In the immortal words of Louie Renauld:
I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!
Anyone outside the bubble of the progressive blogosphere would see Hillary's triangulation vis. a vis. the health care industry, and their eagerness to place bets on her, for what it is -- evidence of her political maturity and their estimatation of her potential electorial success -- and hence good news for Democrats. But no, it's a betrayal of all our cherished ideals, a Hostile Takeover of the Health Care Debate, and blah blah blah.
The subtext is so obvious -- this community deeply fears Hillary. That fear is misplaced -- leave it to our enemies. Follow me over the flip to discuss why.
Yes,
the Times is shilling for her -- to imply that she is the "presumtive Democratic nominee" is of course great nonsense at this date, anything could yet happen -- but she will continue to get that sort of shilling and it will help her.
We are all too aware of her here, aren't we? After the rubber-stamp annointing of Gore, the crucifixion of Dean, and the last-minute resuscitation of the Kerry campaign, we know how the Democratic party works. So we fear Hillary as we fear no other.
This diary isn't about heath care or even Hillary, it's about us.
How can we be so worldly and simultaneously so naive? Do any of us really believe that Russ Feingold or some other untarnished worthy of the blogosphere is going to ascend to the presidency of this nation in 2008? Get a grip. There is altogether too much blathering about how powerful the netroots is around here. Sure, the netroots is creating the future. The 50-state strategy is going to change everything, eventually. That's the key word -- EVENTUALLY.
The best thing this blog does is bring focus to regional races, empowering incremental change. It's what the right has been doing successfully since the defeat of Goldwater. It didn't pay off for them overnight.
The worst thing this blog does is act as if it could pick the next president. That power, folks, the netroots doesn't have, and never will. At best it may someday help return it to the people, wresting it from corporations and the wealthy. Then the people would pick someone the netroots disapproves of, to be sure.
Political miracles do happen, but only for patient, well-triangulated politicians, at rare tippping points. I remind you that Lincoln and FDR were both born politicians first, and idealists only when they finally got their chance at power. Even so, both ascended only by a sort of miracle -- the events of 1860 and 1929 plucking those ambitious men from the sidelines and elevating them to a prominance no one ever expected of them.
Lincoln benefited from his careful triangulation on the slavery issue (leave it intact but don't extend it to new states), which ensured his lock on the abolitionist vote when more idealist candidates failed to reach the first rank. Then a miracle came his way -- the opposition split the vote.
FDR was a governor who supported a Republican-lite 1928 Democratic platform ("balance the federal budget") and stayed well under the radar -- much less populist in his rhetoric at that time than the great Al Smith, the Democratic presidential nominee (who was defeated by a Rove-like anti-Catholic smear in the red states). Then the crash of 1929 happened -- followed by three years of bitter depression before the next presidential election, mind you, it wasn't just a single event the day before the election -- and suddenly FDR could start talking to the people like Huey Long and get away with it.
So watch Hillary -- and smile, if you can. She isn't the enemy. You may not like it, but she might turn out to be the best hope in sight. I'm well aware of the uncertainties surrounding her -- she has the potential to become an American Margaret Thatcher just as much as she might have the potential to be a female FDR -- and of course the luck of the game could put the prize beyond her reach at any time.
But don't rage so much. You betray your nervousness of this formidible woman, not to mention her husband, still the world's most capable politician, and only seemingly Emeritus. Let the other side worry and rage about them. They are still the longest arrow in our quiver, by far.