No, Hillary Clinton Isn’t a Republican – but the Resemblance Is Striking

Andrew O’Hehir | Salon | Reader Supported News | May 16, 2016

Clinton is a lot closer to Richard Nixon than Trump is, but she’s really a Cold War liberal left behind by history

 

ou don’t have to look far on the American left to find accusations that Hillary Clinton is essentially a Republican, or almost a Republican, or simply too damn close to being a Republican. At least I don’t: I’ve done it myself, very recently, in a throwaway jibe partway through a recent article on the GOP’s spectacular implosion. I was aware, even as I wrote that, that it’s only partly true. If the joke stings, that’s because it cuts closer to the bone than Clinton supporters and Democratic Party loyalists would like. But it’s imprecise at best; even in his harshest criticisms of Clinton, Bernie Sanders has never suggested that she might, y’know, be like that.

Part of the problem is definitional and historical, and maybe even epistemological. What do we mean by “Republican”? A Republican where, and when? In broad strokes of politics and policy, Clinton is a lot closer to the worldview of Richard Nixon — the president who funded Planned Parenthood and proposed a national single-payer healthcare plan — than Donald Trump is. (Less charitably, we could mention Clinton’s recent reference to her good friend Henry Kissinger, one of the moments of 2016 she definitely wishes she could take back.) But the Richard Nixon who got elected in 1968 would not be a remotely viable presidential candidate in today’s GOP, and quite likely would not be a Republican at all.

So no, those things don’t make Hillary Clinton a Republican. Let’s say this all together: She’s a Democrat — a Democrat of a specific vintage and a particular type. At least in her 2016 incarnation, Clinton is an old-school Cold War liberal out of the Scoop Jackson Way-Back Machine, a believer in global American hegemony and engineered American prosperity. (I realize that’s a completely obscure reference to anyone under 45 or so. We’ll get back to it.) Many such Democrats became Republicans after 1980 — in several prominent cases, the Cold War liberals of the 1970s became the George W. Bush neocons of the 2000s — but Clinton didn’t exactly do that, and that’s not my point.

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Big Money and the Corruption of Democracy

Robert Reich | Robert Reich’s Facebook Page | Reader Supported News | May 14, 2016

he U.S. blames places around the world like the Cayman Islands and the Isle of Man for giving corporations and billionaires secret havens to hide their loot. But the United States doesn’t require companies registered here to disclose their real owners. We thereby provide global corporations and billionaires one of the world’s easiest means of hiding their money. Yesterday the chief minister of the Isle of Man charged that nearly 10 times more shell companies were registered in one building in Delaware than in his entire territory. Researchers in the U.S. and Australia have concluded it’s “easier to obtain an untraceable shell company … in the U.S. than in any other country save Kenya.”

Last week the Obama Administration submitted legislation to Congress requiring companies registered in the U.S. to disclose their real owners, at least confidentially to the U.S. Treasury. But not even this mild proposal has any chance of passage. Almost all Republicans are opposed, as are many Democrats. There’s no justification for their opposition to this common-sense measure.

Yet another example of the corruption of our democracy by big money.

What do you think?

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Salt Lake City’s First Openly Gay Mayor Takes Office With Fiancée By Her Side

Amanda Terkel | Huffington Post | January 6, 2016

Rick Bowmer/Associated Press

Jackie Biskupski is Salt Lake City’s first openly gay mayor.

 

Jackie Biskupski was sworn in as Salt Lake City’s new mayor Monday, becoming the first openly gay person to hold that position.

Biskupski, a Democrat, won 52 percent of the vote in November.

“Today is not just about making history,” Biskupski, 49, said after being elected. “It is about people. It is about effecting change.”

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Privacy advocates blast surveillance laws hidden in spending bill

 

RT America | December 17, 2015

A new version of the “omnibus” federal government funding bill includes a version of the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, outraging privacy advocates. Long-standing critic of government overreach in surveillance, Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), who voted against the Senate bill speaks out, citing the Department of Homeland Security as saying the bill “could sweep away important privacy protections.” RT’s Manuel Rapalo reports.

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This Was Bernie’s Year: How a Socialist Emerged as a National Political Phenomenon

Rolling Stone | Reader Supported News | December 14, 2015

he rise of Bernie Sanders has no doubt been one of the more fascinating political stories of 2015 – a year that was not short on fascinating political stories. When he announced his run in the spring, few thought the self-described democratic socialist would be such a strong opponent against Hillary Clinton, but his impact in the race has been significant: He’s raised significant money, without relying on super PACs, and has pushed Clinton to the left in very real ways.

