Here's what I have to say to the Clinton haters,

[Ironpost]

stop for a moment and give some thought to where you would be now if ghwb had won his second term. Scary isn't it.

[BrklynLiberal]

1. Excellent point.

[Cuban_Liberal]

2. Excellent point.

:thumbsup:

[cheezus]

3. well, w probably wouldn't be president

[ulysses]

4. and think where we'd be

if BC hadn't decided to govern from the center-right.

[Ironpost]

5. At least he had our best interest at heart, irregardless of where

governed from. The best President I've ever had and I'm a 1948 model.

[ulysses]

7. NAFTA and welfare reform

are not examples of having our best interests at heart.

[Ironpost]

10. Every body makes mistakes, I'm sure you do also.

AT least he tried to make our world better simple as that.

[ulysses]

12. indeed I do.

But those were policy goals for Clinton, not "oops" moments. And no, it's not as simple as that.

[Terran1212]

15. Clinton had falling out with liberals but

Things like his Iraq policy, and NAFTA, welfare reform, "Defense of Marriage," made Clinton an opponent of liberals many times during his presidency, but he was in no way the far-right puppet like Mr. Bush.

[ulysses]

16. that's the kind of thinking

that keeps us tied to the fuckers at the DLC. "Sure, he hurt workers, poor people and gays, but at least he's not as bad as *those* people over there! Boo!"

Tired of that.

[lastliberalintexas]

6. Gosh, you're so right

NAFTA would never have been signed into law, the Telecommunications Act of 1996 would not have been passed, a toothless FMLA would not be showcased as the savior of the middle class, and welfare "reform" never would have happened. Oh, wait... :eyes:


Clinton is not nearly as bad as the right wingers in power today, but he wasn't even close to being great. At least not great on the issues- the man had/has charisma. But what good does charisma do you if it means the working/middle class and poor get sold down the river and the party loses control of everything at the federal government? :shrug:

[Ironpost]

8. And the reason why we lost control of everthing at the federal

goverment is because so many Democrats listened to the repukes tearing the good man down. No one is perfect. His good far outweighs the bad no matter what you may think.

[lastliberalintexas]

13. NAFTA alone is enough

for me to want to kick him from the party. You're entitled to your own opinion, as am I. And I am not really a "Clinton hater", so much as one who was extremely disappointed in him (and his wife) by the end of his 1st term.

[iconoclastNYC]

21. Those things might have been passed under the next Republican

But he wouldn't have pissed off the activist base who voted Green instead of Al Gore

[Ironpost]

24. The next republican was this idiots dad for crying out loud.

We sure wouldn't have had the good times we had with Clinton. I'm sure the body count would have made Viet Namn look like a cake walk. It would've been the same bunch of crooks as now. Shit fire and save the matches.

[RBHam]

9. Jesus Christ

Look what you started...

FORWARD, GENTLEMEN! The only thing you'll find behind you is your ass!

[supernova]

11. LOL!

:rofl:

I agree with you RBHam. It's done. It's overwith. It's what we got. No amount of fretting about it now is gonna change a damn thing.

[Ironpost]

14. A shit storm, I tell you. I'll defend the man as long as I am breathing

I don't mean to be ugly but my patience is wearing thin on the Clinton bashing thats all.

[Lindacooks]

17. "I'll defend the man as long as I am breathing"

Me too. I miss having a President who can form a coherent statement (let alone a sentence), who genuinely cares about people, and who isn't a xenophobic war monger.

And every time I hear a joke about President Clinton, I get angry. With all the damage chimpy has caused, all the impeachable offenses he has committed, all the lies he has told, all the people he has hurt and killed, there is NO excuse for dissing President Clinton. NONE.

[Ironpost]

18. Yes.

[MadHound]

23. Perhap you should reconsider then friend,

And realize that you are defending the indefensible.

NAFTA, welfare "reform", '96 Telecom Act, don't ask, don't tell, his health care bomb, the list of his truly illiberal programs is a long one, and nobody brought it upon his head but himself. The man really was a corporate Republican in all but name only.

