I hope Hillary runs in 2016 and crushes Rand Paul/Scott Walker. I think that getting the first woman president elected would be huge for the Democratic party, and, while I like Kirsten Gillibrand better, I think Hillary would be a good president.
More than that, though, I’m fascinated by the train wreck that was the 2008 Hillary campaign in the same way that I’m fascinated by the train wreck that was the W presidency. Substitute Mark Penn for Cheney and Terry McAuliffe for Rumsfeld, and there’s a lot of similarities.
This New York magazine article is very good:
“She doesn’t repeat her mistakes,” says Melanne Verveer, an aide to the First Lady who then served in the State Department as Hillary’s ambassador-at-large for global women’s issues. “She really learns from her mistakes. It’s like, you want to grow a best practice and then always operate on that. She analyzes, ‘What went wrong here?’”
[….]Clintonworld, however, speaks with many voices—albeit many of them not for attribution. Some of her close confidants, including many people with whom her own staff put me in touch, are far less circumspect than she is. “She’s running, but she doesn’t know it yet,” one such person put it to me. “It’s just like a force of history. It’s inexorable, it’s gravitational. I think she actually believes she has more say in it than she actually does.”
And a longtime friend concurs. “She’s doing a very Clintonian thing. In her mind, she’s running for it, and she’s also convinced herself she hasn’t made up her mind. She’s going to run for president. It’s a foregone conclusion.”
My feeling is that the Clintons are the near-term future of politics. All the Clinton Foundation Aspen-style neoliberal bullshit that nauseates me in the same way that Obama’s embrace of Larry Summers and Rahm Emmanuel (I realize that some became too fixated on him but he sucked) nauseated me but also a reasonable degree of competence and a deep-seated desire to fucking crush the Republican party. The enemy of that enemy is certainly my friend.
Fred Fnord
Ally. The enemy of my enemy is my ally.
Friends can be trusted. Allies need to be watched closely. Especially when they’re more or less defeated your common enemies. Because then they tend to look around for other people to defeat, and there are their (ex-) allies, conveniently close at hand.
dmsilev
If nothing else, it will be absolutely fascinating and horrifying to learn exactly how the Republicans will top their hatred and disrespect for Obama. Because we all know that somehow they will manage to become even worse.
PsiFighter37
@dmsilev: Do they hate women or coloreds or more? That’s what we’ll get to find out.
dmsilev
@PsiFighter37: ‘Yes’.
They hate both, and in terms of intensity it’s a question of turning the ratchet a few times. Now, if only we could find that little lever thingy that reverses the direction.
Anybodybuther2016
Trollin trollin trollin, keeps this blog a blowen
LeftCoastTom
@dmsilev: You mean worse than what the GOP actually did in the ’90s, accusing Hillary Clinton of murdering Vince Foster, accusing both Clintons of murdering the entire population of Mena, AR (the remnant zombies of which got hit by a tornado a few years ago)…
schrodinger's cat
It is still too early. I am not sure that she is inevitable.
WereBear
Works for me.
dmsilev
@LeftCoastTom: Hell, yes. Back in the 90s, at least some of the GOP were still sane and served to (slightly) temper the maniacs. Today, not so much. And it’s getting worse; they’re primary-purging anybody who is even vaguely impure, with the definition of impure changing weekly. If Hillary runs and wins, the crap that will start emanating from the right starting three days before she announces that she’s running will be worse than what we saw 15 years ago.
glocksman
@dmsilev:
Exactly.
Here in Indiana, we had Dick Lugar primaried out by Mourdock the tea party and anti choice nutcase.
The sad thing is that I voted for Mourdock when he ran for Vanderburgh county commissioner the first time because the democrat he ran against was a total tool.
I didn’t vote for him a second time because he started to fly the crazy flag once he won the office.
rikyrah
Hillary is still surrounded by the same pack of losers and leeches.
They’re pushing the inevitable bullshyt once again.
I don’t really like Hillary Clinton..
but, I absolutely loathe the leeches around her.
sparrow
I feel very meh about Hillary. I think political dynasties are crap, and would support an amendment banning family members down to cousins from becoming president (or actually, any federal position). There are hundreds of millions of Americans. A fair number would make good presidents.
And I read some super nauseating articles about Chelsea which has put me off the family even more. Talk about living in the delusional 0.1%. I’d rather have Liz Warren, someone who might actually remember being a regular person.
Sly
I hope Hillary Clinton doesn’t run. Not because I think she’d make a bad President or a bad candidate, or that there necessarily are better potential Presidents or candidates out there, but because I never want to hear the words “Clintonian” or “Clintonesque” again, and because the people who parse her every word and move are genuinely terrible human beings and I want them to go away forever. It’s like watching an episode of TMZ about my high school guidance counselor.
TheMightyTrowel
My money is still on Hill starting the campaign then very quickly stepping back and becoming the behind-the-throne power for one of the younger women – Gillibrand or maybe what’s her face from MN.
Patricia Kayden
@rikyrah: Why don’t you like Hilary? I was a little po’d at the way she and Bill behaved during the 2008 election cycle, but pretty much forgave them after she became Secretary of the State Department. I always felt that they let their desperation take over when they saw that Obama was winning most of the primaries and I recall them saying a few wince-inducing comments.
I want her to win in 2016 though. A woman President would be great. She is certainly better than anything the Republicans will put up.
WereBear
I have to disagree.
We see a very small pool and only a few fish thrash to the surface every four years because it’s an incredibly tough job getting elected… and then the real fun starts. Being a good President is even harder, and part of the slog to being Prez is how it selects and trains you to be Prez.
I’ve heard Hillary Clinton speak at events, even shook her hand once, and observed her as our NY Senator. She’s whip smart, does her homework, and really does both know and care about moving the levers to help all Americans.
On the other hand, I see her two greatest flaws entertwining to cause trouble; I believe she is still stuck in First Wave Feminism and then married a Good Ol’ Boy from Arkansas. So her entire adult life she’s been deferring to, and maneuvering around, the giant quivering ego of Southern Males.
However, I think her stint as Secretary of State probably helped fix those attitudes; she seemed to do very well. If she could continue that trend, I think she could do very well as our first woman President; and I think she could get elected.
And does she want some Payback? Could she get all Medieval on some right wing asses?
A girl can dream.
Kay
@Sly:
From the article, about Bill Clinton:
Single-handedly. Some say that.
mdblanche
A slight contradiction?
WereBear
I look at it differently; President Hilary Clinton would explode any remaining heads that President Barack Obama left somewhat intact.
