HIllary Clinton’s campaign sells her as a competent administrator. But she doesn’t offer any substantial policy changes that would improve Americans’ lives. All she really promises is to try to protect the status quo.
Where Hope Goes to Die
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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First. Sanders, based on the polls alone, is going to lose by about 12%. In history class, the phrase is “Pyrrhic victory.” Clinton winning by 12%? I’ll make my bet right now. If Clinton wins New York by a scant 12%, she will lose the general election. The entire Clinton campaign has been like something run by a batch of simpletons.
Question: She’s lost how many earned delegates because the people who were supposed to show up for the second round of voting didn’t do so? I leave it to the uber-politcos here to delve further. Does this happen a lot to candidates? I don’t recall it happening in Bush/Gore or Obama/McCain. It sure isn’t happening with Sanders.
Second. I’ve tried to ask this before. And, well, who knew the Internet could be so cruel. So here goes.
Question: What has HRC actually done that had a real-world impact that she can hold up as an example of getting it right? I recall she was involved in a program to get cook stoves to India. Here’s the results of that: the stoves made no significant difference. The program was one of those “private-public” things involving Shell and Morgan Stanley. From my read of it, the companies saw it as a way to get another foothold in a developing market, make some connections so that they’d be first in line at the trough when something really good came along. Turns out people who are poor can’t afford to keep stoves running properly because they’re simply too expensive. And no one thought of that beforehand? “How will these really poor people PAY for this on their end?” What kind of administrator doesn’t factor that in during the planning stage?
The successful ones.
What has Hillary done?
Secretary Clinton is very well read. She knew that the 9/11 hijackers were from a small strain of jihadist Islam, and, once eradicated, the world would be safe. Bush, jr named the 5 terrorist leaders that follow that single, jihadist sect of Islam: the Taliban of Afghanistan, Saddam’s evil government of Iraq, the Ayatollahs of Iran, the Syrian dictator, and Kim of North Korea, and she strongly supported the effort that liberated Afghanistan and Iraq from jihadist dictators and made both peaceful, prosperous, Democratic and free. Thomas Friedman (and many other US and UK reporters) have interviewed many, many Iraqis, and all say that they are very, very grateful to the US for turning their country from a terrible, impoverished tyranny into paradise. Of course, all those Friedman interviewed were in the Green Zone, but that was reasonable, since, as the new rulers, those were the only reliable Iraqi witnesses to what happened.
And, after Obama discovered the sixth member of the Axis of Evil, namely Libya, Clinton forced Obama to do the right thing: ‘We came, we saw, he died,’ and she is so proud, and all the Libyans are eternally grateful, since she turned their poor, tyrannical state into a peaceful, prosperous Democracy. Europe also has much to be grateful for, since Libya is now peaceful, so no one taking a boat from Libya can claim refugee status, and all can be immediately deported back to Libya. Before Clinton, the tyrant forced free health care on all Libyans, but now they have their freedom, so no one gets any health care and everyone has to pay for insurance policies that cover nothing, which is what every decent nation does.
Based on her excellent track record, I predict that Syria will be liberated before summer, 2017, and will be just as peaceful and prosperous as Iraq and Libya are now. Then she’ll fix the Iranian Ayatollahs, boot Putin out of the Ukraine (including the Crimea) and she’ll get China out of the East and South China sea.
And the world will then be very, very peaceful.
And I think it’s great that she’s almost certain to be the next president. I’ve thought that ever since the day when I “woke from troubled dreams”, and found myself “transformed … into a horrible vermin.”
(All of us vermin will be very happy when there’s no one around to step on us.)
I saw a great bumper sticker, “America. Be nice to us or we’ll bring democracy to your country”
Ted – Your cartoon says it all – voting for Hillary is like choosing to buy a cheap , frozen TV dinner – don’t expect much and don’t be surprised if there is something wrong with it.
> All she really promises is to try to protect the status quo.
Well, I suppose that *is* better than a GOPrano who promises to try to increase the economic injustice even further.
Disclaimer: We’re discussing “promise”, here. Not “what they would actually do once in office”
«HIllary Clinton’s campaign sells her as a competent administrator.» But what evidence can be adduced to show Ms Clinton’s competence ? Did the US State Department become a model of competence and proficiency under her tenure there (the only administrative post in the public domain Ms Clinton has held, as far as I know) ? From what I have read, its power and influence lessened still more in favour of that of the Pentagon – given Ms Clinton’s well-known chicken-hawk tendencies, hardly a surprise….
Perhaps one should compare Ms Clinton’s record at the US State Department with that of Mr Sanders as an administrator during his four consecutive terms as mayor of Burlington, Vermont (1981 – 89). From what I understand he, together with members of the Progressive Coalition, managed to get quite a few (good) things done, among others Burlington becoming the first city in the United States to fund Community Trust Housing….
The operative word in the sentence I cite above is the verb «sells». Caveat emptor !…
Henri