Hate Republican Obstruction? Love Bill Clinton!
Friend of the blog Jamelle Bouie disagrees with this denunciation of Bill Clinton from the left:
- In reading this post from Bruce Reed the other day offering advice to Obama and the Democrats, while trumpeting Bill Clinton’s political adjustments after the 1994 election, this thought kept occurring to me — has there ever been a less consequential two-term president in the history of the United States than Bill Clinton? Seriously, what did he accomplish in his eight years? A balanced budget. That’s something. There was prosperity on his watch — but how much of that was ephemeral and how much of it was Clinton’s doing? It seems to me that the neo-liberal policies that he embraced were not all that different from those of Reagan and Bush II — oh they were the free market with a human face of sorts, but by and large he helped foster the bubble economy.
One thing that hasn’t happened yet — but should — is that liberals who are noting that Republican obstructionism and the 60 vote Senate are the primary causes of a frustrating first year for Obama should become much more sympathetic to Bill Clinton. After all, Clinton was in much worse shape than Obama to pass any progressive legislation. He was elected with well under 50% of the popular vote and from 1994 to 2000 had to face Republican majorities in Congress. That he was able to do anything worthwhile — and balancing the budget was worthwhile — is remarkable. Now, there is room to complain about his priorities in office and whether NAFTA and welfare reform were really key components of any type of progressive or liberal agenda, but it seems impossible to say that the only reason that the Clinton administration didn’t produce the progressive results one might have wanted had much to do with Clinton himself.
Good points and congratulations on the link from Yglesias. I object very strongly to two words in your post “welfare reform.” You write that it was arguably not a “key component[] of any type of progressive or liberal agenda,”
For the sake of debate, I’ll scotch the “arguably” and interpret “one can complain” as meaning “it is true that.” Your praising welfare reform with faint damnation is still, to put it as politely as I can, batshit insane.
You do know that there are over 6,000,000 food stamps recipients in the USA with 0 cash income (nothing to live on but food stamps) don’t you ? I’d say that situation has a whole whole whole hell of a lot less than nothing to do with ” any type of progressive or liberal agenda,” It is also true that TANF enrollment has barely increased during the current recession and is about one third of peak AFDC enrollment.
Welfare reform caused and is causing immense human suffering. There are desperately desperately poor people in the USA (I define that as income less than half the poverty line) because the social safety net was destroyed by a bill signed into law by Clinton.
The perception that welfare reform was good policy or OK policy or not terrible policy is based entirely on the fact that, when it was enacted, the economy was booming. The poor did OK in the late 90s in spite of welfare reform. The non poor did very well. You can’t judge a policy looking only at events during an extraordinary boom. Look the US poor did very well indeed during the war in Vietnam, but it was terrible policy.
I assert that your reasoning is absolutely along the lines of admitting that the war in Vietnam was not a “key component[] of any type of progressive or liberal agenda.” I really mean that. Each consists of Evaluating a policy only by looking at what happened at the same time.
We can’t blame welfare reform on the filibuster. We can’t even blame it on the Republicans in congress. They did not have the votes to over ride a veto. Clinton decided not to veto a welfare reform bill. He condemned millions of people to horrible horrible poverty (as opposed to merely horrible poverty without welfare reform).
I also find it odd that you classify NAFTA along with welfare reform. I strongly support NAFTA and I don’t like hearing it associated with welfare reform. What was wrong with NAFTA ? I’d consider free trade to be a key component of any progressive or liberal agenda. That is because protection condemns third world workers to horrible horrible horrible poverty. The only case for protection is that it is needed to defend hereditary privilege (the advantage of being born a citizen of a first world country). No decent progressive or liberal can support any such thing. Instead people who want to unite the forces of egalitarians and selfish racists who want to keep the third world poor convince themselves that trade is bad for the third world.
Now, in general, I absolutely agree with your excellent post. It is simply insane to act as if Clinton ran the country when he was President. It is especially insane to act as if he ran the country when the only power he had was the veto. However, he did not use the veto when any decent person would have done so. That’s a fact and the only excuse would have been that there were 67 senators willing to over ride a veto (there weren’t 60 senators willing to vote for cloture it passed under reconciliation).
Robert Waldmann
January 29, 2010 at 5:11 pm
[...] Sympathy for the Clinton [...]
Matthew Yglesias » Endgame
January 29, 2010 at 5:12 pm
A balanced budget (and eventually a surplus) was one accomplishment. Though liberals can’t admit it, the (in their minds draconian) 1994 crime bill led to a precipitous decline in crime rates that continues to this day. Prosperity of the kind that was enjoyed on Clinton’s watch doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Clinton played small ball, passing less ambitious but still consequential legislation that greatly benefited the country, helped redeem (in the eyes of the voters) an utterly discredited Democratic Party and he kept the Idiot Right from enabling their agenda. Liberals who criticize Clinton are fools. Clinton was the best thing to happen to Liberalism in decades.
Nathan
January 29, 2010 at 5:46 pm
As I noted to Jamelle, I don’t think that the man who pledged to end welfare as we know it and pronounced the era of big government to be over should be held up as the man who paved the way to expand the welfare state. I really don’t get that.
Don’t get me wrong. Clinton had his virtues, but he didn’t really push a left agenda. I understand that the Republicans were incredibly bloody minded in dealing with him, but he did very little to change the terms of the debate in a substantial way. He played great defense — and drove the repukes insane in the process — but I don’t think he advanced our cause much at all.
I don’t quite know what to think about the Clinton economic record. It was awfully impressive while it lasted, but so much of it turned to shit when he left — and I don’t think all of that can be laid at Bush’s feet. Glass-Steagall repeal, the unleashing of Wall Street, the unbelievable stock bubble, NAFTA, Greenspan worship, the culture of day trading — he wasn’t exactly the second coming of Emma Goldman.
In the end there isn’t that much of a legacy. At most one can claim he laid the groundwork to restoring Democratic Party legitimacy with the middle class — and that’s not nothing. Same with the surplus. But it still doesn’t strike me as much to show for eight years.
Sir Charles
January 29, 2010 at 6:34 pm