Hillary Clinton Represents the Entrenched D.C. Political Class Vs. the Grassroots People Power of Obama
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Mark Karlin
Editor and Publisher
March 4, 2009
In our daily surfing, we came across an interesting primary analysis article by one Steve Borris, in which he writes:
But the most striking impact of New Media in this cycle has been the emergence of a new two-party system. It will no longer just be Democrats vs. Republicans, but also the Political Class vs. the People. The Political Class includes Old Media, powerful incumbents on both sides of the aisle, political operatives, lobbyists, and all others who suck-off the teat of the federal government. The People are the New Media-fueled citizens who are now listening to that multitude of voices competing in a freewheeling marketplace of ideas. What is shocking is that in this cycle, the Political Class actually lost.
Given all the accusatory emotion between Obama supporters and Clinton advocates on BuzzFlash and elsewhere, it is worth noting that gender and race issues aside, the Democratic Primary is largely about a battle between one candidate who comes from the centrist DLC permanent "Political Class" vs. another who represents the broadening base of non-Washington based grassroots realignment.
Now, as Borris notes, it is a touch more complicated than this simple analysis. For one, Obama is moderate enough -- hardly a radical -- that he is acceptable to the permanent "Political Class," even though Clinton is more their candidate on the Democratic side. Nonetheless, Obama owes his campaign financing primarily to grassroots fundraising while Hillary owes it more to high-end contributions.
Moreover, Clinton's advisers -- including the Machiavellian dinosaur Mark Penn, who worked with the infamous Dick Morris on the 1996 Bill Clinton campaign, and the definitely old school big money bully, Terry McAuliffe as Hillary's honorary campaign manager -- are primarily drawn from the permanent D.C. ruling class that owes itself to the "K Street" lobbyists and business as usual.
Clinton supporters forget that her roots as First Lady were not in the progressive wing of the party, but rather in the triangulating DLC, which she only distanced herself from once the primary became unexpectedly competitive.
Clinton is about the "I" of established Washington "solving" problems for us while never hurting the entrenched financial interests that circle the city like vultures. Obama is about the we of America solving problems with us.
It's pretty clear that Obama could not have advanced as far as he has -- vanquishing the anointed media winner of last year, Clinton -- with what Borris calls the New Media, which includes BuzzFlash:
New Media may break us into pieces, but it will also unite all of us, from far-left to far-right, against a common enemy — the Political Class. So, New Media will not just take us back to the old days before Old Media. It is also a new revolution that will take us back to the old, but timeless, ideas of America’s oldest revolution.
We understand Clinton supporters who want the symbolic breakthrough of a female president, but there is nothing in Clinton's record (which is, despite her rhetoric, very thin on foreign affairs) that indicates that she has a political ideology based on "women's values." She has, for politically pragmatic purposes, become one of the boys, talking and voting tough on war, including her refusal to vote for the banning of the use of monstrous cluster bombs in civilian areas.
It appears that in this primary many Clinton voters have forgotten that the netroots movement is a progressive movement. While John Edwards or Dennis Kucinich had platforms that more reflected the netroots progressive values, Obama's campaign structure and values are much closer to the netroots than the dreaded "triangulation" strategies of the DLC, reflected by Senator Clinton.
We're writing this because it's important to put into perspective the basic dynamic that is pitting the netroots, for the most part, against the Clinton campaign strategy of the last few months, and her cocoon of DLC, Washington, D.C. entrenched consultants who are part of a permanent ruling class in D.C.
Obama as president, should he win that position, will surely disappoint us at times. All elected officials do at some point. But he will owe his victory to the people, who have given him nearly a million more votes in the primaries than Senator Clinton (as of the morning of March 4th).
Senator Clinton -- based on her past actions and assumptions -- will owe her victory to the same group of consulting, lobbyist, and political elite people who have been a part of the Republicrats for years, and prospered through their relationship with the corporate world.
Let us not forget that basic distinction, which has been at the heart of the core values of the netroots.
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