Edwards Out

As regular readers know, I've been leaning towards John Edwards from the start. Now that he's out, I'm left with what Matt Taibbi described as a choice between poetry and prose.

Lord knows I love poetry. Like Obama, I'm a child of the twilight between the Boomers and the Xers. Our earliest exposure to the greater American narrative was shaped by political assassinations, Watergate, trips to the moon, large scale dissent, generational warfare, bad pop music, bad pop psychology,  and ...well, you get the picture. In that way, I think I might have an affinity with Obama that others might not have. At the same time, I've struggled with supporting him. Mostly because I can't get past his "all poetry, no prose" message. Deep in the pit of my stomach,  he feels like a poseur. And the burden of proving to me that he's not is on him.

While I thought the Clinton Presidency was pretty damned great all-in-all --and especially in comparison with every other presidency of my entire lifetime, I also have issues with the prose candidate. But, unlike the sexist, irrational, media-driven Hillary Hate-Hard-On Circle Jerk, my objection to Clinton hinges solely on her voting record. And electibility.  And coat tails.

As most folks have observed, Clinton and Obama are nearly indistinguishable on the issues. So, my choice between the two is probably going to come down to intangibles. They both have until April 22nd to fight for my vote.

Comments

[Hankie]

did the left make a stink about being reality-based?

[eRobin]

Prose-lover here.

I'm with you on every point except the love for the Clinton presidency. I hated those eight years and didn't vote for Clinton either time. I've hated the seven years that I believe they spawned.

I'm going to jump to Obama though and here's why:

1. Electibility, as you said. HRC just cannot win. That said, I'm fairy sure that McCain will beat Obama too but I think he's marginally less unelectable than HRC is.

2. I have it on the word of a strong, longtime progressive activist, whom I trust, that Obama is movable. She knew him when he came up in Chicago. She said that we will have to work very very hard to move him but that we'll have a small window through which to shout from the margins.

3. Obama will bring people to register & vote, which is only good for us way (way, way) down the road - I guess that's the coattails argument.

Now, I want to see Edwards do something great - and then run again one day. And I want Elizabeth to be there when he does.

[Roxanne]

So, you liked the 12 year Reagan-Bush period better? How bout the Nixon-Ford-Carter years? LBJ ...good or bad, depending on the day and how much it benefited Texas?

And how did the Clintons spawn the last seven years?

[KathyF]

I don't care at all for poetry, but I've always thought Obama would make a damn fine president.

eRobin, where do you want to move Obama to? Pennsylvania? I think he's in a pretty good place right now.

[eRobin]

Oh god - LBJ's presidency has to win for Medicare alone. I don't consider it of my lifetime, but I certainly could.

Re: Clinton

I've never been interested in ranking things within a set of items that are uniformly good or bad. It drives my husband crazy b/c it's one of his favorite things to do. Of course I didn't prefer any combination of Reagan and BushCo to Clinton but I was still was very unhappy during the Clinton years. Matt Bai's deeply flawed article on Clintonism from a couple of weeks ago in the NYT magazine gets at why - you've heard it all before:

Some Democrats, though, and especially those who are apt to call themselves “progressives,” offer a more complicated and less charitable explanation. In their view, Clinton failed to seize his moment and create a more enduring, more progressive legacy — not just because of the personal travails and Republican attacks that hobbled his presidency, but because his centrist, “third way” political strategy, his strategy of “triangulating” to find some middle point in every argument, sapped the party of its core principles. By this thinking, Clinton and his friends at the Democratic Leadership Council, the centrist think tank that served as a platform for his bid for national office, were so desperate to woo back moderate Southern voters that they accepted conservative assertions about government (that it was too big and unwieldy, that what was good for business was good for workers)[and you can add the inadequacy of Social Security to that list - eR] and thus opened the door wide for Bush to come along and enact his extremist agenda with only token opposition. In other words, they say, he was less a victim of Bush’s radicalism than he was its enabler.

It's more complicated than that, of course. The American Left has a lot to answer for for letting Clinton get away with it. He faced a lot of trouble in Congress from his own party - supporters have told me that he did the best he could with what he had. He himself loves to say that bad legislation is better than no legislation and that bad laws can be fixed, e.g. he expected Gore to fix NAFTA. That strategy of governing is either stupid or dishonest b/c it's so obviously false.