I base this on the fact that while President Obama might be viewed by the loonies as a Sekrit Muslin Time Traveling Usurper, he’s still a MAN.
A woman President would rock their tiny world far more than an African American President.
Crouchback
@sparrow: I’m inclined to agree with this and I’m very nervous about how competent Hillary Clinton’s campaign team would be. I get the sense a lot of them are still stuck in the 1990s. I don’t care for Bill Clinton’s excessive fondness for the overclass. And all the liberals who have convinced themselves she’ll transform into the feminist avenger once she’s in office, well they’ll be a pain in the ass when she pursues policies very similar to Obama.
That said, she’d be a competent sane President which puts her light years ahead of anything the Republicans throw up. She’ll protect Obamacare and put liberals (or at least moderates) on the courts. So if she wins the primary any sane liberal should back her in the general. Besides, once the GOP flips from a racist to a misogynistic focus, we’ll see a whole new level of creepiness and come November 2016 we’ll be likely to vote for Clinton if only out of spite.
I wouldn’t worry too much about Chelsea. She lacks her father’s political talent and her mother’s modesty and work ethic. The worst that will happen is that the Good and the Wise will hustle her as a candidate in a winnable election and blow it a la Coakley or Quinn.
Full Metal Wingnut
I just hope someone runs to her left to keep things interesting.
The Hill-bots are going to be awful this time. There was some truly vile and borderline racist stuff in 08. Now they’re going to think the nomination is hers by rights. All I want is a competitive primary.
glocksman
@schrodinger’s cat:
Agreed.
The lesson of 2008 was that on the Democratic side, no candidate is inevitable (see Clinton, Hillary).
As far as the Repubs go, it’ll depend on who manages to jigger the primary rules in their favor this time around, as they don’t have someone in the wings whose turn has come (see McCain, John and Romney, Willard).
That said, the only way I’d vote Republican in 2016 is if the ghost of Theodore Roosevelt wins the nomination.
Oh, and can we please do something about the goddamn Iowa caucuses.
I am sick and tired of seeing every candidate pledge fealty to the god of corn and ag subsidies.
Jeremy
@Kay: Bill was great at the convention but one speech can’t win a presidential race. Obama and his team were the main drivers behind the victory.
Splitting Image
@PsiFighter37:
I don’t think there is much of a difference anymore. Racists and sexists are like pigs and farmers. The longer you look at them, the more alike they seem.
Full Metal Wingnut
@Sly: I’m also tired of the Clintonism that cemented Reaganism. I don’t dislike Bill too much, but he signed some dogshit legislation. I want a real Democrat. An old school Democrat. An LBJ minus bombing Southeast Asia. No more fucking New Democrats. Fuck that obscenity. Maybe one day we’ll get there-where the Clintonian center democrat move is renounced.
Redshirt
Yep. Amen. What this country absolutely, 100% needs is another Democratic Presidential Administration, preferably one that can go 8 years. We need to erase the deep seated stain that is current Republican thought and the only way we can do that is by surrounding them, and time. We need time for their craziness to burn out, for a new generation to come of age.
Hillary (the Clintons, really) is not my fave, but I’ll work for her gladly if she gets the nomination.
Kay
@Jeremy:
It’s a crazy thing to say.
Chris
@Kay:
Oh for Zeus’ sake.
I didn’t even remember that.
(In sharp contrast to “Please proceed, senator.”)
magurakurin
I say double down on that eleven. Clinton/Obama in 2016. Hil and Michelle, rockin the house. Bring the motherfuckin walls down.
All, but all, the remaining wingnut heads will explode when they crush whatever pudfucker the Repukes can find. They’d win Texas those two.
so, double down, the dealer has 2 and we have an 11.
WereBear
I love the fact that this post opens with: Iz our candidates learning?
Because she really screwed up in 2008. She lost fair and square. From where I sat, she let Bill run things and he partied like it was 1993. Same old faces, same old tactics; no wonder they got dusted.
But if she takes that under advisement, and the Sharper Democrats are able to move up into influential positions, she could make this campaign about really important things that haven’t been talked about enough.
And I’m serious; you think the Wurlitzer of Cray Cray was cranked up for Barack Obama? Well, it was, but he was new, and they didn’t have a history with him.
If Hilary runs, it’s going to be a grudge match. On both sides.
Jeremy
I will give the Hillary super pac credit for reaching out to former Obama campaign people to advise in 2016. If she becomes the nominee she is going to have to learn from the Obama campaign. The 90’s model is out of date and no longer necessary due to demographic changes.
Jeremy
@Full Metal Wingnut: Well It takes time to get there. I think Hillary if she becomes president will govern differently from her husband due to the changing times and the fact that Hillary is the smarter one out of the two.
LBJ had 2/3 democratic majorities in both houses, and a republican party that had moderate and liberal republicans in it. So it was easier for LBJ to enact that kind of change.
Anya
The Clintons are surrounded by leaches and unprincipled douchebags (Penn, Lanny Davis, Terry McAuliffe and any number of unsavoury characters) but what was Obama thinking with his embrace of Rahm Emmanuel? I never understood that.
As for Hillary’s inevitability, I am not jumping on the Hillary love bandwagon. Okay, look. I know we’re ALL trying to wipe the memory of 2008 Dem primary wars out of our minds, but it did exist, and we have to acknowledge it, then we can move on. Hillary’s campaign was atrocious. The birther craziness and the race baiting can be traced back to the wink-wink-nod-nod racism her campaign encouraged. I will never forget her interview with 60 Minutes when Steve Carell kept asking her if she believed Obama was Christian, and she would not say it because it was her interest that Ohio racists to fear him and perceive him as an other. Not to mention her assertion that she had the support of “Hard-Working Americans, White Americans.”
I would love to have a woman POTUS, and would work very hard to elect Hillary if she was our nominee, but I will not forgive her untill she acknowledges her error by deed or words.
Full Metal Wingnut
Let’s not underestimate Warren. She may be old. She doesn’t have the speaking talents of Obama. But the kids love her, and I mean love her. All the young liberals I know, seriously, everyone under 30 or even 35 loves her to death.
Hillary would do well to not underestimate her. Warren is also a woman, so that’s doubly dangerous-taking the historic edge away from Hillary.
I’m not kidding-ask a young liberal how they feel about Warren if you’re older.
Full Metal Wingnut
@Jeremy: I mostly mean personality. LBJ, Congress majorities not withstanding, was extraordinarily talented. We deserve another Democrat like him.
But I just read master of the senate so maybe that colors my opinion.
Anya
@Full Metal Wingnut: I agree. It’s really sad that LBJ’s legacy was ruined by the Vietnam war. In my opinion, he does not get the recognition he deserves.
