If Hillary Wins

[Avalon Sparks]

So we all know Hillary has taken large contributions, and sometimes personal contributions from Wall Street, Health Insurance Companies, Big Pharm, Defense Industry, and the Oil & Gas industries. It's well known, and she's been transparent about it.

When she pushes for legislation in our best interest, for example "Ban on Fracking" do you think her Big Industry donors will be be pissed about it? I would be.

Makes me wonderful if they'll give her those large sums of money again, when she runs for a second term. What do you think?

[SFnomad]

1. Why is anybody even starting to talk about the 2020 race yet? n/t

[Avalon Sparks]

6. She's making a lot of promises to the people...

I'm just thinking ahead...

Basically wondering what her big backers are gonna do when the things she fights for legislation that will hurt their bottom line.

Not that I mind it she gives it to them, Busta.

[strategery blunder]

2. She'll pander just long enough to get our votes in the GE

And then sign anything that her "campaign contributors" lobbied Congress to pass, while maybe occasionally deigning to throw out a crumb to us here and there in the hopes of avoiding an embarrassing 1980-style primary.

[bjo59]

3. I think that it's one thing to say something and it's another thing to do something.

I take what she now says with regard to fracking with a grain of salt. I think the oil industry knows that when government representatives and appointees take its money, campaign promises are neither here nor there.

[CentralMass]

4. It is a leap of faith the she would push such legislation.

[Avalon Sparks]

5. Hi Central!

Hillary said she would ban fracking, right?

I live close to Denton, Texas, are air here is horrible with all the fracking. And we have earthquakes too.

[CentralMass]

25. I'm no fan of fracking. I just have my doubts that Hillary would

Push for legislation that would hurt that industries profits.

[JackRiddler]

35. HRC has never to my knowledge said she would ban fracking.

In the Michigan debate she did a lot of double-talk that requires some translation, but no, she does not oppose it.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

7. They're realists. Investors who expect a return from the products they invest in.

They hold a lot of I.O.U.s from Hillary.

[Avalon Sparks]

8. She's between a rock and a hard place then....

Either throw them under the bus or throw the people who voted for her based on what she's saying now. Maybe she'll give a little to them and a little to us.... A win / win, how nice

[Buzz cook]

9. Obama lost a bunch of big money donors before 2012

And more showed up to take their place. I hope Clinton learned a lesson from that.

[SheilaT]

10. If she wins,

look forward to a cut in Social Security, especially if you are under age 50.

Happily anticipate reductions in Medicare. Be pleased to pay higher taxes to support our wars, which will increase at a nearly exponential rate.

Listen with enthusiasm to why those cuts are necessary, why college will cost more than ever, why minimum wage needs to be cut back to $5/hour.

Oh, the brave new world of the second Clinton Presidency!

Please don't think I need the sarcasm thingy.

[Avalon Sparks]

11. She says she will increase min wage.

So Hillary is really honorable, she won't screw over her backers, and that means she will......


OMG. !

[SheilaT]

15. Given how she's changed her positions on so many things,

not to mention given that she only supports a $12/hour minimum wage . . .

[Fumesucker]

17. I see you have gotten into the spirit of the New DU with a vengeance

[kristopher]

13. She won't be able to help it though.

"It's the fault of those damned Republican's in Congress", not only Hillary but any establishment candidate would claim.

But, when both sides of the aisle are working towards the same goal of corporate socialism, those goals are what become policy.

...our analyses suggest that majorities of the American public actually have little influence over the policies our government adopts. Americans do enjoy many features central to democratic governance, such as regular elections, freedom of speech and association, and a wide-spread (if still contested) franchise. But we believe that if policymaking is dominated by powerful business organizations and a small number of affluent Americans, then America’s claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened.


https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf

[Avalon Sparks]

14. Hey thanks!

I've been looking for the Princeton study link!

[kristopher]

12. Major study: "majorities ... public ... little influence ... policies ... government"

I think the answer is well researched and statistically established.

Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens
Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page

ABSTRACTEach of four theoretical traditions in the study of American politics—which can be characterized as theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy, Economic-Elite Domination, and two types of interest-group pluralism, Majoritarian Pluralism and Biased Pluralism—offers different predictions about which sets of actors have how much influence over public policy: average citizens; economic elites; and organized interest groups, mass-based or business-oriented.
A great deal of empirical research speaks to the policy influence of one or another set of actors, but until recently it has not been possible to test these contrasting theoretical predictions against each other within a single statistical model. We report on an effort to do so, using a unique data set that includes measures of the key variables for 1,779 policy issues.
Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence. The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.

The last paragraph of their findings:

Despite the seemingly strong empirical support in previous studies for theories of majoritarian democracy, our analyses suggest that majorities of the American public actually have little influence over the policies our government adopts. Americans do enjoy many features central to democratic governance, such as regular elections, freedom of speech and association, and a wide-spread (if still contested) franchise. But we believe that if policymaking is dominated by powerful business organizations and a small number of affluent Americans, then America’s claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened.

https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf

"...America’s claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened."

[ZombieHorde]

16. Your post helps to confirm my biases.

Thanks for posting this study.