But at bottom, to me, all of his accommodating (instead of leading - which would require him to have wanted to take us in a different direction, an assumption that was always shaky at best) let people believe that there isn't a difference b/t the GOP and the Dems. Now, thanks largely to the DLC, that's now more true than not. And now we get kids falling in love with the vague idea of reaching across the aisle to get along again - as if accommodating the power elite was ever the answer to America's problems - as if these people can be accommodated.

When I want to feel good about Clinton, I acknowledge that he was the best Republican president we've had in my lifetime. If that's what HRC has in mind, I'll roll the dice with Obama and hope that he's the closet champion we need.

[eRobin]

Kathy F: Well, up this scale would be nice. And if he never says another word about the Social Security "crisis" or any of Reagan's alleged positive qualities, I'd be happy with that too.

[Roxanne]

So, you don't see all this "post-partisan" nonsense (and it IS nonsense) as being lakovian for "triangulation" or "third way"?

[eRobin]

Oh, I absolutely do. I'm heartsick that I'm forced to support Obama. My fondest wish and I mean that I'm absolutely clinging to it - is that all the crap he's talking is a lie similar to the crap that BushCo was talking in 2000 about being a uniter. More than anything I wanted that Chicago activist to tell me that I was wrong about him and that he's just waiting to do great things. Instead she told me that he's able to be pushed to do great things and that Roosevelt wasn't FDR when he took office. (Of course, Eleanor was always Eleanor.) It's thin broth but I'll take it. And if HRC makes it through the primaries - I'll take her too.

Do you think I'm being unfair punishing HRC for the terms of her husband? SHE could be the one waiting to do great things. It's easier to support people when you don't have to read their minds - or when you're in the majority of public opinion, which I never ever seem to be.

[Roxanne]

Do you think I'm being unfair punishing HRC for the terms of her husband? SHE could be the one waiting to do great things.

Not necessarily. She's the one who's running on 35 years of experience ...so if she's claiming the experience, she's due the blame too.

But I think what most people hate about that era is the raging lunacy of the Right. Should we punish the Clintons because they piss off the Right? Might be interesting to see what a Clinton would do in power with a Democratically-controlled congress.

[eRobin]

Might be interesting to see what a Clinton would do in power with a Democratically-controlled congress.

Well, history tells us that the first thing they'd do is lose the House. ;)

[Roxanne]

Well you're old enough to know better! ;-)

...the Gingrichies were lined up right after Clinton was elected. And you'll recall that the House was mired in scandals, mismanagement, etc. If you want to blame someone, try Tip.

[Hawise]

Congress set itself up to get trounced and Clinton had to deal with the fallout. It is rather remarkable that anything got done in those years but the budget did get balanced- a mean feat in the chaos of Washington politics.

What struck me today is what a stellar First Lady Bill could be. With his charitable connections, the goodwill he built up after the tsunami, his ability to speak (when not defending Hillary) and his boundless energy, he would make one helluva great 1st Lady. Eleanor great, no false smile Laura Bush mediocrity. Plus he already has the security, so you save on the budget right there.

[upyernoz]

obama have one area where they are different: certain foreign policy issues. obama wants to talk to iran without precondition. clinton has adopted bush's we-only-deal-with-people-we-like stance. she also refuses to admit she was wrong about her iraq war support.

clinton's foreign policy looks a lot like bush's foreign policy. and the fact that she has belittled obama's attempt to suggest non-insane proposals that break from bush's disasterous middle eastern policies (like talking to iran), makes it extremely hard for me to support her. and that's not even getting into the contrast between clinton and obama's foreign policy advisors.

the middle eastern foreign policy is my big thing. i probably weight the candidates' stance on that front more than most people. but at least in that small realm, i do see a clear difference.

[Roxanne]

That's what I like about you, up. Cogent, tangible argument

[Chris R]

Three reasons:

1) Foreign policy: HRC voted for the war and still doesn't see it as a mistake (to paraphrase Kerry, how many have to die before she can admit that it was a mistake), voted for the Kyl-Leiberman resolution, applauded the troop surge remark. Wrong instincts, learns the wrong lessons.

2) Yeah, I find the idea of Bill Clinton freelancing dangerous from a constitutional standpoint. Sorry. I do.

[Roxanne]

Yeah, I find the idea of Bill Clinton freelancing dangerous from a constitutional standpoint. Sorry. I do.

What's to stop him or any ex-president from freelancing, whether their spouse is in the White House or not? A bunch of them already have. Some of them are doing it right now.

