The other side of not liking Clinton

[WilliamPitt]

The Mission
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t | Perspective

Friday 10 October 2003

http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/101003A.shtml

"The right-wing politics that had forced the scandal were alien and unknown to much of the White House senior staff. To them, what the right was doing seemed so far-fetched, so impossibly convoluted, that they couldn't quite credit it. The self-enclosed hothouse nature of the right-wing world made it difficult to explain what was going on to those who lacked contact with it. Many had never even heard of people like Scaife."

- Sidney Blumenthal, 'The Clinton Wars'

I am writing this essay from an internet cafe nestled in a blue-collar neighborhood in Berlin, Germany. I have been, in the last week, to Amsterdam, Antwerp and The Hague. I will go from here to London, Oxford and Paris. I have been giving talks to ex-pat American groups and large crowds of confused Europeans. The Europeans are not confused because they are ill-informed; they are, in fact, far more aware of what is happening in America than most Americans are back home. These Europeans know all about the Project for The New American Century, they know all about the Office of Special Plans, they know all about the lies that have been spoon-fed to America and the world. They know all of this, simply, because the news media in Europe is not owned and operated as an advertising wing for General Electric, AOL/TimeWarner, Viacom, Disney or Ruppert Murdoch.

What these Europeans don't understand, and what they keep asking me, is why. "America had everything going for it," said noted Dutch author Karel von Wolfen to me the other day. "America had the respect of just about the whole world. No one here can possibly fathom why they would so quickly and so brazenly throw that all away."

Explaining this whole phenomenon is a bit like trying to unravel a Robert Ludlum plot. It is part fantasy, part madness, part greed, bound together with the barbed wire of an unyielding ideology. I try, again and again, to make it all clear.

I tell them that all this started in 1932 with the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. This election ushered in the phenomenon known as the New Deal - the rise of Social Security, the eventual rise of Medicare, the development of dozens of other social programs, and the enshrinement of the basic idea that the Federal government in America can be a force for good within the populace. Even in 1932, such an idea was anathema to unrestricted free-market profiteers and powerful business interests, for the rise of a powerful Federal government also heralded the rise of regulation.

Within the ebb and drift of American politics, those who stood agains tthe concepts espoused by FDR and his adherents drifted inexorably into what is now the modern Republican Party. This drift was aided by the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which motivated the last vestiges of the old, racist, Confederate Democratic Party to bolt to the right. Lyndon Johnson's Great Society plan further widened the rift, and the progressive activism in the 1960's and 1970's solidified the battle lines. Once the shift was completed, the stage was set for the kind of political to-the-knife trench warfare that has been happening to this day.

Many issues were bandied about in the no-man's land between the lines, but at the end of the day, the issue to be tested was that basic premise brought by FDR: What will the place of the Federal government be in the lives of the American people? Can that government be a help?

Those who argued against this idea had ample rationales for their resistance, some of them uncomfortable to hear in the light of day. The activism of the Federal government brought about racial desegregation and the rise of minority rights, something a segment of the right finds unacceptable to this day. The activism of the federal government made it difficult for unrestricted free-market loyalists to secure the privatization of available mass markets like health care, insurance and Social Security. The activism of the Federal government kept mega-businesses from the ability to grow to whatever size they pleased, even though such growth was death to the basic capitalist concept of competition. The activism of the Federal government forced these businesses to spend a portion of their profits on pollution controls. The list of complaints went on and on. In a corner of their hearts, many who stood against FDR's plans did so because the rise of an activist Federal government smelled a little too much like Soviet-style communism for comfort.

And so the trenches were dug, the bayonet’s were fixed, and the war dragged on and on. The right howled that such an activist government would require the American people to be taxed to death. The right howled that public schooling did not work, and they de-funded public education on the state and local levels to prove their point. The right invented bugaboos like the "welfare queen," with her Cadillac and ten children, who avoided working and lived of the sweat from the honest man's brow. Often, the American people listened to their arguments. The rise of Ronald Reagan is evidence that their message had strength, if not merit.

The problem, as ever, became clear before too long. Unrestricted free-marketeering, deficit spending, tax cuts for the richest people in the country which would purportedly cause the trickling down of monies to the rest, unrestricted polluting, unrestricted defense spending, and the deregulation of absolutely everything, is poison to any economy that is subjected to it. George Herbert Walker Bush was left holding this particular bag in 1992, and he was not enough of a salesman to convince the American people that it was still working.