The economy? Hell, the man opened the floodgates for outsourceing. Under his watch, the gap between the obscenely rich and the rest of us opened into a chasm, breaking all of the records set in the first Gilded Age, back when robber barons ruled the roost.

As for progressive and liberal issues, the man paid nothing but lip service to them, opting for style over substance. And many have speculated that the reason why he was so villified by the right in this country is because he was threatening the Republicans by saying he was a Democrat, yet governing from the right.

Under Clinton's watch the median family income for middle class families went down, even in midst of a so called economic boom. Meanwhile, the official poverty rate held at 14.5%, a higher rate than all but three of the Reagan/Bush years.

Sorry friend, but history will judge Clinton as simply another corporate whore, putting the interests of his corporate masters ahead of the good of the people.

[Ironpost]

25. So I suppose the few bad decision far out weigh the many goods.

I don't buy that. History will show Bill Clinton to be one if not the best President we ever had irregardless of his few shortcomings. On a lighter note he likes women and I like that.

[MadHound]

26. What are the good decisions?

People keep mentioning this, but really now, what were the good decisions? That the markets shot up? Hell, the dot com boom would have probably happened not matter who was in the Oval Office, since it was a matter of maturing tech forces, not political ones. Besides, who did that really benefit besides the rich few? For most of the middle class it was a wash at best, since while their portfolio was going up, the median household income went down. And it is obvious that it didn't help the poor, since the poverty rate stayed at 14.5%, and this during a supposed economic boom. And then Clinton really lowered the boom on the poor with welfare "reform".

His social record is also sad. Gay rights? Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Abortion rights? Clinton allowed states to refuse Medicaid funding of abortion and did not attempt to repeal the Hyde Amendment—while the number of abortion clinics declined, especially in rural areas. Civil rights? Clinton racheted up the War on Drugs, shredding the Constitution in the process.

And yet you continue to delude yourself, thinking that history will judge this man "to be one if not the best President we ever had. . ."?
That's laughable, especially when you consider that men like FDR did more to help this country in his first hundred days than Clinton did in his entire eight years.

Sorry, but the verdict remains, Clinton was more interested in serving the good of his corporate masters than he was in serving the good of the people. He was a charismatic man who paid lip service to progressive ideals while selling this country down the river for that filthy corporate lucre, and apparently fooling a lot of otherwise intelligent people along the way.

[lastliberalintexas]

27. So why don't you list his good acts/decisions?

Mostly all I see from the "Clinton defenders" is vague language claiming he did so much good that his few bad acts should be ignored and the liberals among us should just sit down and stop criticizing the man.

Well, several of us "Clinton haters" on this thread have posted very specific instances/issues on which we disagreed with Clinton. So what were the good things about his administrations? Specific language, please. :)


And pet peeve/grammar Nazi alert: "irregardless" is not a word. Just saying. :)

[Ironpost]

28. I just printed off a post the other day that was 6 full pages. for criss

sakes. By the way it was posted on sat. 02 05 at 2:16 am. by Scooter24... Spelling never was my strongest asset.

[MadHound]

31. Well then, provide a link please

And we're asking for YOUR list, not something posted somewhere, sometime, in the wee hours of the AM.

C'mon friend, if Clinton was as great as you're claiming he is, this should be a snap. Hell, I'm rattling the points I'm posting from the top of my head, working from memory on Census Bureau reports, labor stats etc. If his good actions outnumber his bad by the margin you claim, you should easily be able to do the same. In fact it should be glaringly obvious, but gee, somehow it isn't now. Now why's that:eyes:

[TabulaRasa]

19. I think it's possible, maybe even probable

that we would have been much better off. It's one of the few elections I can think of where a Republican winning might have been better for the country in the long run. George HW Bush would have basically followed Clinton's policies ... welfare reform, NAFTA, balanced budgets, and GHWB was such an incompetent politician, he probably would have fucked up the Republican party for years to come, much like Clinton has fucked the Democratic party for years to come. They continue to labor under the myth that being mealy-mouthed pansies is the way to win elections. Clinton won due to his own charisma, and the fact that he ran against 2 charisma vacuums. Instead of finding charismatic candidates with conviction, the Democratic party has chosen the mealy-mouthed pansy approach, which Clinton honed into an art. He just had the charisma to back it up. Gore and Kerry did not. Though it's also possible GHWB would have helped his party by associating it with a good economy that was bound to happen with or without Clinton. Counterfactuals are very difficult to play with.