Redshirt
@Full Metal Wingnut: Do you have any insight on Warren’s relationship with Obama and/or Obama’s team?
Jeremy
@Full Metal Wingnut: I agree. We need another president like LBJ (excluding Vietnam).
Redshirt
@Anya: Agreed. I mean, that’s a big smear, but it also killed him. He cared. Nixon didn’t give a shit. LBJ changed this country for the better in big ways and deserves accolades.
And I dislike those emoprogs who drove him, and the Democratic Party, into the ditch. And ushered in Reagan and our current swell politics. Thanks, Abbie Hoffman! The contradictions have indeed been heightened!
Full Metal Wingnut
@Redshirt: I have absolutely no idea. I assume there’s better blood between the Clintons and the Obamas now-that could really work against Warren.
Chris
@WereBear:
and
@Anya:
all of this;
Ever since the Southern Strategy started in the sixties, it seems like the closest thing the Democratic Party could come to a winning strategy was “stop the bleeding by running someone who can speak Good Ole Boy convincingly enough to get enough of them back over to our side to put us over the top.” Hence Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton. I suppose Hillary was trying to follow that blueprint in 2008, not realizing that thanks to demographic shifts, the people who responded to Good Ole Boy had already stopped being the center of gravity of U.S. politics.
Not that it excuses any of what she did in the primaries.
Jeremy
@Anya: This is so true. The Clinton campaign did some dirty stuff during the primaries that pissed a lot of people off. They need to prove that they changed.
Tom Q
I was not-Hillary in 2008, but I think, because of the whole “inevitable” thing, people overlook how well she did, especially in the later stages. I’d assumed she was a glass-jaw candidate — that once her inevitability was shattered, she’d collapse — but in fact, after Obama racked up that string of victories, she steadied her campaign and came a whole lot closer than I would have imagined. I’ve also since been impressed that she handled a real job, not just the Senate position that she essentially inherited as an adjunct to her husband’s fame. I think most people feel she acquitted herself pretty well at State.
My take is that she’ll be a better candidate and potential president than she would have been if elected in ’08. A President Hillary back then would have been more wedded to Third Way/poll-tested school uniform type stuff — she’d have gone back to Bill’s style, no more no less. The Obama administration has moved the needle some — at least on a number of fronts — and she’ll be more inclined to move on from there.
And, from a totally technical/pragmatic standpoint: she stands the best chance of scoring a resounding electoral victory — holding onto Obama’s voters while winning over some of those Appalachian Valley folk who just couldn’t buy into Barack — and bringing in as Democratic a Congress as possible.
Full Metal Wingnut
@Anya: yeah. I mean, he kind of deserves it-it was a big deal. We can also blame Nixon and Killinger for their treason in sabotaging the Paris peace talks in 68.
I really think that LBJ not running/winning in 68 is one of the great tragedies of modern American politics-so the Vietnam war is why I guess. Nixon wasn’t even that abysmal but Watergate was such a deep wound I wish we could undo.
My other choice for great American political tragedy was not only Reagan winning in 80, but him not winning in 76. Reagan before his base is solidified I think would’ve saved a lot of shit. Sigh. If we could turn back time…
Redshirt
@Tom Q: Amen again! She will get votes Obama could not get, and even if that means more Blue Dogs from WV and NC, so be it if it gives the Dems the majorities in both Houses and restores basic sanity and competence to our government. That’s a core issue now, fer crikey! Competence! I wouldn’t trust a Republican to run a town government anymore, let alone the entire Empire.
Kay
@Chris:
I don’t know. I like debates, generally, all debates, but at the time it seemed like there were two campaigns, one “national” and one in the states, and I’m still not sure the “national” campaign mattered as much as the other one.
I think 47% mattered, but they had already labeled Romney as an uncaring plutocrat by then so it was just a chance for people to say “I knew that about him.”
My theory was the central fact of Romney’s life is his religion and he decided he couldn’t reveal that, too risky, so that’s why he seemed inauthentic.
Jeremy
@Chris: The changing demographics have changed the landscape. Like you said there is no need for that old strategy.
Full Metal Wingnut
@Redshirt: So true. My mother, born and raised in Boston, JFK Democrat, became a Reagan Democrat and hasn’t looked back since. Bush twice, McCain and Romney.
But when Hillary came to the local university, she went and would not stop talking about it. I really think HRC can snag the married women demographic that Obama couldn’t.
Chris
@Full Metal Wingnut:
I don’t know. The nice thing about Warren is that she’s an unapologetic, full-on liberal voice, not Not-Republican, not Third Way milquetoast, actually liberal, and on economic issues of all things… at a time when such voices are really not as common as they should be. I’d rather have her continue to be a voice on the left for the people who do run for the presidency to take into account, than have her dilute that the way you have to when you’re running for president of the entire country.
In a nutshell, what I took from the Lincoln movie was that you need both your Abe Lincolns and your Thaddeus Stevenses, and I see her as more of a Stevens type.
(What FDR said about needing voices on the left to “make me do what I want to do, even though I want to do it,” also too).
Full Metal Wingnut
@Chris: not only that, I think she’s more valuable spending a good long time in the Senate, especially with her current committee assignments. It’s just that I think a lot of people underestimate her potential.
Jeremy
@Tom Q: You make a great point and I agree with it. I think Hillary can win states that President Obama couldn’t win. And based on the polls she is doing well in Louisiana, Kentucky, Arkansas. West Virgina, etc.
Kay
@Jeremy:
I would like to see her do her own strategy, her own map. You’re right that it’s different than the 1990’s, but she could put something together that was different than both Bill Clinton and Obama. I actually think she got into trouble in 2008 chasing “Bill Clinton’s voters”, or people that campaign saw as “Clinton voters.”
She didn’t have to chase them. She was getting them. She dominated in Ohio.
She could have been making her own map. Maybe she sees that now, because she did get better as she went along.
Redshirt
@Kay: It’ll have been 8 years. Surely she picked up a few tricks.
I don’t really care about Hillary one way or another. I just want a Dem, and I want as strong a choice as possible, in order to overwhelm Republican voting law shenanigans. Hill’s vetted, baby, fully vetted. Any other Dem that comes along, save Biden, is not, and therefore a risk is introduced into the process. It had better be worth it in order to justify extra, perhaps calamitous risk.
doug r
So does embrace mean the same thing to you as me?
Jeremy
My last comment on this. It would be hilarious watching the wingnuts go crazy on election night if Hillary were to win. 8 years of Obama and possibly 8 years of Hillary would drive them into depression.
askew
@rikyrah:
That’s my feelings exactly.