[Tn]

Just a tangent here. I hope Edward's out and non-endorsement of either candidate keeps each hopping for the Edwards constituency by further committing themselves on eliminating poverty in America altogether. In clearly explained, solid and practicable ways.

I found the Reagan/Bush years long sufferance, and it was the light of day breaking through when the Clintons actually won the election, breaking the Republican strangle hold on America.

Two terms of Bush have been worse still. I am saddened that there is so much emphasis during this election on the Clinton years, which were comparatively so better, and when America has been absolutely ravaged by GW II and his band of pirates.

[B.D.]

To add to up's comments, foreign policy is one of the few major areas that a president has a constitutional right to affect. Oh, sure, s/he can veto bills (and be overridden), make trade agreements, propose budgets, and such, but none of that happens without the complicity of Congress and the courts. Foreign policy, on the other paw, is directly run by the President (despite what Pelosi haters will tell you). It's why presidents so often fall back on the topic when they are in trouble or are lame ducks or are seeking a "legacy".

[PSoTD]

I hope TN's right:

Just a tangent here. I hope Edward's out and non-endorsement of either candidate keeps each hopping for the Edwards constituency by further committing themselves on eliminating poverty in America altogether. In clearly explained, solid and practicable ways.

This is what I'm looking for. One of the most attractive parts to me about the Edwards campaign was his insistence that people will have to fight corporate power in order to achieve fairness in government, that until they do, money talks. I know that everyone derides it as populism alone, but it's common sense. The powerful don't give up power because they want to. They give up power because they have to.

Maybe brandishing this approach made Edwards a nonstarter with people, but rejecting this approach out-of-hand is a nonstarter with me. So... I will wait to hear what the last two standing have to say as they approach the Edwards' constituency, and try to weigh how much they actually mean it.

[Tony Iovino]

What does the end of poverty look like?

John Edwards concluded his Presidential campaign yesterday, but not before securing pledges from Obama and Clinton that they would make the ending of poverty central to their presidential campaigns.

Regardless the road we choose to take, be it a conservative path or a liberal one-- at what point will we consider people out of poverty? Can somebody tell me. Not platitudes like "when every person is living in dignity and without fear" or some other claptrap. I can't measure that, and unless we figure out how to achieve some communistic land of perfection, where everyone is robotically equal, we will always have different strata in society. The poor will always be with us.

So, please somebody tell me-- What does the end of poverty look like?

[KathyF]

eRobin: re Soc Sec crisis: Did you not notice that his plan to cure the crisis was pure progressive/liberal/less regressive taxes?

It's called turning their talking points against them. He's a master of this.

I don't have time now to get into the whole language framing issues, but it was a pet cause of mine in 04, and when I first heard Obama speak I knew he got it.

Unfortunately, liberals only seem to hear what they don't want to hear when it comes to him. For some reason I cannot fathom. (At least not in the next five minutes.)

[Roxanne]

"Uh, what crisis?" is eRobin's most likely response (sorry to speak for you, hon).

As for "language framing issues," I think it was invented by one of those greek fellers.

[eRobin]

I'm always happy to hear that Obama has a secret plan to advance progressive causes. As I've said, it's pretty much what I'm clinging to this year.

On SocSec: There is no crisis. To discuss fixing it at all with people who only want to destroy it is to begin from a position of enormous weakness. It didn't do us any good when Clinton used the word "crisis," and I'm not sure that Obama is slicker or more progressive at heart than Clinton, but I guess we'll find out.

[Tn]

Tony: Ending poverty in the United States doesn't mean making everyone robotically equal. Nor is it laying claim to the possibility of a magical utopia.

Look, we are (still, for now) the richest nation on earth, and yet we are surpassed by many others in providing health care to all citizens, college educations, and knowing that citizens will not be spending their senior years in fear of such basic wants such as heating oil, housing, or food. Nor should any veteran or family have to be living on the street in this day and age.

It is criminal in the 21st century U.S. that any persons, including children or the elderly, go to bed hungry. Or that people fear winding up on the street.

What is that saying about how some say why? And others say why not? I think it was JFK quoting a damned socialist, George Bernard Shaw, in his memorable address to the nation.

[Tn]

That being said, I thought Senator Obama's opening statement in the debate was superior to Senator Clinton's, bringing in Edwards and addressing American poverty. She clearly won on all other counts, however, with the sole exception of Iraq ... where I need to ... see it played again ... Sam .. available on youtube.

Blessings and possibilities of the internet. Not utopia.