraq and now she's wrong on Iran:

Today:

"U.S. Finds That Iran Halted Nuclear Arms Bid in 2003"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/03/AR2007120300846.html

From 2006:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/19/AR2006011903220.html

"Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) accused the Bush administration of playing down the threat of a nuclear Iran and called for swift action at the United Nations to impose sanctions on the Iranian government­."

From 2006:

[Qbear]

I was an Obama supporter until he hired Donnie McClurkin to SPIT on me and every LGBT American. At this point I usually get called a Hillary hack, I'm not. Her Kyl/Lieberman vote lost me even being able to hold my nose and support her. I recommend Democratic Caucus attendees form uncommited groups, on Global warming, Anti-Iraq War, LGBT, pro-Immigrants, let the DLC and DNC get a little nervous, and stop saying from the top down who OUR candidate will be.

[mudfiles]

There are two words that sum up her desperate attacks as of late: Howard Wolfson. A lot of her negative comments over the past couple weeks sound like they're straight from his ridiculous mouth. She would be wise to fire him before she digs this hole so deep, there's no way out.

It's interesting your comment about their health plans. No one in the main stream media has asserted the idea that her plan may, in fact, insure less people. But if it's true, he needs to call her out on that, because he;s taken a (minor) beating on that issue over the past month.

The 'kindergarten defense' about his wanting to be the President because of a paper he wrote in pre-school is so bottom of the barrel negative politics, it's embarrassing. You'd think Wolfson would have more brains than that.

[racetoinfinity]

Thank you, Robert Reich. Very good and informative post on those two issues, and on "untruths" by Her Royal Centrist-s­niffing-th­e-prevaili­ng-winds.

I hope it gets circulated.

[Kane]

Hillary's recent negative attacks reveal more about her as a person than all the policy proposals and speeches of her campaign.

Take a good look in the mirror, Hillary. You have become what you despised most in your republican enemies.

[benfrankln]

I think this campaign and Hillary's champions on the comments section, here, demonstrate just how dishonest politics gets when people get more concerned about winning than about doing the right thing.

Barack Obama opposed that war from the beginning. He showed courage when Hillary showed cowardice. And now she wants credit for that cowardice.

The lesson I'm learning from the last 6 or 7 years of politics is that once people start lying for their own causes, they will continue to do so as long as they please and they will stop being able to tell the difference between the truth and a lie.

Hillary Clinton demonstrates that propensity better than any of the candidates in either primary, I'm concerned. She does not deserve to be rewarded for her cowardice.

Let us hope that the nation heeds that lesson, this time, instead of rewarding the candidate who shared their cowardice.

Ben Sutherland
http://benfrankln.blogspot.com/

[OTOH]

Bill Gates's 2006 salary was $966,667. So he has earned the maximum salary taxable for social security by about February 7th. Or, he has earned salary that is equal to his social security tax for the year by about January 3rd (if we count only his contribution) or by January 6th (if we count his employer's contribution too).