This, I tell my European counterparts, is when all hell really began to break loose.

Many people believe the statement that "Bill Clinton was the best Republican President we've ever had." There are a great many facts to back this assertion, but it begs the question: If Clinton was the best Republican President we've ever had, why did the Republicans work every night and every day for eight years, why do they continue to work to this day, to destroy him and the economic legacy he left behind?

The answer is complex. Clinton is labeled 'Republican' by the Left because of the passage of NAFTA, of GATT, of the Welfare Reform Act, of the Telecommunications Act, and for a variety of other reasons. In many ways, however, this does not tell the entire story. The passage of these rightist packages came, in no small part, because Clinton had no hard-core activated base pushing him in the proper direction. After twelve years of warfare against Reagan and Bush, a massive swath of the progressive community saw Clinton's victory in 1992 and felt like they had at last won the fight. They threw their activism into neutral, leaving Clinton with no army to back him up. One can hardly blame them for doing so after such a protracted struggle.

But this left Clinton exposed. The onslaughts of the right pushed him inexorably in their direction, because there was no powerful progressive network there to push back. Only after the impeachment mayhem broke loose did the tattered threads of progressive activism come back together again, but by then the damage had been done. Certainly, there were many progressives in America who fought the good fight every step of the way, but there were not enough of them. Progressives in 2003 who label Clinton as 'Republican' should take a long look in the mirror, and remember what they were not doing from 1993 to 1998, before casting final judgment. I am, sadly, one who has trouble facing that mirror.

An analysis of the facts, and the record, reveals Clinton to have been one of the most effective progressive Presidents in American history. By 1998 he had managed to create an economic system that filled the Federal treasury with unprecedented amounts of available money, and he had also managed to pass a variety of progressive social programs that benefited vast numbers of middle-class Americans. When Clinton stood up in 1998, with a massive budget surplus waiting in the wings, and cried, "Save Social Security first!" he was roaring a battle cry across the trenches that had been there since 1932. Such a surplus would fund social programs all across the country. Such a surplus would, at long last, settle the argument: An activist Federal government can be a force for good within the American populace, and once more, can be paid for with extra left over. The New Deal/Great Society wars seemed to be coming to an end.

This was why he had to be destroyed.

The rest is coda. The impeachment, funded by right-wing activists and business interests, stormed along by a mainstream media whose Reagan-era deregulated status led to a complete breakdown in journalistic ethics, and all buttressed by years of unsubstantiated scandals pushed along by congressional zealots with subpoena power, left the American population exhausted enough to vote against their own best interests in 2000. Too many didn't vote at all. The "Clinton! Clinton! Clinton!" drumbeat that lasted over 2,000 days drove the voters into thinking a change was required. Though Gore won the election, the margin of victory was small enough to be exposed to theft by a partisan Supreme Court which, by rights, should not have come within a country mile of touching that case. A corrupted news media, again, pushed the whole farce along.

Now, we have a nation run by profiteers who preach the gospel of privatization in all things. When Bush, on October 4, 2001, argued that more massive tax cuts for rich people were needed to "counteract the shockwave of the evildoer," while a pall of poison smoke still hung over New York City, the truth was there for all to see. Now, pollution controls have ceased to exist, and the private realm of defense contractors are seeing more money than they ever dreamed they could. The simple truth that the Federal government can be a force for good within the American populace, a truth realized in 1998, has been flushed down the toilet by a pack of right-wing activists who are links in a chain of warfare that stretches back to 1932.

Mission accomplished indeed.

The fallout from this has been extreme. Trickle-down economics have returned to America, with the inevitable economic downturn and unemployment riding sidecar. The Federal Treasury, once full to bursting, has been looted completely. This, in the end, was the mission. That money could not be allowed to stay in the Treasury, because the American people would have expected it to be used to fund the programs they depend on. The Bush administration moved every penny of that money into the wealthiest portions of the private sector, using September 11 and terrorism and fear and war as an excuse to storm the trenches their forefathers had been shooting into for over 70 years. It was a smash-and-grab robbery writ large.

...more...

[hlthe2b]

1. Sadly, this is all too true....

Nice piece, Will, even if someone demoralizing. Will we show in 2004 that we've learned our lesson as progressives? Or,will the backbiting and bickering cause us to lose further ground. Hope springs eternal, I guess. Damn the ignorant in this country who will not wake up until it is too late....

