Excellent piece

From:brentbbi@webtv.net To: david.weigel@washingtonpost.com Date: 2015-07-21 09:43 Subject: Excellent piece

David, an excellent piece in the Post this morning, well above the cut of what is normally written in the Post. I have tried to make some of these points in my columns in The Hill and the New York Observer, with modest impact. The net result of the first six years of Obama, which is a fact and not an opinion, it that Democratic majorities in the House, Senate and among governerships were totally destroyed leaving Republican majorities in all of these cases. What Obamism does is inflame conservatives who vote, and depress many liberals who do not vote. I tried to warn the Obama White House and Democratic leaders about this well before the 2010 and 2014 midterms. One of the great fallacies in our political discussion is to paint "the left" as marginal, when in fact many positions advocated by "the left" are majority positions of voters nationally. Such as the public option, Medicare for all, serious reform of Wall Street (not a reallocation of capital gains or tax breaks for employee stock options which are fine but marginal) etc...... On Obamacare we got a bill that made things somewhat better but created major unpopularity that helped destroy Democrats in 2010 and 2014, when we could have had a bill that was far better healthcare policy and far more popular. This pattern has been repeated again and again. Ditto Obama's bizarre insults of liberals on the trade bill and Hillary Clinton's irrelevance in the trade debate when it mattered while she was publicly stating she was "fighting" for working people..... What Barney Frank got wrong was a) political opportunism would have mitigated in favor of stronger banking legislation, not weaker, which polling proves, and b) liberals do not primarily watch MSNBC, which they (we) do not fundamentally regard as speaking to them but representing a more corporatist and personality driven perspective which is why their ratings are so anemic and c) this is important---progressives have migrated to social media and away from cable television and mainstream media which is why liberals are so disrespected in major media and underestimated by the political consultant class-----it is social media that fuels Bernie Sanders' huge crowds that dwarf Donald Trump's crowds.....and fuels Bernie Sanders' small donor success which dwarfs Hillary Clinton's small donor success while Hillary's paradigm combines large donors with large cash burn.... My own view has been to support Hillary though with declining enthusiasm as her campaign has unfolded, but write favorably about Bernie....the issue is far deeper than moving Hillary to the left (she will never truly move anywhere, she is who she is and only the tactical talking points will shift).....the issue is morally what is the heart and soul of the Democratic party, and politically, our view (including myself in the left for this purpose) is that we represent a majority of voters more than reactionary Republicans or Third Way-style Democrats which is what Obama, Hillary and their shared consultants represent despite occasional rhetorical bows to liberals..... What the left (and I) worry about---though most will not state this as explicitly as I do here) is the most likely positive trajectory for Clinton is that she will move rhetorically left before the Convention, rhetorically rightward towards center after the convention, and then move actionably further rightward from where liberals are after the election and call for a new era of bipartisanship with Republican leaders in Congress. It is absolutely correct that one genesis of support for Bernie and reluctance about Hillary is the widespread view among liberals that Obama burned them after what could have been a seminal and realigning moment after the 2008 election but turned into an epochal disappointment for progressives and many others, turning huge Democratic majorities in the House and Senate into large Republican majorities that began with the naming of Geithner as Treasury Secretary, a man of the banks and not a man of progressivism, and was locked in by side deals on ObamaCare that turned what could have been a profound reform of healthcare into incremental improvements with vast unpopularity before two defining midterm elections that destroyed Democrats in Congress.... Liberals hunger for Hillary not to imitate Bernie but to authentically champion a progressive vision which takes more than slogans about "fighting" followed by caution about policy and fear of antagonizing sources of money or whatever accounts for the caution.....assuming she is nominated most liberals will support her but for many it would be a loveless marriage which is very dangerous for her in a nation that is politically 50-50 and even a 2% turnout fall could well perpetuate a Republican Congress..... Candidly, I am sending blind copies of this note to some influential Democrats I respect though personally I believe I am fighting a lost cause because highest level Democrats live in a Stockholm syndrome where folks like me are currently obsolete relics of true FDR and RFK Democrats....we are surrounded by corporatist consultants and rorschach politician Democrats who give liberals rhetoric while they lobby for campaign cash from special interests who neuter bold positions of leadership and conviction.... I was one of the first to write outright that Bernie could win the Iowa caucus and potentially pull a Eugene McCarthy in New Hampshire which could make the primary process far more unpredictable.....I am now agnostic about whether this would be a desirable outcome but analytically I have believed this for the last eight weeks.... I may well write a column soon about "The Two Hillary Clintons", one who has the opportunity to be a great president with vast experience and knowledge, the other who may not be able to rise above the Stockholm syndrome of being surrounded by money and wealth and Obama-style consultants.....notice how few Clinton supporters even make the case with passion that she could be a great president, which I will make....while I know and respect Dan Pfeiffer I found it absurd that he wrote one piece quoting Plouffe and criticizing "bed-wetters" and a second piece bannered in Outlook that says nothing about how Hillary could be a great president but wastes bandwith comparing Bernie to Barack which is an irrelevance that misses the key point and insults the very liberals that Hillary will need a 100% turnout from if she is nominated.... Take all of the writing and television appearances of the pro-Clinton people and how many times do you see them making the case that even I would make, that she could become a great president if she grows to the next level during the campaign? Team Clinton and their advocates almost never suggest this, they almost exclusively talk of tactics....I find many of their advocates unwatchable on cable television as they repeat inane talking points and talk about political tactics....while Bernie advocates, who are missing persons on cable television.... fervently believe and state that they want to change and lift America......a view almost never represented on cable television, including MSNBC and CNN, but widely discussed on social media by those who ultimately give Bernie the large crowds and small donors.... Follow Bernie's Facebook page and the way it promotes his speeches and then follow the crowds who turn out....the missing persons on cable news will make the small donations and befuddle insiders when they attend Iowa and other caucuses.... Of course Bernie cannot win the presidency, but Hillary could lose, the same way and for the same reasons that Obama's rorschach destroyed the Democratic House and Senate.... At any rate your piece was well above the cut, I appreciate it, you framed the issue better than most and I respect and appreciate that....so accept my kudos and thanks. As for me, I will probably ultimately opt-out of the campaign, and end up in Paris finishing my historical fiction novel, and let others send their invoices for participating in a Kabuki drama that will have, on current course, a mediocre outcome at best and yet another disappointment and disaster at worst..... Regards, Brent Sent from my iPad