I am already getting sick of this play that Hillary only lost because she had bad staff. Hillary lost because she was the lesser politician and she didn’t take responsibility for her campaign. She let her dysfunctional team make all the decisions and never got control of Bill. This team is the same dysfunctional team that had been with her for 20 years but “she never makes the same mistake twice”. Give me a break already.
As for Bill Clinton singlehandedly winning the re-election for Obama, that is so offensive that it makes me ill. Yes, Obama needed a white man to come in and do his job for him. That is some bullshit white privilege talking there. Obama won because he and the team he picked spent 2 years running a great campaign with almost zero missteps. The psychotic need of some white Democrats to try to take away or belittle Obama’s accomplishments in order to make a white politician/activist seem more important is repugnant.
cckids
@PsiFighter37: They (at least the vocal ones) hate everyone who isn’t them. They will come up with and change the rationale for that hatred as the occasion warrants. (see Obamacare, formerly Romneycare, formerly Heritage Foundation ideas).
They have always been at war with Eastasia.
Chris
@Kay:
Eh. Maybe I’m just buying into my own stereotypes, but I don’t think Romney had any other god before himself.
He looked comfortable enough when he was yucking it up with his fellow blue bloods about the unworthy peons refusing to “take responsibility for their own lives.” But that was the side of him he had to repress in order to run. Had to actually pretend to like the unworthy peons, no matter how bad he was at it. And that’s why he was inauthentic.
Redshirt
@Jeremy: It would drive a lot of them to death. And as long as Wingnuts ain’t gettin’ made as fast as they’re gettin’ busy dyin’, we’re winning. DEATH PANELS.
Tom Q
@Kay: I think she (and a lot of other Democrats, in 2008) thought the GOP “lock on the presidency” was still operative, and that Bill had only managed co-opt it via his triangulation (esp. after the ’94 midterm loss). She and her people were quoted as thinking Obama couldn’t win, because he was clearly proposing a new route/platform to the presidency (besides, of course, being black). Even after the ’08 results, some of them held onto the idea that it was only the uniquely horrible economic meltdown that made Obama possible. But after his solid re-election in ’12, it ought to be clear to them that “we’re not really Democrats” is no longer a necessary pose for victory. The Democratic baseline is strong enough to win elections, and, demographically, it’s only going to expand as time goes by.
cckids
@Sly:
Yes. And, I, fear, Bill is both a plus and a huge, HUGE liability. There will be so much speculation about who he’s screwing, who has he screwed in the past, ad nauseum, it will detract from her at every turn. And, while Hillary isn’t my favorite Dem in the world, I think she’d make a perfectly decent, fine President. But there is SO MUCH hate, and so much ammunition, in the R’s little rabid world for the Clintons.
Give the wolverines someone new & fresh to hate on.
Jeremy
@Kay: She can expand the map.
cckids
@WereBear:
askew
@Jeremy:
I think the opposite is true. Appalchia is long-gone for Dem presidential. She won’t be winning AR, WV, KY or TN. And she is going to have problems holding some of Obama’s independent and younger demographic in western states like CO, NV and NM. She is also not going to be able to win IN and NC like Obama did in 2008 and may even have problems in VA. She is much more divisive than Obama is personally and she and her team like mud-throwing and ugly campaigns something that turns off young voters and independent voters. If Hillary’s team thinks she has Obama’s entire coalition is already in hand and can spend her campaign triangulating to get conservative white women to turn out for her, she is sorely mistaken. Yes, her poll #s are high now, but that is because she has spent the past 6 years in a non-partisan role with very little press coverage. When she hits the campaign trail, her #s will plummet again. Hell, they are already plummeting now compared to where they were when she left the State post.
Also, if Obama/Kerry are successful in getting Syria’s chemical weapons destroyed and get to the negotiating table with Iran, her tenure at State is going to look a lot weaker.
Jeremy
@askew: I disagree. She was performing well there in 2008 and currently she is performing well there. Many of those voters love the Clinton’s which is something Gore, Kerry, and Obama didn’t have going for them. She is polling very well in Virginia, and I can see her winning NC. I just don’t agree that she can’t win the Obama states because the polling is showing that she is.
Jax6655
IMO–Hillary will have problems with two major demos, Black women & millennials. Older white feminists think she’s it but what has she got for younger women or men?
To many Black women, like Rikyra above, her and Bill’s antics in 2008 toward POTUS not forgotten nor forgiven, myself included. Plus something forced and almost phoney about her. This came up in 2008 as well. And nonsense about Bill winning election for PBO is insulting to most Black voters esp given their shenanigans after South Carolina. Like all Dems, she will need Black vote to win.
If she’s nominee I’ll vote for her but frankly I hope it’s someone else.
Not wise to assume she’ll garner excitement that PBO did. Hillary is many things–exciting? Not so much.
amk
Ah, nothing like the smell of dynasty politics with a side order of inevitability factor.
Jax6655
@WereBear:
You’ve got to be kidding or high, or both.
Jeremy
@askew: Look I’m not a big Hillary fan but I don’t see her making the same mistakes after 2008. I supported President Obama over her because I thought he was the right man for the job at this critical juncture in our country and I still believe this.
I just don’t buy into this Hilliary’s numbers will plummet stuff because that’s not what happened during the later stage of the primaries. She adjusted and finished strong especially in areas that the President didn’t do so well. Of course her numbers will go down as she becomes more political, but based on the polls she is competitive in Appalachia and we couldn’t say that for other recent democratic nominees. If she is the nominee the President is going to throw full support behind her because he wants a democrat to succeed him.
askew
@Jeremy:
You can’t look at polling now. her numbers are hugely inflated from her not being in a partisan role for 6 years. And she performed will in 2008 in a Democratic primary against an African-American candidate. That’s not a sign of strength. North Carolina and Virginia are both perfect Obama coalition states – young voters, minorities, highly-educated independent whites. Hillary isn’t going to do as well with independent whites and we’ll see how she does with minorities. A lot of people ignored her team’s race-baiting in 2008 because Obama put her in his cabinet. But, it will come up again in 2016 primaries.
Jeremy
I believe that at this point the main person who can beat Hillary is herself. The republican side is full of losers and if she wins the nomination and fails to win, it will be because of stupid mistakes and picking the wrong people.