[djean111]

18. You should, really, just consider anything Hillary says she will do as "campaign blather".

There is not a chance in hell that she would really introduce legislation that would upset her donors, unless it was with the certain knowledge that it would not pass.

Be really really scared of whatever the GOP cooperates with Hillary on, though - those things will be Third Way Neocon items.

And if she were in a position to run for a second term, she would just "campaign blather" again.

[hobbit709]

19. the corporations win.

[MisterP]

20. she'll have won on naked lies about Sanders, millions from the people wrecking the country

and corrupting its politics, openly denying her own atrocious record, and getting the voters to turn a blind eye to all of this in the name of sitting down and shutting up and agreeing to not be represented for another 4-8 years

[VulgarPoet]

21. If Hillary wins, it won't be with my vote. I could give a tinker's damn what she does.

Outright attacking someone who isn't even in the race and then having the undying nerve to hold Sanders in an ultimatum to basically kiss her ass or she won't do anymore debates-- fuck that. I was willing to point out her policies that made her a no-go in my eyes, but now I just think she's a reprehensible human being who is unworthy of anything resembling respect from yours truly.

[Motown_Johnny]

22. She will do the bidding of the elites and expect the rest of us to support her

because "at least she isn't a Republican". Exactly the same strategy that is being used to try and get Progressives to support her now.

Nothing is going to change as far as her approach goes. Screw the little guy and remind them that they could be getting screwed even worse.

[geek tragedy]

23. wall street regretted their donations to Obama in 2008 nt

[Avalon Sparks]

24. I thought that was the case....I haven't researched about Obama...

So, I guess it's a wait and see, if she gets it. I woke up to the issue with influence money and corruption, after I became one of the Compliance Officers at a large company 8 years ago.
Until then it wasn't something I really thought about.

The money for speeches really bugs me, but there are some CO's that I work with that don't see it as an issue.....others do. Hard to dig much deeper cause don't want to talk politics with my colleagues. I'm having a hard time getting past it....

Most don't take the speech money until they are out of office......

Her spouse accepting things of value while she was SOS is also concerning to me....

[onecaliberal]

26. She isn't going to "ban fracking" or do anything else her coporate owners don't approve of.

[highprincipleswork]

27. I couldn't care less. She probably would not go after them anyway.

And Bernie has already shown that plenty can be raised in other ways.

Who is going to fight Climate Change, like the end of the world scenario it is quickly becoming?
Who is going to really fight for some kind of economic prosperity for all Americans, not just the few?
Who is going to keep us from our usual interventionist ways in too much war?
Who is really going to be steadfast in fighting racial injustice?

I know my answer, and I remain confident (through his actions and words over so many years) that he will remain true to all these causes

[floriduck]

28. I don't think she'll even get one term in.

She'll lose and that's why I support Bernie. His numbers against all GOPers is better than Clintons. Why vote for a loser and then complain because she was a flawed candidate?

[delrem]

29. Hillary has been honest: totally PNAC, pro war. Pro private health insurance. Pro fracking.

In support of regime change in once (shakily) democratic Honduras.

The list goes all the way down her schedule of payola and graft, never missing a beat. Not once missing a beat.
She won't change that tune if elected POTUS! No way!

The only people being dishonest are those of her supporters who've been claiming that none of that is true. That she's not a neocon responsible for the Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc. wars and the slaughter of over a million Arabs, and that she's not responsible for the fat war profits that serve her paymasters as reason for slipping her millions of private cash. That she's not pro private health insurance first and forever, but is "incrementally" for some indescribable universal plan. That she's not pro fracking but is some kind of secret environmentalist. etc etc.

Oh I know, she's hardly the only one. But she and her husband sure the hell have been the LEADERS of that full-tilt boogie to the extreme right.

If she wins, SHE WILL DO THE JOB SHE'S BEEN PAID FOR.
There will be hundreds of thousands if not millions more slaughtered.
The cluster bombs that she favors will be dropped on more hospitals and schools, and it won't be any accident.
The fat war profits will be raked in. "It's the US economy, stupid!"
(But who cares about Arabs, right? It's like who cared about the "gooks" that the US was "liberating" in Vietnam and Cambodia. Answer: very very few.)
Investment capital will get further deregulated, the deregulated freedom enacted in "free trade agreements" focused entirely on empowering that sector at the expense of all others.

Moreover, her extreme right-wing politics will be further entrenched in the Democratic party, mirroring the Republican party, and the extreme right will be very very happy indeed.

[Avalon Sparks]

30. Hi Delrem

Why do you think her DU supporters won't admit that? I can understand people that don't know much about politics, but DU folks are at least somewhat informed I would think.

And thank you for the assessment, I agree with much of what you said

[delrem]

31. #1: because Barack Obama appointed her as SoS.

That is her entire credibility, so to criticize her is to criticize Barack Obama.

For my part, I have a lot of reasons for liking Obama's administration, none of which owe to Hillary Clinton.
I think he did better when rid of her. His second administration was shining and I'm overall happy with it.

[Avalon Sparks]

32. Hadn't thought of that, good point

I agree he did better w/o her.

[delrem]

33. Not happy with the TPP. But that's an universal complaint...

[Avalon Sparks]

34. Me too....

Great minds...