This also picks up our other thread.
N-, I have noticed how centrist you are; thankless job, done on the web, it seems. I remember how, at the time, I too thought that guff phrase a wild hair. My rambling is admitted. It does, however, improve as topics are narrowed and simply with familiarity.
I agree with you that LBJ accomplished a mammoth agenda. I agree that Bill's is eclipsed by it. And likely through his own lack of political skill, the National, Legislative kind. My Point is that with both of these Democratic Presidents the domestic agenda was leveraged by the Foreign Policy. That is, the two Prez gave up control of foreign policy to their political opponents so that they would give support, or less obstruction, to an agenda at home that the opponents cared little for.
This is not a slur; it is compromise politics. For LBJ, the focus was Vietnam. He didn't care about it. [No one did, but it could do things for us.] Kennedy gave it to him as a nothing. But, after winding down from WWII and Korea, LBJ's opponents needed a war. 1st, there was the direct profit from supplies. 2nd, the indirect profit in the supply communities. 3rd, wartime government deficit borrowing gave [an illusion] of economic growth and good times. 4th. The rising counterculture was based on wholesale rejection of goods. This is a horrible economic trend. 5th. The protest movements were creating instability: in the economy, the workplace, the institutions. Instability raises business expenses. 6th. There was the unifying force of patriotism in a foreign war. Especially for the President's political opponents voters.
All these factors [more?], point to the need for escalation in the war. But it drew so much from the country that LBJ's agenda was getting lost or countered. For him, he had to give up an assured second term. Not a Slur. He'd created a structure that balanced on his Great Society in exchange for their foreign policy direction. That structure was irretrievably damaged, collapsing. He had no way to <fight his way back to some kind of significance.>
Clinton did the same with his home agenda and with trade treaties. His accomplishments with the former are pretty mild. [Health care was his true love.] Treaties that removed blue-collar jobs from America was pretty radical, especially for a Democrat. I suspect the pay wasn't enough for our money-men, or Clinton timed it all badly. I don't know, I wonder if the Conservative Revolution threw a wrench into the works for Clinton, just as the 60's groups hijacked LBJ. Best I can tell, Clinton's accomplishments have been 1) stopped the Conservative Revolution, 2) Didn't screw up the economy, 3) This and that in foreign affairs.
So, while LBJ got his agenda and became boxed in, Clinton lost his agenda, but disorganized the enemy and survived.
The economic implications of Clinton's treaties could have been enormously better. American workers competing against peasants earning $10/day is never going to bring happiness to far too many. The greatness of the WWII generation was that it not only crushed tyranny, but it also went back and restored the allies and the enemy. We have shared prosperity with WE & Japan for decades. War, constant war, disappeared. What we failed to do was continue that blueprint. Had we fought communism, not in Vietnam, but with the same commitment of resources, starting with Mexico, we would not need NAFTA, we would now have a frictionless partner south of us that is an asset as the one to the north.
Yes, there are severe differences between temporary war torn France and always peasant Mexico. But, we could not effect a country with such massive [wasted] money, men, and brains? We are either cowards, or fools. |
