Clintonism SCREWED the Democrats: How Bill, Hillary & DLC Gutted Progressivism

[Octafish]

110. Hillary Clinton's Ghosts: A Legacy of Pushing the Democratic Party to the Right

By Michael Corcoran
Truthout, 02 December 2015

EXCERPT...

But the party's latest generation of "New Democrats" - self-described "moderates" who are funded by Wall Street and are aggressively trying to steer the party to the right - have noticed this trend and are now fighting back. Third Way, a "centrist" think tank that serves as the hub for contemporary New Democrats, has recently published a sizable policy paper, "Ready for the New Economy," urging the Democratic Party to avoid focusing on economic inequality. Former Obama chief of staff Bill Daley, a Third Way trustee, recently argued that Sanders' influence on the primary "is a recipe for disaster" for Democrats.

This "ideological gulf" inside the party, as The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus describes it, is not a new phenomenon. Before there was Third Way, there was the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC). And before there was Bill Daley, there was Hillary Clinton - a key member of the DLC's leadership team during her entire tenure in the US Senate (2000-2008). As Clinton seeks progressive support, it is important to consider her role in the influential movement to, as The American Prospect describes it, "reinvent the [Democratic] party as one pledged to fiscal restraint, less government, and a pro-business, pro-free market outlook." This fairly recent history is an important part of Clinton's record, and she owes it to primary voters to answer for it.

The Reign of the DLC

A lot has happened since the last time the Democrats had a contested primary. The 2008 economic crisis, the growth of the Occupy movement, the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement and the consequent increase in public attention to the ongoing killings of Black people by police, and the Bernie Sanders campaign have all played major roles in shaping the political consensus of primary voters. None of these existed when Barack Obama won the nomination over Clinton in June 2008.

But before all of these events shaped public opinion, the party was largely guided by the ideas of the Democratic Leadership Council. Founded by Southern Democrats in 1985, the group sought to transform the party by pushing it to embrace more conservative positions and win support from big business.

The DLC's goal was to advance "a message that was less tilted toward minorities and welfare, less radical on social issues like abortion and gays, more pro-defense, and more conservative on economic issues," wrote Robert Dreyfuss in a 2001 article in The American Prospect. "The DLC thundered against the 'liberal fundamentalism' of the party's base - unionists, blacks, feminists, Greens, and cause groups generally."

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