Hillary and the Is She a Progressive or a Moderate? question... [View all]

[Lucinda]

I have posted this in another thread and am OP'ing it here.

Hillary Clinton Was Liberal. Hillary Clinton Is Liberal.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/hillary-clinton-was-liberal-hillary-clinton-is-liberal/

"...Clinton was one of the most liberal members during her time in the Senate. According to an analysis of roll call votes by Voteview, Clinton’s record was more liberal than 70 percent of Democrats in her final term in the Senate. She was more liberal than 85 percent of all members. Her 2008 rival in the Democratic presidential primary, Barack Obama, was nearby with a record more liberal than 82 percent of all members — he was not more liberal than Clinton.

Clinton also has a history of very liberal public statements. Clinton rates as a “hard core liberal” per the OnTheIssues.org scale. She is as liberal as Elizabeth Warren and barely more moderate than Bernie Sanders. And while Obama is also a “hard core liberal,” Clinton again was rated as more liberal than Obama..."

There is quite a bit more at the link. She has always advocated for universal health care, and the flip flop talking points have to do with what she is saying NOW about the political climate.


That said, she talks about the business of governing from the center, which she does, while advocating liberal issues. And it is necessary in a representative democracy like ours, to work with the other side, from the middle, in order to make any lasting progress at all. It is pretty much designed to work that way, so one faction cannot pass policy that doesn't represent the majority of the people. Each side has voters expecting their congress people to support the policies they campaigned on. The only way we have to counter it, is to outnumber the Reps in congress, and maintain those numbers, or it would all flip back again when more Reps were elected. Right now, as the election stands, experts say we may be able to retake the Senate, but not the House because it would take apx 30 seats to turn over, and there only appear to be about 10 that are competitive.

I think the only way to a permanent progressive country, is to move moderate right voters leftward. Then we would have a clear majority. Not an easy talk with 20+ years of people like Rush and Glenn Beck scaring the crap out of people. But I think Trump's popularity shows that they are beginning to get the fact that their elected politicians are actually making things much worse.

There may be other ways, but I cannot think of any which would give us a solid majority not subject to constant election changes.