[KG]

2. so, it was the activists fault for clintons betrayal of progresive causes

it's all so clear now. :wtf: was i thinkig?

[PVnRT]

4. Where were they?

Were they constantly making a stink about those things? Were they getting their side of the story out? Staging big protests? Sorry, but activists don't get a free pass any more than the DLC does.

[kentuck]

3. "...there was no powerful progressive network there to push back"

That is true, because many progressives accepted Nafta, GATT, and the other ill-advised legislation because they thought it was all necessary to maintain power. With the help of the DLC, they were convinced that it was a necessary to maintain control and relevancy in the democratic process. No doubt, progressives were either fooled or were asleep at the wheel.

However, we cannot overlook the fact that the Bush crowd have been the most adept crowd in history at propaganda. They paint rosy scenarios and define disasters as something positive. They muddy and pollute our streams and our consciousness. All the while, they will call it the Clear Stream Initiative and tell us that we have the greatest economy in decades. The sad truth is just the opposite. We will have negative growth of jobs in this economy for the first time since Herbert Hoover.

[PATRICK]

5. Simply and well said

Another summing up might be that there are no real activists with the zeal or funds to match the right- and the mad zeal of the right is compensated for its hapless illogic by a lot of well placed special interest money. Labor unions however they swell their coffers and smartly organize and work are using sweat equity not filthy lucre. Labor accepted this inequity as a fact of life. The Democratic Party went further in giving up on ever tapping the limited resources of their base and risked instead further weakening the zeal of people rapidly losing their clout- or if successful- turning to the blowhards and the stock market to become even more foolish zealots than the anti-union people they crazily take sides with.(I know a few- talk about contradictions! But they will not be voting Bush)

What we need is not a temporary crusade but a real and organically broadening activation of ordinary people in the process- people who by simple logic will be more compassionate, rational and talented than their thuggish oligarch-sponsored counterparts. I think relying on your organization or political leader quickly leads to the lapse of such a group- because they think falsely that decency and sanity have become thus permanently institutionalized and if the current people in place can be trusted- what is there to fight against? I think maybe this time the people who are smart enough to learn will try harder this time not to let up or stop the pursuit of the evils of this world down to their Osama warrens.

But the unions have long experience. The leaders and the active still preach and act, but the majority slip away in the dotage of democracy and listen to diabolical whispers of wealth and privilege and secret hates. Organizers and leaders should never assume they can substitute or be delegates for such a populace, but must engage them constantly in mutual action, or else the next time they are roused they will find their children's feet headed to fields of war.

It is hopeful that the media is not prospering, that dissent here is alive and growing. That the greed soaked triumph collapses on occasion of its own excesses. That people really are not as bad the frauds they cannot admit to at the top.

It is insanely hopeful that for once the world, that also once ignored and took our politics for granted, has taken the right side in the struggle(except it's weak and throttled government leaders). Someone come over and light the beacon. It is getting dark over here.

[bloom]

6. There was also the demonization of Hillary

with her liberal 'agenda' and health care plan.

And the continuing demonization of liberals in general.

Sort of like this Bush=Hitler thing going on. WE see all of these parallels - but are the parallels anywhere near the discussion. NO. It's' all about how bad the extremists are.

Even justifying the Bush=Hitler thing like comparing it to feminazis and Hitlery avoids the discussion - making it out to be just politics as usual....

[Spentastic]

7. No, it's the third way I'm afraid

"because Clinton had no hard-core activated base pushing him in the proper direction"

That may or may not be true. What is more likely is that the "base" was changed by the DLC. Third way politic is predicated on a need to please certain groups to gain maximum electoral gain. The priciples that appeal to the previous "base" are often sold out to pacify the middle (read new base).

The leadership is then effectively insulated from the new "base" and forms policy based on the focus group results obtained from the new base. Old activists are marginalised and ignored.

This is not the fault of the activists it is a strategy of the third way. If the third wayers are in fact rightwing plants then Clinton stood fuck all chance of doing anything. In the same way Tony Blair is showing what happens when you sell out your values.

When people on the left decide to sell out in order to win the fight is lost before it starts. Clinton was destroyed by the right and those on the right of the left.

