Progressives (Liberals)

And?

(...)

Yet the left, in its critiques, sometimes acts as if Republicans don’t exist and have no say in political outcomes. Leftists tend to interpret the policy failures of the Obama era as a function of his own lack of will, or his reliance on corporate interests, rather than what they more often were, in my view—a reflection of the facts that in the Senate, a unified and dug-in minority can thwart a majority, and even a majority can pass legislation only as progressive as the sixtieth senator will allow because of the super-majority voting rules. I recall several conversations with administration officials who had worked for months on certain policy matters but who knew that the ideas would never get through the Senate. And presidents just don’t have endless political capital.

I’ve always found this a useful heuristic: imagine Obama in his first term with LBJ-like majorities in Congress, sixty-eight senators and nearly three hundred House members. What would he have passed? It’s useful because our answers define the limits of mainstream liberalism—what it would be willing to push for, and the interests it would be hesitant to take on.

First, I think a larger stimulus would have passed, with fewer tax cuts and more spending, like the green school construction proposal that was killed by Republican Susan Collins. Quite possibly there would have been a second stimulus the next year (a good and needed dose of Keynesian counter-cyclical spending). A more progressive health care bill with a public option might well have passed. Certainly a minimum wage increase. A big infrastructure bill. The Democrats would have done something on climate change—nothing on the scale of today’s Green New Deal ambitions, but something. Immigration reform. Probably a student-loan reform bill. And, I believe, a paid family leave bill of some kind (some of this would have depended on where those extra eight Democratic senators were from and what they were willing to support).

Some things that still would not have passed: Medicare for All; free college; card-check legislation to ease union organizing, which was opposed by southern Democrats; aggressive antitrust legislation; any efforts to take on or break up the big tech companies; any bill that would have seriously weakened the power of Big Pharma. It’s also quite unlikely there would have been any effort to break up or punish the big banks—on that issue, Obama was definitely not a populist crusader.

The broader American public would likely have been delighted with this balance sheet (which Republicans knew well and took care to thwart). But the left would not have been, because Obama would still have failed to take on some powerful special interests and because he would have refrained from adopting the broad Sanders-esque efforts to combat wealth concentration and corporate power. Also, people on the left would have judged the accomplishments inadequate, as surely many of them would have been—student debt forgiveness not generous enough, the climate measure not ambitious enough, and so on. So their assessment of Obama as a neoliberal would still have stood.

(...)

Yet the left, in its critiques, sometimes acts as if Republicans don’t exist and have no say in political outcomes.

I think because of your vote harassment, I’ll vote Green again. Thanks!

‘There Must Be a Woman On This Ticket’

A female vice president would make history. But some cringe at settling for silver after spending a year competing hard for the gold.

So it’s all set. Biden will be the nominee and give the party a solid chance of scoring a November trifecta: beating President Trump, taking the Senate and holding the House.

Count me as skeptical.

The widespread belief that the former veep is ready and able to go the distance strikes me as wishful thinking at best. It is suspect because it is so sudden and reflects a complete reversal of the sentiment about him less than two weeks ago.

The political obituaries were already written and blamed his demise largely on the notion that his party had left him behind. Then there were his brain freezes and frequent bouts of oddball references...His revival can’t erase the memory of the sad failure he was just two weeks ago, nor are the cognitive issues suddenly resolved by a winning streak.

But who are the alternatives? All the supposed moderates — Buttigieg, Klobuchar and Bloomberg — were thoroughly rejected by primary voters. The prickly Warren finished third in her home state.

All of which leaves Clinton as the best backup plan. She’s hardly my cup of tea but for all her problems, including doubts about her physical stamina, she is a fundraising machine, has a true following and could hit the ground running.

And, in case you hadn’t noticed, she’s advertising her availability.

...She didn’t really lose the 2016 election. Trump colluded with the Russians to deprive her of her civil right to be president. You’re with her, or a misogynist.

Talk show host Ellen DeGeneres asked the former Secretary of State on Thursday whether she’d agree to be on the ticket of the of the eventual Democratic nominee, if she were asked....Pushed on the question, Clinton, 72, reluctantly said she’d consider it.

The former 2016 Democratic presidential nominee revealed on an appearance on the UK’s “Graham Norton Show,” in December that she’d been “deluged” with pleas to run again.

“I’d have to make up my mind really quickly,” she said at the time, “because it’s moving very fast.”

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
13m
Saudi Arabia and Russia are arguing over the price and flow of oil. That, and the Fake News, is the reason for the market drop!

Jonathan Chait
@jonathanchait
1h
stocks plunge on news of Von Sydow death