Suzanne
If Hillary is the nominee, we’ll have to start tracking the number of times they call her a cu-CLANG!
askew
@Jeremy:
I think you are remembering the primary differently than what happened. From April – June, there were 10 states contested. Obama won 3, Hillary won 5 and they essentially tied 2, which netted Hillary 40 extra delegates. She didn’t come back and win because of some new strategy. She had a favorable map which included states in Appalachia and it was during the height of the Wright controversy and that is still all she could manage. I am not seeing any impressive campaign strategy or any improvement in her political skill.
askew
@Jeremy:
Nah, she’s an average politician she doesn’t have near the skill that Bill had in his prime. If a strong liberal Dem runs (O’Malley would be my choice) who can generate excitement among the base and attract talent and early money, Hillary is beatable in the primary. But, I am not sure there is anyone who has enough nerve to run against Hillary in 2016. The Clintons are a petty people and they will hold grudges if anyone dares to run against her.
mai naem
Hillary’s supposed to be surrounding herself with a lot of Obama people for the campaign so I figure not only will she not make the same stupid mistakes but that she’s going to get some of the best people out there who know how to deal with social media and do a good job with GOTV. I also think Hillary’s naturally more liberal than Bill(esp. because she’s a woman) but will be pragmatic when she needs to be. She doesn’t have the natural political skills that Bill has, but I think she’s intellectually smarter than Bill.
Ruckus
@askew:
This. Well stated. Both you and @rikyrah: are saying what I felt in 2008 and now.
Yes she did well at SoS. Yes she is a polished politician. And I’d like to see a woman as pres. I just don’t see her as the right one. I’ll support her if she is the nominee of course. I just wouldn’t be all that overjoyed about it. It’s a big job. It is an unbelievably hard job. Eight years can just about kill a person with the stress and demands. And because of this it requires people to help. So hiring good people to help and to actually run things, letting the head person make decisions is the only way it will work. Her history of hiring is abysmal. How do we trust her to do better this time? How do we trust her to do better in office than she has done in running? Her senate service? Her SoS service? I don’t believe either of those come close to the level required of a president, candidate or office holder.
IOW, I just don’t trust her.
daverave
Damn, is it 2015 already?
Anybodybuther2016
@askew: @askew: thank you, it is sickening. It feels like they’re trying to set up a scenario in which Hilary Clinton will get all of the credit for Obamas programs once they start paying back dividends while she’s in office. It doesn’t matter, that woman will never be president.
Thymezone
Like.
Phil Perspective
@askew: Elizabeth Warren will wipe the floor with Hillary, if she runs in ’16.
Death Panel Truck
@WereBear:
Oh, bullshit. She’s white. Racism trumps sexism every time. Every. Fucking. Time.
Suzanne
@Phil Perspective: As much as I like Warren, this will never happen. Beauty politics matters here, which is unfortunate but is reality. Hillary dealt with comments about her pantsuits and her cankles, FFS. If Warren runs, there will not be a day that goes by in which we don’t hear about her hair, her glasses, looking “tired”, etc etc etc. Older women are only taken seriously if they attempt some level of glamorous—and Hillary didn’t do that enough last time. I am sure that she has learned from last time. If she runs, she will always have a perfect dye job, no roots, designer clothes, Louboutins and Manolos.
Suzanne
@Death Panel Truck:
If that were true, we would have had a white woman president before we had a black male one. Or a white woman Supreme Court justice before we had a black male one. Or white women could have voted before black men.
Racism trumps sexism….some of the time. And sometimes it doesn’t.
Jim in Chicago
@Anya: You mean the way she admitted her error in voting for Bush’s war? Oh, wait…
Put me down in the camp that hopes Hillary doesn’t run and that Elizabeth Warren, or Sherrod Brown, or any other real progressive does.
b
See how this article affects your analysis of Clinton. It is just the tip of the ice berg of Bill’s dealings over the years post presidency. I think his dealings and associations will turn a lot of young voters of. As much as Hillary is her own person, I fear she can never shed his baggage.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/114790/how-doug-band-drove-wedge-through-clinton-dynasty
b
See how this article affects your analysis of Clinton. It is just the tip of the ice berg of Bill’s dealings over the years post presidency. I think his dealings and associations will turn off a lot of young voters. As much as Hillary is her own person, I fear she can never shed his baggage.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/114790/how-doug-band-drove-wedge-through-clinton-dynasty
AxelFoley
@Full Metal Wingnut:
Yeah, but can she keep the black vote that she pissed off in ’08? She may gain the married (read: white) women vote, but the Clintons upset many black folks in ’08 and many haven’t come back around to them.
AxelFoley
@askew:
This.
fuckwit
Doug, you gots ya a lot of bullshit in that there post.
First of all, I live in HORROR of having a president that is capable of the kind of denial and self-delusion that you appear to be celebrating in this post. That is exactly what sucked about W, and Clinton the First, and I don’t want it: that postmodern ability to believe one’s own bullshit while pretending not to believe it while also pretending it’s not bullshit to begin with. I HATE THAT SHIT.
Secondly, I do not want there to be a Clinton The Second any more than I wanted there to be a Bush The Second. This whole aristocratic dynasty bullshit has got to stop somewhere. Just because you are the son/spouse/cousin/etc of a president doesn’t mean you get the job: this isn’t fucking Hollywood and I’m disgusted to see nepotism infecting it. Yeah, that goes for you too Russert, Cheney, Wallace, Kristol, etc
Finally, I don’t like her policies. She did a fantastic job implementing Obama’s policies, which were just better.
If it’s time for a woman to be president, I’d rather it be Elizabeth Warren. Actually, there is now a fairly good bench on the Democratic side of female candidates who could, and probably should, make a solid run for president. I’d prefer almost any of them to Clinton.
That said, sigh, if she ends up as the nominee, I’m out campaigning for her. With all the enthusiasm I put into campaigning for Kerry in 2004…. and hopefully with not a repeat of those results either.
Ailuridae
She’s going to get rolled over by someone comparably competent/electable who didn’t cast an indefensible vote in favor of going to war in Iraq a decade ago. Myself like a lot of Democrats will simply never cast a vote for anybody whose judgment was so poor as to support the invasion of Iraq unless the alternative also supported the war or would be incapable of doing the job.
Here’s my candidate of choice. Although I would drop him for Warren in a second
ChaseBears
If Hillary Clinton becomes president I don’t think it will be a Dynasty thing. She was always politically active herself, she’s not a Cheney or Bush trying to ride coattails. Marrying someone who became President shouldn’t disqualify her.
It’s interesting to note that the notable Democratic political families are a group of talented brothers and a husband/wife while the Republicans get worthless kleptocrat children.
