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Josh Marshall, my online journalistic hero with at least one editorial foot of clay, posted this video flashback of Bill Clinton yesterday. It's from 2004; click through after you read Josh's introduction.
It's difficult for me to understand why smart younger guys like Marshall, as well as Atrios and others, still lionize the Bill Clinton of the past and to this day cannot understand that they bought a Bill of goods back in the early 1990s. The words Clinton speaks in Josh's video clip are fine words, and true, even if they reflect irony on the campaign of his wife today, 4 years hence. But those fine and true words were uttered by a slippery peckerwood who has even stopped trying to sound sincere since he started earning $50K/hour flicking his silver tongue at corporate audiences following his "retirement."
Look, fellas: Bill Clinton was never a liberal, and was never even a "progressive." His program has always been basically the same as the Rockefeller Republicans, including their twisted heirs such as G.H.W. Bush. Not liberal. Not progressive. Not concerned in the slightest about you or me. This fact was obvious to liberal adults in 1988 and 1992 and 1996. So guys, stop waxing nostalgic about the "old" Bill Clinton. The "new" one is same as the "old" one.
Do you disagree, Puny Human? OK: send me one example of any truly liberal or progressive initiative that arose from either of the two Clinton administrations. And Al Gore accomplishments don't count. Neither do things that just look liberal in comparison with the Reagan/Bush administration. Neither do botched healthcare policy reforms....
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He was progressive one time in his career-- his first term as Gov. But he got punished for that and spent 4 years converting (tutored by chicken king Tyson), and never looked back.
ReplyDeleteHe did cultivate a "cool" image, which might be what your blogger friends responded to. Jazz sax, shades, Maya Angelou poetry. But, then, Lee Atwater did those exact same cool things while creating the Willie Horton ads in 1988.
It all comes back to style over substance-- exactly how Republicans "create" their "leaders". Might as well make a Pixar President.
In Arkansas, anybody to the left of Orval Faubus could qualify as progressive. Since this blog operates according to the highest standards of academic integrity, I'm going to have to ask you to provide specific examples of Bill Clinton's progressivism, and cite references.
ReplyDeleteEven if Clinton made progressive noises early in his career, he was too big a coward to stick with those so-called ideas after getting roughed up a little by the ofays. From my perspective, that's pretty much how a hypocrite and a sissy would respond.