[BrendaM]

8. The far left of the Democratic party will prevail this time

That's why we must elect Dean or Kucinich and not let the others sneak in with corporate help.

[Military Brat]

14. Good point. Welcome to DU, BrendaM

:hi:

[Catfish]

9. Excellent piece

Thank you for posting this. This is one point I think about (from the article) when I think of the Clinton years:

"There are a great many facts to back this assertion, but it begs the question: If Clinton was the best Republican President we've ever had, why did the Republicans work every night and every day for eight years, why do they continue to work to this day, to destroy him and the economic legacy he left behind?"

[enough]

10. Bookmark, and multiple print. Great essay.

Very interesting to see the decades one has lived through set forth so clearly. Everything you say here rings true, but I have never put the whole thing together this way.

Thank you.

[kaitykaity]

11. First person singular has become overpoweringly

omnipresent in this pieces, and thus has made them
noxiously insufferable to read.

"I I I, me me me. See me!!" No thanks.

[PVnRT]

12. Do you have a legitimate criticism of what was said?

Something tells me that you don't...

[kaitykaity]

27. When the blogger becomes the central figure in the

drama, the blog becomes less than a waste of
my time.

That's a valid criticism of what was said.
I I I, me me me!! Look at me!! No
thanks.

[robcon]

13. Clinton is responsible for his actions

W R Pitt wrote: Clinton is labeled 'Republican' by the Left because of the passage of NAFTA, of GATT, of the Welfare Reform Act, of the Telecommunications Act, and for a variety of other reasons. In many ways, however, this does not tell the entire story. The passage of these rightist packages came, in no small part, because Clinton had no hard-core activated base pushing him in the proper direction. After twelve years of warfare against Reagan and Bush, a massive swath of the progressive community saw Clinton's victory in 1992 and felt like they had at last won the fight. They threw their activism into neutral, leaving Clinton with no army to back him up. One can hardly blame them for doing so after such a protracted struggle. "

Blaming the so-called 'mistakes' of Clinton because he didn't have enough people "pushing him" from the left is the most egregious bit of apologia I've read in a long time. Clinton is responsible for what he did. Trying to "blame" his actions on others is ridiculous.

(btw, I think NAFTA, WTO and welfare reform will be the most outstanding legacies of the Clinton administration. We will still be benefiting from these programs 20-30 years from now.)

[PVnRT]

16. "Still be" benefiting?

Who the hell is benefiting now? Workers sure aren't. People on welfare who now can't earn enough to support their families aren't. The only people benefiting are the businessmen who get to move factories to Mexico for cheaper labor, as well as drive down wages in this country because there are more people coming off welfare who have to get a job.

So, please tell me how we are all going to "still be benefiting" 20-30 years from now.

[lovedems]

15. I don't think I have ever been this touched by a history lesson.

It makes me want to cry. The damage these right-wing "activists" have done to our country will take 20 years to recuperate from. Maybe longer if they are given 4 more years. They aren't anything but self-serving thieves in the highest order.

[KoKo]

17. Clinton had the advantage of the Tech Boom which helped to grow us

out of the Deficit. Otherwise NAFTA, GATT and other problems would have come home to roost earlier. He may have been able to do more if he hadn't been attacked so heavily from the Right. But, if the tech boom hadn't occurred he may have been able to do more to address the problems which were festering under the surface and now have come out into the light.

A defence of Clinton is good to see. But leaving out the DLC influence and the curbs which should have been put on the SEC (would have helped curb some excesses of the Bubble) which Lieberman and Dodd worked against Clinton on and blaming it on "activists" not supporting Clinton is not the whole picture.

The problems started with Nixon and have grown under the surface hidden and papered over as our Democratic Party increasingly relied on Lobbyists for Money and Pollsters for opinion. The Zells, Bidens, Dodds, Bayhs and others are more responsible for Clinton's problems than a lack of Democratic Party Activists. After all the Anti-Viet Nam activists and Civil Rights activists were pretty much run over when the Right Wing and budding Neo-Cons starting showing their claws.

The Country forgot the Activists of the 60's and rewrote history in the minds of following generations that those folks were Freaky, hippie flower children and liberals who advocated free sex, drugs and didn't really care about the causes they supported. That re-writing of history supported the whole notion that Democrats were "Liberals" and the label has stuck with us who were active back then and not at all like what we have been portrayed.