[merh]

20. Stop and think where you would be right now if big dawg had

1. Not gotten a blow job in the WH oval office "because he could" (his words, not mine.

2. If he had backed the renewal of the fairness doctrine.

[Terran1212]

22. I like a president who is man enough to get a blow job in the oval office

Really...

[Q]

29. It's too bad that you have to stoop to the level...

...of accusing those who disagree with Clinton as 'hating' him. The rhetoric from the 'center' is getting just as shrill as that from the fundie right. Remember them...they're the ones that say we HATE Bush because we don't like that he's destroying America.

I defended Clinton for the eight years of the RWing witch hunt against him. But what I don't understand is why we're expected to 'worship' him like the GOPers worship Reagan. Both are mere politicians unworthy of that kind of adoration.

What's 'scary' is the way that many Dems still believe that the Clintonian politics of compromise and 'triangulation' should be used against extremism of the New Fascist Right.

[Ironpost]

30. You're right I should never have used the word hate. My bad

Actually Hate is foreign to me.

[Q]

32. The Age of Clinton is over...

...and now we must use a new type of politics against the most extreme opponent we've ever faced. This nation is on the verge of being taken over by fanatics who want to replace the Constitution with 'God's law' and our courts with RWing cronies. We no longer have a working justice or voting system and the wall that used to separate church and state has been torn down by theocrats.

There is much more at stake than simply winning elections. At stake is our very democracy. We can no longer afford to follow Clinton's 'third way' politics against an 'enemy' that refuses to share power or compromise.

[veteran_for_peace]

33. I didn't like Clinton

I didn't like Bill Clinton because I thought that he lost his progressive roots. He could have been a great president had he not sold out to the corporate interest. I know that I will probably get flamed for this one. I want a democrat who will be a democrat. Someone who has the courage to stand up for the people. Like Paul Wellstone or Dennis Kucinich.

[oasis]

34. Bill Clinton gets nothing but high marks from this Democrat. What kind of

support did the "Democratic base" give Democrats in the 1994 mid-term elections? IMHO, Newt came to power because Dems got lazy and didn't turnout at the polls. Clinton realized that he had to move slightly to the right in order to hold on to the White House.

[Q]

35. But I guess Clinton DIDN'T realize that his 'slight' move to the right...

...opened the door for George?

[oasis]

36. Gore "opened the door for George" by distancing himself from Clinton.

[Lindacooks]

39. Yep, you're right.

Gore should never have distanced himself from Clinton - that was really his big mistake.

[Catherine Vincent]

37. I agree 100%!

And I remember you from the other thread. I admire your defense of Clinton. But just so you'll know, I'm his number 1 fan here on DU.:-)

[oasis]

38. "Number 1 fan on DU"????? Say, howzabout sharing that title with me?

:-)

[Ironpost]

40. That makes a couple of us.

What a shit storm, Damn, I hope bruises are lethal.

[theboss]

41. To me, the tech boom defines Clinton's presidency

And I don't really know what role - if any - he played in that.

I do think his first budget act set up the federal government to reap many benefits from that boom, which led to the balanced budget. But again, I don't know if that is being lucky or good.

I do think that he moved the Democrats so far to the right with NAFTA and Welfare Reform, that the Republicans won a long-term victory. Now, "Rockefeller Republicans" are the centrists in the political discussion.

And, the 1994 election is going to haunt us for God knows how long. And I lay that debacle completely at Clinton's feet.

[ArkDem]

42. Bush, Bush Lite.....What's the difference?

[Placebo]

43. Someone had to say it.

:thumbsup:

[oasis]

44. Sadly, good enough just isn't good enough for many on the left. "If you

can't cure the ills of the world overnight then you ain't worth a damn". :eyes: