(FAIR founder) Jeff Cohen: Hillary Rolls On - Are Netroots a Paper Tiger?

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

Perfect reminder of the Clinton 90s in this one
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Published on Tuesday, September 4, 2007 by CommonDreams.org
Hillary Rolls On: Are Netroots a Paper Tiger?
by Jeff Cohen

<...>
Several factors may explain why most Netroots leaders are not taking stronger action:
1) They “misunderestimate” the potential hazards of another Clinton White House.
While progressives desperately want a Democratic president, the last Clinton in the White House subverted the progressive agenda. Eight years of Clintonite triangulation caused the Democratic Party to decline at every level of government. Hillary today is surrounded by the same staff and would likely appoint the same corporate types to top jobs as Clinton I, where big decisions were often corrupt and calculated toward moneyed interests.
The toughest brawl Bill Clinton was willing to wage (besides saving his own hide from impeachment) was against the Democratic base: for the corporate-backed NAFTA. Through the 1996 Telecommunications Act, Bill brought us far more media conglomeration than George W. He pardoned well-connected fugitive financier Marc Rich, while leaving Native American activist Leonard Peltier to rot in prison despite pleas from Amnesty International and others.
Hillary’s contribution to Clinton I was her botched healthcare proposal, a corporate-originated “reform” that would have enshrined a half-dozen of the largest insurance companies at the center of the system, and was so convoluted it never came up for a vote.
What we’ve seen of Hillary Clinton in the Senate and on the campaign trail suggests that Clinton II would indeed be a sorry sequel. Today she’s winning the endorsement of Republican CEOs, after having had Murdoch host a benefit for her at the Fox News building in 2006. Just as Bill Clinton’s spine achieved a rare firmness while battling for NAFTA, we recently observed in Hillary a rare passion and firmness on a single issue: her YearlyKos defense of lobbyists, including those who “represent corporations that employ a lot of people.”
more:
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/09/04/3610/

[MannyGoldstein]

1. Know What I'm Going To Do?

About two weeks before the NH primary, I'm gonna grab all of my buddies and we'll plaster the major cities in NH with "The Truth About Clinton" posters.

The problem is that people aren't aware of just how awful she is. When I talk to someone who is "OK" with Hillary (I've only met one actual supporter, ever), I go through her votes, and those people get ANGRY. They are no longer OK with Clinton.

[KoKo]

3. But...we have to remember that so many of us are still reacting to having to defend Bill

on the Dem side that many didn't really take time to examine what we Dems Lost in his two-term Presidency. The RW went after him so strong that we were caught up in a "constant defense mode" and many Dems never could get out of it. Others are Lazy and figure under Clinton life was better not realizing that he was the "tipping point" to the HELL...HELL we Dems and All Americans have lived under with Bush and are still living under.

It's only the dedicated and those who were so horrified with the stealing of election from Gore that spent the time to educate ourselves. In hindsight, the Clintons do not look very good...for policy. Whether they were blackmailed to allow such terrible legislation as NAFTA, loosening of the SEC Regulations leading to Dot Com Bust and forerunner of Mortgage Crisis (which Bush II of course further eroded) and the FCC Deregulations allowing Murdoch and Fox to reign along with the other conglomerates and the Welfare Reform throwing so many into poverty.... The few good things like COBRA for the unemplouyed and AmeriCorps have all blown away in the Clinton legacy of his Monica Gate Scandal and weakness to challenge the very people who trashed his Presidency. Like Carter...he didn't see it coming from the Repug Attack Machine in place and never seemed to know what hit him...like our current Dem House and Senate who seem to be living in another Century where parliamentary rules and commity and graciousness are supposed to defeat the fire breathing well funded hungry dragons read to kill.

[liberaldemocrat7]

5. YES!! a paper tiger. What a coincidence that I call Moveon a paper tiger

because it hasn't gotten much past the Republicans in the last 7 years and now Jeff Cohen calls the netroots a paper tiger.

By the way, the new incarnation of buyblue.org might act a lot more partisan with action campaigns.

[jgraz]

2. K&R -- Cohen nails it again

What's the use of having a progressive net presence if we can't even keep Hillary's claws off the White House?

[Cha]

6. It's not over yet..

Just because she has the postoffice snockered.

[BeyondGeography]

4. Great piece

Netroots "hero" Kos votes "no freakin' clue,"...proof that hasn't got one when it comes to 2008.