The silver lining in the Trump election? It just might have been the enema that the DNC needed after 24 years of Clintonism (of which the Obama administration, sadly, turned out to be merely an extension). Now long past its "stale after" date, it's time to send it to the basement of the Smithsonian, where it can be shelved and occasionally put on display as a dark piece of American history that once upon a time sparkled as bright as fool's gold. The rot of Clintonism began when Bill Clinton, in his eternal quest to win, hold power and be liked all at the same time, turned the Democrats into Republicans by adopting significant chunks of the core Republican agenda: "welfare reform," which cut off subsistence payments to a whole lot of people, single moms in particular, and required those same moms to hold jobs - without providing them with child care or wage supports; international "free trade" agreements, in particular NAFTA, which allowed major American enterprises to move American jobs across the border to Mexico while devastating parts of the Mexican economy as well; the deregulation of banking and finance which Bush II completed, the nasty results of which we've been seeing and experiencing; and so-called "law and order" initiatives which led to our nation having the highest incarceration rate of any post industrial country in the world with a prison population disproportionately African American and Hispanic. And he did it with those "I feel your pain" speeches of empathetic compassion as his off-camera hand moved the chips on the national board to the right.
This cynical sleight of hand had two significant effects: By pandering to the right Clinton undermined the core accomplishments of FDR's New Deal and LBJ's Great Society - things like social security, labor rights, Medicare, voting rights and the end of the final pieces of the Jim Crow laws; tight regulation of finance, banking, industry and agriculture that kept blue collar workers and small farmers afloat; the G.I. bill, etc. - all the things that built a robust middle class and opened the doors wider for African Americans and other minorities to become a part.
The other effect was arguably even worse: By occupying core Republican turf under a Democrat flag, it left the Republicans only one way to go. Already moved substantially to the right by 12 years of Reagan - Bush, right wing fanatics of all stripes were left free and clear to move the Republican party into fascist territory - and it got support from all those voters which included the much maligned "angry white males" who were left behind in the rust belts in the core of the nation. That it has ended to date with the official Republican nomination of a nouveau Mussolini should be no surprise.
Forget the Right - why so many on the Left couldn't trust Hillary
As I wrote back in March, 2016, Hillary Clinton was the only real Republican in the race. That naturally got some heated reposts (cries of "hogwash" and such), each Hillary supporter dutifully trotting out her record on her pet social issues: women, children, LGBT rights. But not a one could point to her "progressive" stands on the economy other than her support for an increase in the minimum wage. Banking and financial regulation? Reigning in corporate power and excesses? Big Pharma? Re-empowering labor? Hillary's response: Zip. Zero. Reversing the bleed of jobs that "free trade" initiatives have engendered when enacted with only corporate profits in mind? Industrialized agriculture wiping out small farmers while poisoning the ground, water and us? Dodge, dart. A long overdue ban on fracking? "Try one of the truffles, they're excellent."
A prime example of the perennially slippery and evasive Hillary was provided only a few weeks before the election. The Standing Rock Sioux had been protesting the pipeline that poses an imminent threat to their lands and community. After months of ignoring and dodging this protest the Clinton campaign finally issued an official statement:
"...Secretary Clinton has been clear that she thinks all voices should be heard and all views considered in federal infrastructure projects. Now, all of the parties involved... need to find a path forward that serves the broadest public interest. As that happens, it's important that on the ground in North Dakota, everyone respects demonstrators' rights to protest peacefully, and workers' rights to do their jobs safely."
Classic Hillary: A statement meant to be seen as carefully measured and balanced but which was rightfully perceived as an evasive, slick and cagey dodge. Even worse, it was yet another betrayal of this people who have suffered over 150 years of betrayals: Remember, this is the same Sioux who were ignominiously betrayed by the U.S. government so that the Black Hills could be stolen from them, which led to a war which ended in the infamous slaughter of the Sioux at Wounded Knee. Hillary is too smart not to know that there cannot be "a path forward that serves the broadest public interest" without the full and fair consideration of the rights of the Sioux Nation, and that that cannot take place without an immediate halt to the construction. This was a major moral and ethical failure on her part and it didn't take a rocket scientist to know that Hillary's "official statement" was pure, condescending crap.