And, when those of us who knew this "Invasion of Iraq" was morally wrong and would head us down the road to Hell, what happened? We got tarred with the "freaky, socialist, communist, flower children who were anti-war, and anti patriotic before, and just trying to relive their glory days." Even here on DU after the Iraq Invasion began people who had protested started being associated with all the 60's labels. Those are your activists, Will. The ones you say didn't support Clinton. The one's who are still around, and here on DU and supporting Move-On and who phone, fax and e-mail the Media and Congress.

What were we supposed to be protesting while Clinton was President? We were against his Impeachment we were against the RW in the Media.
But, until the Internet made it easier to organize what were we supposed to do to support Clinton?

Your article is a nice read, however. And, it's good to have some defence of Clinton out there as a counterweight to all the negativity, it just isn't getting into enough detail of what went wrong with the Democratic Party.

He could have been a Great President if so much hadn't intervened. But, at least he managed to stall some of the RW's evil intentions, although they just managed to become a more powerul beast....the one that's devouring America and the World right now.

History may be kinder to Clinton when more is revealed. His backers were more of a problem than the man himself and what he might have wanted to do, if he had been supported. But, it's not the lack of "activists."

This, of course, is just my perspective from living through it all. And, badly written because I've said it before, and just don't put much effort into saying it again here on DU.

[WilliamPitt]

18. About putting curbs on the SEC and the market...

From my book:

There is a cancer on the Presidency of George W. Bush. Maybe he jobbed Harken stockholders, maybe he didn't. Maybe he sold out with insider information, maybe he didn't. Maybe he was part of the Harken scheme to lie about their stock value, and maybe he wasn't. But he always seems to be standing right next to the scumbags when the bad noise starts, doesn't he?

As all of this was unfolding there was, of course, a push by many within the GOP to blame Bill Clinton. It is a visceral reaction among these folks, automatic in its essence. These folks always manage to forget that when Bush passed his massive, ruinous tax cut, thus gutting the Treasury, this American became his and his alone. But blaming Clinton for the economy, for 9/11, and for anything else that may go wrong is part of the playbook that GOP legislators and media mouthpieces when they join the club, I guess.

The facts beg to differ. The collapse in stock market value and the preponderance of corporate criminality is not Clinton's fault. It is not even Bush's fault, though he is definitely a man made from the same DNA as the thieves. No, the crisis we're dealing with came about through the actions of the Republican-controlled Congress in 1995, through a bill called PSLRA.

The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act basically allowed corporations to wildly overstate the value of their stock. Before PSLRA, the SEC severely limited the ability of corporations to make claims about their value - such predictions are prone to exaggeration because the executives want to present their businesses in the best possible light. But along came PSLRA, passed by Congress, which basically did away with all restrictions along these lines. Corporations could promise the moon and lie without restraint about the value of their stock.

From 1935 to 1995, less than 100 corporations were forced to restate their earnings, a la Enron and WorldCom. In the last seven years, approximately 1,000 corporations have been forced to restate their earnings. The difference? PSLRA in 1995. Here is the Clintonian rub: Bill vetoed PSLRA, but the Republican Congress - with the help of some shamefully compromised Democrats - overrode his veto. In that override was sown the seeds of this mess.

So now, as you gaze at the crater that used to be your 401k, don't blame Bill. Hell, don't blame Bush - but take note of how the ethics his personal business life mirrors the ethics of the thieves, and wonder at his credibility when he says he will fix it. If you are looking to affix blame, find Newt Gingrich and the cowboys his revolution brought to Congress in 1994.

[redqueen]

20. This was one thing I did appreciate

His vetoing of that bill is one of the things I did appreciate.

However, I wonder what the count was. I know Carol Mosely Braun, Joe Lieberman, and Diane Feinstein voted with Republicans to overturn his veto. There were many othters as well, IIRC.

Too bad he couldn't have better advised and persuaded his fellow Democrats on the Hill to vote with their party. That bill was a major mistake, and most econonmists were saying so at the time, so there's really no excuse for voting for it.

[redqueen]

19. Criticisms

"The passage of these rightist packages came, in no small part, because Clinton had no hard-core activated base pushing him in the proper direction. (...) They threw their activism into neutral, leaving Clinton with no army to back him up."