The Art of Compromise
@Full Metal Wingnut: I agree with the vile, borderline racist 2008 campaign that started the birthers. Do “democrats” remember Clinton’s policies? First was ‘don’t ask, don’t tell, he decimated welfare (how many people suffered like the repubs are trying to do with SNAP) he threw Jocelyn Elders under the bus, repeal Glass Steagall, Nafta and they didn’t “fight” for hillarycare. I believe Hillary voted for Iraq war and made speeches in support of going to war. We talk about if Reagan came back the republicans would not vote for him, democrats really need to look at Clinton policies without the filter of republicans hated them, but with what his policies actually did and who they harmed and helped.
Jax6655
@Suzanne: no. Obama didn’t beat Hillary because he’s Black. He beat her because he was better. Only one who would have harder time than PBO is a Black woman.
Matt McIrvin
@Full Metal Wingnut:
OK, but… damn it, when will they stop taking our Senators away? I don’t relish yet another special election.
(I know, it’s irrational given that I’m worrying about the case of Elizabeth Warren becoming President.)
Anya
@Ailuridae: Martin O’Malley is my candidate of choice as well, though I would love a viable woman candidate. What about Kathleen Sebelius. She’s tenacious and proved herself to be a great executive. But I think she might be really tired after 8-years of dealing with the most attacked piece of legislation since the Civil Right Act.
cleek
i vote No Thank You on Hillary.
Original Lee
@rikyrah: This. I don’t think she’ll be able to shed enough of her 2008 staff to make a new path to the nomination.
She did a pretty good job as Secretary of State, and I have heard she was a pretty good Senator. BUT I don’t think she would make a good President.
Hillary Clinton is the Bob Dole of the Democratic Party.
may
Gillibrand, really?
Clinton has so much more to offer.
cvstoner
@dmsilev:
Indeed. The difference, however, is that Hillary can give as good as she gets.
Johnnybuck
@Original Lee: Even that staff would have cleaned McCain’s clock. Romney’s too.
Johnnybuck
@Ailuridae: You are delusional.
cleek
@cvstoner:
examples?
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@TheMightyTrowel:
Amy is both too provincial, and too conservative. I’d rather see Hillary run, and I’m no fan of Hillary.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@TheMightyTrowel:
Amy is both too provincial, and too conservative. I’d rather see Hillary run, and I’m no fan of Hillary.
Elie
I dunno… I like Hillary a lot but think her candidacy and if elected, her Presidency would be made immensely complicated by her husband who can’t keep his mouth shut and wants to be the center of attention. I am very happy to be wrong, but I don’t think this leapard can change his spots, and being that close to power for him is an aphrodisiac he can’t resist. We’ll see. I hope that most of the prep work she is doing is getting Big Dawg ready for a quiet role BEHIND her. We’ll see if he can even make it past the primaries without blowing up her campaign… I am not convinced, frankly.
The Moar You Know
She is not running. You can take that to the bank.
askew
@The Moar You Know:
If she isn’t running, then why are her close confidantes setting up Hillary PACs and giving quotes saying she’s running? A part of me thinks she won’t run, but I don’t want to get my hopes up.
Anybodybuther2016
@The Moar You Know: She won’t run unless her minions “clear the field” for her by intimidating any democrat that would dare challenge her highness. Despite the whitewashing done here on a regular basis of her record, Hilary doesn’t impress me as smart and SOS Kerry is putting the lie that she is a hard worker to the test. Kerry has accomplished more in a few months as SOS than Hilary did in in 5 years, so how is she smart and a hard worker when she has nothing to show for it?
artem1s
@Matt McIrvin:
gotta agree with this. we need politically aggressive and progressive Senators more than we need a politically aggressive Preznit. I don’t want Warren to run for the WH because she is capable of doing more good where she is. Once a politician occupies the WH, their political life is pretty much over except maybe foreign policy. Once they lose a campaign for the WH, they are effectively useless as far as setting policy because no one wants their name attached to anything. If you are a wingnut you can clean up on the Sunday morning gobbshite circuit but that’s about all. I don’t think EW cares about making lots of money speaking at thinktank conventions and that’s why I love her.
there are plenty of fresh faces who would better fit the role TV role of the presidency. I’d like and support a good progressive president but I want a functioning, aware Congress more.
Elie
@may:
Including endless melodrama and controversy that her husband will bring… seriously… there would be more palace intrigues than Marie Antoinette’s court.
I just watched an interview of Bill on Fareed Zacharia’s show and I just could see that his whole life is about being larger than life and IMPORTANT. As an ex-President behind his wife, — well, I just can’t see him being happy not being able to hold court and control things. Let me ask you this: do you think that Bill Clinton will let his wife be true President, or will he be running a separate focus of power within her administration, making all decisions uncertain about who really is behind things? Can you see her team and his team maybe not getting along and spending their time with a lot of internecine shit that will be a joyful pleasure for the Republicans and their press shills to exploit? I do. Definitely. And I am very afraid for what it would do to a progressive agenda most of all.
Elie
@artem1s:
I think your characterization of the Presidency as a “TV role” is terribly wrong —
My goodness.. does anyone know civics anymore or been paying any attention in the last 8 years? If it didn’t matter and was just a photo op, why wouldn’t Romney do just as well?
Geez
artem1s
@Elie:
there is running for President and being President.
I’m not saying that the job is all show, I’m saying that too many people grab onto the idea of a candidate who makes good show. Or at least their idea of good show. I love the idea of EW as the ideological leader of the party more than I believe that, as President, she would actually be able to use the bully pulpit any more than Obama did. The reality of Presidency just doesn’t work that way.
And I think a Senator can actually have more power and enact more policy and legislation than a President can. It does depend on the Senator but I’d rather have EW in the Senate for as long as she can hold the seat, than the, maybe, 4-5 years any President gets to craft legislation in an 8 year term. And the President needs good reps in Congress to make that happen.
do you really believe that this President wouldn’t have gotten hugely more done if the GOP had anything like actual legislators in Congress, instead of being the party of NO/crazy/wingnut/birther, et al?
I’m not saying the Presidency isn’t important, I’m saying putting all your eggs in the WH basket is a losing strategy if you really care more about good law than good looks. Look at what has happened on the state level in the mid west swing states, OH, MI, PA, IN, MI. They almost all voted for O in both elections but have crazy clown car governing at the state level. Doesn’t make a whit of difference to me if the President’s initiatives gets passed and Kasich and his pals in the state legislature won’t take the money. As much as I would love to see Sherrod Brown make a run at the WH, NE OH (and the Senate) can’t afford to lose him right now because we have too few actual legislators in Congress and at the state level.
and how does choosing to want EW in the Senate equal wanting Mitt in the WH?
Suzanne
@Jax6655:
Wow. You say that like that’s what I said.
