Much has been spoken and written about the philosophical differences between the top Democratic candidates: Bernie is idealistic and inspirational, while Hillary is realistic and pragmatic. While the Sanders campaign continues to raise important, progressive issues that many Democrats support, the recent Clinton response – echoed in much of the media – is that Bernie would be wholly unable to enact his agenda, presumably due to the expected Republican control of Congress.
The underlying message is that a Clinton presidency would result in incremental change that either (i) Clinton manages to cajole the Republicans to support, or (ii) the Republicans force Clinton to accept. Any other option puts her in the same place as Sanders. Given the long-time animosity within the Republican party for all things Clinton, I have a hard time believing option (i) is likely, and I believe option (ii) is not particularly desirable. So perhaps all a good progressive can hope for, in the short term, is that no harmful legislation is passed (and signed into law) and good thoughtful jurists are nominated to the Supreme Court, both of which Bernie and Hillary are capable of.
So, in a time where Washington gridlock is unlikely to end until Democrats have a fair chance to regain control of the House of Representatives, we should be looking to the elections that could have more impact on a progressive political agenda: the 2017, 2018 and 2019 gubernatorial elections in over 40 states. The Republicans adeptly sought state houses in and around 2010 so that they could control the redistricting process after the 2010 census. If the Democrats (and other progressives) want to reverse the harm done then, they need to develop the message that the 2016 election is only the first step in the process, and that the energy usually found in Presidential election years needs to carry over to the years leading up to the 2020 census.
In this light, I believe the inspirational, “revolutionary” candidate is more likely than the pragmatic incrementalist to build the movement necessary to carry this energy forward. Simply preventing a Republican from gaining the White House in 2016 – however important that is – is not enough if the Democratic party fails to have influence over the redistricting process in 2021. Short of having more nonpartisan redistricting commissions in place, or the greater adoption of ranked choice voting or proportional representation, that influence will come from getting more progressive voters to the polls in coming years, not just in 2016. I believe Bernie is more capable, and better positioned, to provide the inspiration and generate the interest and energy needed to accomplish this. Unlike the Clinton candidacy, which is focused on the incremental change that might be possible in the short term – essentially an Obama third term – the Sanders campaign is built specifically to build the requisite progressive movement. In fact, continued gridlock could serve as the rallying cry from the right bully pulpit. The Democrats need to begin their “long game” now, and Bernie, more so than Hillary, represents that long game.
We may have to accept congressional gridlock no matter the Democratic choice for President, but we shouldn’t have to accept it forever. But that will require us to elect a President who can inspire and energize the electorate beyond 2016. Bernie Sanders can do, and is doing, just that.
Hillary’s proposals, like Bernie’s, are not going to pass a Republican Congress. That critique is only ever made of Bernie’s, but it’s equally applicable. But if your proposal won’t pass, you should start with a stronger one–to shape momentum and, in case you do end up negotiating, to get a more favorable compromise.
Beyond that, though, much of what will have to happen will be through executive actions. And wouldn’t the bolder candidate be better here? You don’t need to “compromise” with Republicans there.
There have been a lot of hit pieces by soi-disant liberal pundits recently about Bernie’s “flawed” “theory of change.” One thing we do know from his time as mayor is that if he faces a hostile legislature, he will actively organize and campaign to get a more favorable one. He helped shift the ideological balance of the Burlington City Council in order to get his programs passed. Hillary often sounds like she’s echoing Obama’s flawed bipartisan/post-partisan-y 08 language. But Republicans are going to still block most, if not all, of the *good* proposals put forth by a Democratic president.
Use executive power, make deals when they can be mutually advantageous, and then campaign to get the (expletive)ers out.
I hear you, I just don’t buy your premise.
I remind you that the governing body of Burlington, Vermont is barely a sandlot pickup team in comparison to the House GOP. Shifting the ideological balance of the US Congress is a MUCH different task from doing the same with the Burlington VT city council.
I’ve heard his repeated calls for political revolution. I’m receptive to his message — I find him uninspiring as the carrier of that message.
I think that Bernie Sanders will have a very difficult time getting elected if nominated, and I think he would be absolutely demolished by the right wing if he somehow won office.
I’m all for the “long game”, and I’m all for inspiration. That’s why I prefer Hillary Clinton to Bernie Sanders.
I’m not sure if there is a compelling case that one will be more successful than the other on that count, but my support for HRC envelops a whole host of items in the presidential job description and being more prepared to do that. In terms of both pragmatism and ideology I tend to reserve the legislative checklist for judging legislative races.
I haven’t finalized the Dem candidate I’ll support in March, nor have I told BMG which way I’m leaning, but…
I’m an incrementalist.
On civil rights, incrementally replacing (for example) Justices Ginsburg and Scalia with two liberals will have a massive impact on future decisions.
On health care, incrementally reducing the number of uninsured by a few million at a time is a great outcome. Same goes for underinsured.
On energy and environment, incrementally reducing the GW of coal-fired power plants from 330 GW (2 years ago) to 300 GW (today) to ~250 GW (~2019) is an important incremental change in a short period of time. Driving it down from 250 GW to 150 GW by 2024 would represent halving our coal in a decade, a substantial incremental change.
And so on.
Without a Democratic Congress, incremental change is the only change we’ll get, and most of it will come from the executive branch. Policy changes, one at a time, bending the arc. Executive agencies have an awful lot of levers. A skilled POTUS can pull on lots of them at one time. It may not be inspirational or celebratory, but I’m perfectly happy taking my journey of one thousand miles one step at a time… so long as those steps are in the direction of my destination and come one after the other at a steady pace.
I have tremendous respect for folks who swing for the fences. We need both incrementalists and (ahem) inspirationalists. More than once I’ve been sure that the big political play was going to go down in flames, only to see it come to fruition. My meager incrementalist approach would have yielded less in those cases.
I think one can pursue something bold and creative to push the mainstream in the right direction by making it come to you, or one could incrementally push for change. There is a great Vox piece, neutral in tone, that breaks down the two candidates approaches and what their respective impact would be vis a vis the Republican Congress.
That’s a good piece.
One thing to note – looking at his career, Sanders seems to have a clear vision of direction and has taken a very incrementalist approach to getting closer to those goals – especially on the amendment front. He’s not just out there sponsoring bold bills that go nowhere and doing nothing else. I think he has aspects of both viewpoints. Clinton does as well, but flipped in degree.
This discussion makes me think of the pending minimum wage fight and their respective ability to get things done.
Sanders wants a $15 minimum wage, Clinton wants a $12 minimum wage. There may be no chance at either in Congress. But if a $15 bill goes in and gets cut up, the compromise result may be better than what happens if a $12 bill goes in. Clinton has to be able to get more, much more out of less bold proposals to make the compromise work well than Sanders might on a variety of issues. She might be able to do that, but I don’t think that’s clear.
On the minimum wage issue, the bolder leadership might have effects outside of federal wrangling. Having a president push for the bolder option might help move certain states and cities closer to the right outcome.
One thing I am confident about with Clinton is that she will use executive action more broadly and more creatively. That could result in a lot of great things domestically. Given her record on war and peace and secrecy, however, thinking about how she might use that power in those areas straight up terrifies me.
progressing ever forward step by step is. I believe, the most effective way to achieve real, lasting change.
GO HILLARY !
Fred Rich LaRiccia
that the bigger the talk, the harder the fall will be when the reality doesn’t match the rhetoric. So my concern is that Bernie is making several promises (we will build a new political revolution, we will raise taxes, we will get universal health care, etc.) that, if he’s elected, will be unlikely to occur given the nature of the contemporary political system. If that happened, and if a Sanders presidency was mired in constant gridlock, I’m not sure how that would energize a broader movement.
Ultimately, I think the inspiration that you discuss is more likely to come from the bottom-up than the top-down. In other words, the best ideas and energy are likely to come from organizations in civil society rather than from the presidency — no matter who occupies the office.
That’s in part why I lean towards Hillary in the primaries, because I don’t think the presidency is the type of institution that can somehow create the type of inspiration that is actually generated by bottom-up social movements. I look more to the presidency for the type of strong leadership, competence, and knowledge about the inner workings of government that — coupled with demands from activists — can find ways to move policy in a positive direction.
Sanders the candidate has impressively harnessed the energy of liberal activists across the country, and the Democratic Party will be better off because of it. When it comes to the institution of the presidency, however, I see Hillary being the best suited to find ways to get the most out of the energy created by the on-the-ground activists.
Not to shift blame from where it belongs, but our failure of the past 8 years has stemmed from an overweening ideology masquerading as pragmatism. The ideology is a kind of compulsive centrism where the center is defined by wherever the extremist have staked out the rightmost edge.
Thus was the Obama administration led by the nose for the first term and much of the second.
Bernie won’t do that, and the rap on Hillary is that she will. Goldman Sachs etc. But I am not convinced of that. This after all the woman who (correctly) named the “vast, right-wing conspiracy” back in the 90s.
Are we to believe she has since sold out? Perhaps she is just biding her time.
I think you’re probably on to something here.
There’s that old saying from the Texas Legislature: “If you can’t drink their whiskey, screw their women, take their money and vote against ’em anyway, you don’t belong in office.”
Like LBJ, who made all kinds of deals with the devil in order to get himself into a position where he could ram The Great Society down the throats of his fellow Southerners, I tend to think that HRC is – and has been – playing a really long game here.
But a big difference is there were such a thing as moderate Republicans and competitive Congressional races when LBJ was President. I do hope she shares his ball busting tactics and broader economic vision.
I agree with you, Jim. Robert Reich said it well in his blog this week, “Clinton is clearly the most qualified candidate for the president of the political system we have. But the political system is profoundly broken. Sanders is the most qualified candidate to create the political system we should have because he’s leading a political movement.” When Oxfam released its report this week reporting that 62 people own more than 3.5 billion people (or half the world), we can see how out of balance things have become. Sanders is inspirational because his message resonates with people right now experiencing this enormous inequality. But he has been talking about this, working on these issues, for years. I support Sanders because he wants to do the things that I feel will really make the most difference to people in this country. I honestly believe Mrs. Clinton is too compromised, not clear enough about what is wrong with the system (in terms of economics and also our foreign policy), to do the really bold things needed, even if we had a Congress that would go along with it.