No surprise that when in her acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention she "reached out" to Bernie supporters saying, "I want you to know, I've heard you. Your cause is our cause," they saw it for what it was: Another "I feel your pain" blow-off. Why would it take over 20 years for her to hear what had been said with increasing fervor for more than two decades? "Your cause is our cause" was politico speak for "thank you for your input, it will be strongly considered." Then next, DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz was exposed by the Wikileaks email disclosures for her underhanded and secret support of Hillary while trying to cripple Bernie Sanders - withholding voter lists, withholding equal funding, those "super delegates" which were there to insure that a pesky "grass roots" candidate wouldn't take the nomination from the Chosen One of the inner party elites. And what did Hillary do after these disclosures of serious wrong-doing? The day Wasserman Schultz resigned she was immediately hired for a top position in the Hillary campaign (and received praise from Obama). Any benefit of the doubt she might still have had was lost right there.
She condones and rewards cheating within the DNC ranks. When she should be making a firm stand in favor of the abused and dispossessed, in favor of what is right and just, whenever there is a big money interest involved she dodges, darts, weaves and bobs, substituting insincere rhetoric for substantive action. That is why she was not trusted by the people she needed to trust her to get elected. Yes, she has consistently been attacked by the Right, often unfairly and with malice aforethought. That has had its bad effects; but it was never insurmountable. The distrust that Hillary engenders from fellow Democrats and Independents has been created by her own hand.
And that also is why so many voters that could have been hers either didn't turn out or voted for a third party candidate: "A pox on both of your houses!" they declared to the Trump and Clinton campaigns.
Trump was allowed to win by default
The title of another post-mortem on the Clinton disaster says it all: "Trump didn't win the election, Hillary lost it." Plain and simple, the Democrats lost by default because they had a candidate who was incapable of addressing the issues and advancing the goals hungered and thirsted for by the majority of voters and would be voters: Secure employment that paid a just and living wage; safe and good public schools for their children; affordable higher education that won't leave the graduates in debt-servitude for a good part of their lives; robust and affordable healthcare for all (sorry, but "Obamacare" is a major fail on that score); and a just retirement income that won't leave the elderly in poverty. That was why Bernie Sanders repeatedly surged with Democratic and Independent voters: It is an agenda that requires taking on the moneyed interests head on, from proper regulation of Wall Street to making sure that the über rich and large corporations all pay their fair share of taxes. Vociferously championing the rights of women, children, the LGBT community and more sane gun laws is all well and good and a solid piece of the so-called "progressive" agenda; but without good and secure incomes, education, healthcare and retirement those are hollow and empty rights: Equality in poverty and misery is neither an accomplishment to brag about nor a cause with which to fire up the electorate. And Hillary couldn't make the argument or do what was necessary because she and Bill have not only joined the ranks of the privileged rich but they also now think like them. No wonder the DNC has been dominated by cocktail party liberals and society page progressives, those comfortable, well-healed personal rights liberals/fiscal conservatives who enjoy rubbing shoulders and bending elbows with hedge fund traders at photogenic, glitzy, grand galas.
I know I was not the only one to cringe in anger when Trump was the one to attack NAFTA - a justified attack which the Democratic nominee should have made but Hillary couldn't. When Trump talked about a rigged system, which resonates with voters right, left and middle, Hillary sat there mum because she was one of the riggers. Repeatedly, Trump scored valid points that she had neither capitalized on nor could she effectively rebut because she was part of the problem. One otherwise usually good political analyst wrote that "there were no easy or believable explanations for Trump's victory and Clinton's crushing defeat" because, besides the polls, "Clinton triumphed in the presidential debates..." Really? The decision as to who won the debates was not up to the political pundits or the elites of either party. It was up to the voters. When the jury comes back with a verdict against you, you didn't win the argument. Trump won the debates in the only way that counted.
The only explanation ventured by this same political analyst for the amazingly low voter turnout (112.5 million, compared to 127 M in 2012 and 130 M in 2008) was that perhaps "Americans were sick of the endless campaign and all the excesses in the political system." That would be a much more satisfying explanation if it had also noted that one of the major "excesses in the political system" was Clintonism, perfectly embodied in the Chosen One of the DNC elites.
If the DNC is to have any future, much less a path of return to rule, it had better put "RIP" on a tombstone marked "Clintonism" and hand the reigns of power to the Bernie Sanders', Elizabeth Warren's and others who truly believe in social and economic justice and can thereby bring their hearts and souls as well as their minds to it. That's the kind of passion that speaks. Nothing less will convince voters who have been fooled way too many times by a DNC dominated by Clintonism.