I agree that BHO is a better politician than HRC. (I voted for him in the primaries over her because I believe he is better than she is.)
But that doesn’t obliterate the fact that black men reached some strata of society and political engagement before white women did. That indicates that sexism is still very potent in political life. FFS, I was supposed to vote Republican in 2008 because some total dumbass who had the same reproductive equipment as I do was on the ticket. Republicans at least understand why blacks don’t vote for them. But they literally think I’m that dumb.
Elie
@artem1s:
Got it. Thanks for the well thought out response..
Drexciya
@Suzanne
Did you really just say this? Can you think about this statement for a moment and retract it, please?
I find this whole thread unbelievable to the point of being surreal.
Jax6655
@Suzanne: Repubs neither understand nor care why AAs don’t vote for them. Plus Herman Cain was their man for a minute too remember? It’s not about you or white women, many of whom still like Palin. You make yourself and women too important in this.
They don’t give a flip about tea partiers either. They just want their country back.
Jax6655
@Drexciya: inorite?
sparrow
@Full Metal Wingnut: Because she’s almost the ONLY one willing to take on the banksters. And for my generation this is a huge, obvious, thing that a lot of “establishment” dems just gloss right over. Fuck the banks.
Elie
@sparrow:
You mean she’s the only one willing to TALK about doing it. Doing it and talking about doing it are not quite the same, though I give her the benefit of the doubt and am glad she is talking about it…
NCgumbo
@Jax6655 and @Drexciya I don’t understand what is controversial about Suzanne’s statement. Black men did receive the right to vote before white women. There were black S.C. justices before female ones.
Suzanne wasn’t saying there is no racism or that racism isn’t a horrible thing, but I think she has a legitimate point that sexism/misogyny is an equally problematic thing in our culture (especially since over 50% of the population is female). And pitting women and people of color against each other (especially as there is so much overlap between these groups!) is EXACTLY what the white, patriarchal power structure wants.
Drexciya
Wow.
Drexciya
@NCgumbo
Stop it. Please stop it. The proper response to not understanding something is to try to better understand it. Not to try and filter confident conclusions through half-conceived premises that are marked by their overreliance on superficial debating points. You’re talking about the lives of real people who operate under similarly real power dynamics. Act like it. Take it seriously. Learn. You’re not honestly engaging the topic when the brunt of your engagement ignores the actual, structurally enforced history of black masses by pointing to a minuscule amount who, by your logic, had some kind of political success. I’m not going to disprove your post. These aren’t facts that are open for debate or discussion. But I would like to appeal to your humanity.
Please, imagine for a second that your comments aren’t just wrong, but immoral. Imagine for a second that your placement in society means that by failing to get this right, you’re contributing to a collective dynamic that leads to the active, daily, disproportionate and particular victimization of black people. Imagine that when certain people process your statements, they’re not having a case of Someone’s Wrong On The Internet, or I’m Smarter Than You And I Know More, they’re hurt. Because they see evidence that someone with the power to affect their life is going out of their way to internalize narratives that threaten it. Imagine how strange it must feel to read your comments right after listening to and reading about this. Imagine how, by tethering yourself to superficial markers of “success,” you elide a structural reality and a structural disparity between black men and white women that’s replicated in wealth acquisition, educational status, societal placement, institutional responses and history. And when you’re done; when you have, for a moment, visualized the human dimensions, the human consequences and the human faces that get marginalized and dismissed when glib equivalences are made for cynically political reasons, empathize.
Please.
Jax6655
@Drexciya:
This. All. Of. This.
GumboNC
Sir, and I am assuming you are a sir, you have no idea how I feel and what I think. Guess what? I’m black. I’m a woman too. And recognizing the grotesque and immoral treatment of black people in this country doesn’t also mean we can’t recognize the grotesque and immoral treatment of women too (yes, particularly black women).
While there are a lot of advantages a white woman may have over a black man, there are also a lot of advantages a black man may have over a white woman- and like it or not you could have voted long before I could have. That is real history that affected real people too.
All I was saying in response to you piling on Suzanne was don’t let your hatred of racism blind you to the oppression of sexism. It has its own horrible legacy that continues today.
Women are vastly poorer than men. A woman’s greatest factor for violence in her life is whether she has a male intimate partner. Banks weren’t legally required to loan money to women until the 1970s. And the forced birth zealots are on the rise. All of these conditions are compounded by the evil of racism.
So please, stop the mansplaining. I know my history as well as you, I just don’t want to get into a more oppressed than thou competition.
Jax6655
@GumboNC: Says the “black woman” from the state where an unarmed black man was just shot by police after surviving a car crash on the word of a white woman.
When a black man can get an innocent white woman shot by police because he’s scared that’s when I’ll believe WW have it worse than black men.
FWIW I’m a Black woman
Drexciya
@GumboNC
This isn’t a “more oppressed than thou” competition and the utilization of that rhetoric advances nothing. My comment was a request that such comparisons be made with a mindfulness, a specificity about the dynamics involved and an empathy toward the people affected. I’m sorry for saying and implying that you’re white, but your presumed whiteness isn’t what motivated my response; it was your imprecise description of history and your similarly imprecise applications of the factual and structural dynamics that would motivate a negative reaction.
You say I could have voted long before you have, but the period directly before the VRA passed – which stands as the first piece of legislation to enforce the guarantee for black voting rights – was the period where the post-Birth of a Nation KKK waged a campaign of widespread lynching, intimidation and terrorism that successfully reversed the advances of a reconstruction that lasted for only a 11 years. It was when poll taxes were widely and successfully implemented only to apply to black people and barred them from voting. It was when the lack of federal enforcement combined with the south’s affirmation of white supremacy left black people segregated not just from economic society, but from meaningful political engagement. You’re not honestly trying to grapple with history if you’re ignoring that the period between Reconstruction’s end and the VRA was a period in which terrorism successfully prevented black access to voting rights.
And it’s particularly absurd that, in order to do this, you have to effectively lionize the comparative privilege of a demographic that the south systematically and successfully attempted to re-enslave in countless numbers by abusing the prison exception in the thirteenth amendment. A series of facts that have even more salience and a noticeable racially disparate effect when you consider that a variant of the same thing still goes on, with a powerful effect on meaningful suffrage.