Whether you’re full-on feeling the Bern, or are just a political observer, it’s worth taking a look back at the year Bernie Sanders transformed from “that socialist from Vermont” to a national political phenomenon.

April 29, 2015: Announces Presidential Run, as a Democrat

Sanders, the longest serving Independent in Congress, jumped into the 2016 presidential race in late spring as a Democrat. Though in the coming months he proved to be a formidable challenger to frontrunner Hillary Clinton, raising significant money and pushing Clinton to the left, one of the terms most associated with his April announcement was “long shot.”

At a campaign announcement event in Vermont in May, Sanders laid out his platform and noted that “we’re going to win…by establishing a very strong grassroots campaign involving millions of people. That’s the only way to win.”

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Deal to end oil export ban in sight

By Timothy Cama and Devin Henry – 12/10/15 06:17 PM EST

An end to the ban on U.S. crude oil exports appears increasingly likely to be included in the sweeping fiscal deal being negotiated this week in Congress.

Lifting the decades-old export ban has been a top energy priority for Republicans for more than a year, and the GOP is eyeing the must-pass government funding and tax policy bills as prime places to address the issue.

Leaders in both parties and both chambers have been working on the bills, and Democrats, viewing the ban as a valuable bargaining chip, are demanding plenty in return.

“It’s an act of desperation on their part, they want it so desperately,” said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), saying she could see a scenario in which she would support lifting the ban.

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Terrorism Truths No Politician Will Admit

Paul Waldman | The American Prospect | December 7, 2015

Here’s a truth that no politician, Democrat or Republican, is going to tell you: There is absolutely nothing that our government could have done to prevent the attack that took 14 lives in San Bernardino last week. If you’re looking for a lesson we can learn from it, that’s the one you ought to take. Universal background checks for gun purchases is a good idea, but it wouldn’t have stopped that couple from killing those people. Starting a new war in the Middle East is a terrible idea, but it also wouldn’t have stopped it.

We can’t stop an attack like the one in San Bernardino before it happens because our ability to do that is dependent on the plot coming to the government’s attention. In order for that to happen, knowledge of the plan has to leak out in some way—to someone who overhears the planning and tells the authorities, to an informant whom the attackers bring into their confidence, over an electronic medium like email or telephone that is being monitored. But what if all you have is a husband and wife working out the details over their kitchen table, and buying their tools of mayhem the same way a hundred million other Americans do, down at the local gun shop? There is no way to stop that.

Which brings us to another truth you won’t see politicians admit: terrorism will never be defeated or vanquished or eliminated or banished. It’s a technique, attractive to those with limited power precisely because it’s relatively easy to use.

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What the 2016 Presidential Candidates Say the US Should Do About ISIS

What the 2016 Presidential Candidates Say the US Should Do About ISIS (ABC News)

 

ERONICA STRACQUALURSI, ALANA ABRAMSON and LISSETTE RODRIGUEZ | Good Morning America | ABC | November 16, 2015

It became the leading topic of discussion during Saturday’s Democratic presidential debate: What should the United States do in the fight against ISIS following the attack on Paris?

In the days since the massacre overseas, the presidential hopefuls have offered an array of opinions, with several of the Republicans contenders coming out in favor of doing more; even if that means American “boots on the ground.”

One of the Paris attackers reportedly crossed into Europe alongside Syrian refugees, providing fuel to the argument, made by some GOP candidates, that ISIS could infiltrate the 10,000 Syrian refugees President Obama vowed to accept over the next year.

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Joe Biden says he will not seek 2016 Democratic nomination

Reuters | Raw Story | October 21, 2015

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said on Wednesday he would not seek the Democratic nomination for president in 2016, ending months of suspense and removing a huge political obstacle for front-runner Hillary Clinton.

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Sanders, Trump lead charge against TPP

 

RT America | October 5, 2015

Presidential candidates Bernie Sanders (D) and Donald Trump (R) have joined in the criticism of President Barack Obama’s 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership, which was finally successfully agreed upon by the US and its partners in the Pacific. Egor Piskunov has more details on the deal from New York.

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