In trying to replicate a color-blind binary to ask for a balanced view of privilege, you’re distorting history to pave over the dynamics that undermine your equivalence. The voting rights of black people have always been suspect and questioned, and they still are. And if you’re saying, as an absolute, that not only can black men can vote, but that the black male vote effectively symbolizes the triumph of black maleness over white womanhood or womanhood generally, you’re using both historical and individualized exceptions to ignore the ongoing pertinence and complications provided by a clear systemic dynamics. If you’re saying that black “firsts” (or, for that matter, black “only’s”) are capably representative of collective racial progress, then you’re willing to pretend that exceptions are sufficient for canceling out the collective victimization imposed by those systemic dynamics. These statements don’t serve to put history in perspective or facts in context, they only serve to propagandize and dismiss collective experiences as though rare, individualized exceptions can capably encompass them. Racism doesn’t work like that. Systems don’t work like that. Privilege doesn’t work like that. There’s absolutely no reason for us to.
Drexciya
There’s a longer post awaiting moderation, but I wanted to ask this separately to see how you’d answer.
Like what?
Which women and which men?
These questions compose the fulcrum of my objections, and the actual answers to them were strangely – one could say suspiciously – absent from efforts to draw a racial-gender comparison.
Drexciya
@Jax6655:
Seriously…
And please, if we’re going to talk about history, let’s stop pretending that white women using the protection of white men to execute black men lacks historical parallels. The whole black brute/savage/super-criminal stereotype was created with fabricated prospects of animalistic black male rape in mind, and American society has a tendency of responding accordingly to “address” that:
I guess one collective reaction to this could be “whoops!” Or we could try expanding and complicating overly simplistic discussions of privilege to incorporate the idea that those with closer proximity to it, those who can be birthed from, birth, marry and befriend its most consistent/powerful recipients probably have quite a bit more of it than those who’ve been historically and systemically excluded from American power.
NCgumbo
You know, I really debated whether to write back or not. But I thought why not try to engage. I’m sorry you don’t take my identity on faith. I’m not lying. I only said what I said originally because it felt to me like you two were ganging up on Suzanne. Guess it’s my turn.
We all know how shitty the racial politics are in this country. We all know many white women get the privilege of their powerful husbands transferred to them. We all know it is scary for young black men in many places in the USA today, not to mention in our recent and distant past.
But making the point that women also have a history of discrimination and repression (and yes, beatings and murder and rape at the hands of men) does not take away from the problems of race. Pointing out misogyny in our culture in a thread about the possibility of a woman being president doesn’t seem remotely out of place to me. I just can’t believe the vitriol you are laying on here.
God, I live this shit too. But I also know that we aren’t going to have any chance of an equal society as black people unless gender equality is addressed as well. I hate that the notion that “the only position for woman in the civil rights movement is prone” is still seen by too many men as A-OK even today. Why can’t we acknowledge and work on both pathologies?
Drexciya
I didn’t question your identity and I specifically apologized for any mistakes made. The apology was genuine. But I think your objections rest on a strawman and I think they do so while ignoring how particularly malicious the original comment was. Let me requote it:
This is historically and presently ridiculous to the point of offensiveness and it amplified a subtextual undercurrent that was already in the thread, and I was correct to take offense. You don’t have to undermine or disagree with the omnipresence of patriarchy to object to this remark, you simply have to look at the myriad of ways that the quoted text is socially, institutionally, economically, politically and practically untrue. I think you’re missing the specificity of my objections and my request by assuming that, by arguing for accuracy, I’m trying to argue in opposition to sexism. That’s incorrect. What I’m trying to do is to pushback against the notion – often fielded by whites – that you can use the reality of sexism to avoid, minimize, whitewash and reject the particular dangers that gender – masculinity included – present when merged with blackness. Those dangers are particular, they’re omnipresent, they’re real, and in cases that have very few comparative parallels, they’re fatal – and wholly backed by this nation’s legal and political framework.
In discussions where racial awareness is missing, or where whiteness is predominant, there’s often nothing to challenge those moments when possessors of white privilege try to use areas where they might be disadvantaged (gender, sexuality, etc) to draw an equivalence with race that doesn’t statistically or morally apply – and that statistically and morally changes when whiteness is removed. Now, you asked for understanding, and I’m going to assume your request was sincere. Do you see where I’m coming from and why your comments were contributing to and consistent with a dynamic that served to minimize the nature and impact of race – particularly blackness? There are implications to this stuff, and neutral discourse/analysis is rarely neutral. White supremacy asserts itself for white people, regardless of their political background, gender, sexuality or class.
If you want an intersectionally feminist analysis, I’d be more than willing to discuss how speculation about a female president exclusively focuses on the political prospects of white women and doesn’t even try to bring up and think about the complete dearth of POC women in Democratic political discussions and why their absence is so pronounced. But no one wants to have that discussion. They are willing to say that black men are politically better off than white women, though, regardless of how anti-factual such a statement would be. Why do you think that is?
mclaren
I’ll vote for Hillary and like it, even though she’s even more hawkish about burning brown babies than Obama or Dubya were, and even though Hillary has even less concern about the bottom 99% than Obama does.
Because, what’s the alternative? A real-life version of Atlas Shrugged? I mean, seriously.
GumboNC
Thank you for such a thoughtful response. I think your objections to the original comment are valid, and I would hope thAt Suzanne isn’t so naive as to believe that the granting ov voting rights in the constitution signaled any kind if parity between the overwhelming mass of blacks and whites.
I think you asked a good question above when pointing out which black men are more powerful than which white women, and vise-versa. Obviously much of that depends on the economic class of those involved. Some of it depends on geography. These intersections aren’t so neatly teased out.
I am sorry that I jumped to conclusions too, and read your original statements as somehow negating the reality of women’s lives lived under patriarchy in your exposition of black lives lived in a white-supremacist culture.
I don’t know if you are a man or not, but I know that I am perhaps on a hair trigger when it comes to men telling us that our experiences just don’t mean what we think they mean. After reading your considered responses, I don’t believe that is what you were trying to do, but it is what happens all too often.
It is interesting but when I talk with white women about this, they say the white men in their lives generally don’t see sexism as a huge problem. The black women I talk with say that is somewhat true with the men they know but that a lot of the ones who do acknowledge the problem also don’t want the women to make waves about it because they feel the racism is the primary problem and the only one worth working on.
There seem to be so few attempts within the past couple of decades to really look at questions of rave and gender and class questions together.
Suzanne
Exactly.
Exactly.
Exactly.
I said that sometimes racism is the dominant factor underlying American inequality. And sometimes it’s sexism. Sometimes it’s neither of those, actually. If it was ALWAYS racism, white women would have achieved some big societal milestones before black men. If it was always sexism, black men would make more money than white women. Evidence suggests that both are potent and ongoing.
But back to the topic at hand….should Hillary get the nomination, we will all have the pleasure of sitting around watching exactly how pervasive sexism still is. I’ll make the popcorn.