This leaves the reader under the impression that Clinton was against NAFTA, the WTO, the Telecom Act and Welfare Reform, and would have succeeded in his progressive struggle, if only those activists hadn't left him twisting in the wind after his election.

But, is that an accurate portrayal of the situation? If memory serves, it's really really not.

Has anyone looked into whether he even tried to make good on his promise to work for / sign legislation akin to the Fairness Doctrine? I wonder...


"By 1998 he had managed to create an economic system that filled the Federal treasury with unprecedented amounts of available money, and he had also managed to pass a variety of progressive social programs that benefited vast numbers of middle-class Americans."

He improved the tax code, I agree. But what 'economic system' did he create?

Is it not an accurate statement to say that the main reason for the unprecedented prosperity during his terms was the tech bubble? Oh yes, I think it is.

And yes, vast numbers of the 'liberal' middle class sing his praises still. However is it too much to expect an evenhanded review of his great achievements? Would it not be interesting to know what he accomplished for the lower classes? Raising the minimum wage was nice, but it would have been nicer if he'd even mentioned how unrealistic it is. Did he? Did he ever mention housing costs at all? The wealth gap?

With all the Clinton apologia on this forum lately I'm very interested now. I'd dismissed him as unworthy of much close consideration, but now I'd really like to know more specifics, since his defenders have been working so hard for him lately.


We can act as if his pledge to save social security was enough to redeem him in the eyes of history. Will it be, in the end? Placed in contrast with his other 'legacies' (NAFTA, WTO, and Welfare Reform), will future generations find that on balance, he was a great Democratic President? Probably not. He'll stand, correctly, as a decent Republican President.

[papau]

21. not an accurate statement -tech bubble was minor part of Clinton econ

"Is it not an accurate statement to say that the main reason for the unprecedented prosperity during his terms was the tech bubble? Oh yes, I think it is."

NOPE

There are many econ amalysis out there at this point that claim to show that the tech bubble was a very minor part of the econ improvement - and was only a somewhat larger part of the stock market improvement (max effect, replacing with lowest tech values subsequent, is 1/3 of rise from 93 to 12/31/2000).

The GOP'ers try to sell "tech bubble" because there was a tech bubble - and it therefore sounds reasonable, and it does a great job - in terms of PR only - in tearing down Dem claims that the increase tax vote of 93 and consequent projected lower deficits really did keep interest rates marginally lower than they would otherwise have been, and thereby the increase in taxes led to Clinton econ happiness!

Of course those same folks forget that the Aug 81 Reagan tax cuts produced the 14 month deepest recession in history from 82 to 83, just as the Dec 2001 date is the point the Bush tax cuts became real and is the point cited by Greenspan (Congress testimony Aug 2001) when the econ trends of the past 6 years ended and the FED lost control of the effects of its rate raising that was the mode pre-election - so 2 tax cuts - 2 disasters

one tax increase - and great times

but folks want to call it the tech bubble - sure as hell do not want to credit Clinton, now, do we?

:-)

peace

:-)

[IkeWarnedUs]

22. Excellent piece - but here's the rest of the story

I agree with Will's assesment that far too many earlier activists "threw their activism into neutral," myself included. We were tired and overconfident in our aparent victory. We were older and many of us were feeling the approach of old age and it seemed time to focus on ourselves, our families and our personal futures. I, for one, am kicking myself for it.

But it wasn't just that we slid into neutral. At the same time, the neo-cons put it in high gear.

The neo-cons have been putting their cabal together for many, many years and they have covered a lot of bases. They developed unholy alliances in the media, military, foreign governments, corporate world and have taken the Republican party to a place many traditional Republicans find uncomfortable. And, through the DLC, they infiltrated the Democratic party as well.

I know some of you are groaning and moving on to the next post, but for those who are not familiar with this, let me explain.

Will Marshall was the policy director for the DLC and is the president and founder of the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), which was formed to create policy for the DLC. The DLC and PPI are very intertwined. Al From, DLC founder, is the chairman of PPI. The DLC website shows joint contact info for both organizations and the same person answers the phone for both (202-547-0001 PPI, 202-546-0007 DLC). The press e-mail for both DLC and PPI is [e-mail]

Will Marshall was one of the select people who actually signed the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) statements on post war Iraq, along with a few frequent Blueprint authors (the DLC magazine).
PNAC has been issuing official statements since it's inception, each signed by about 1-3 dozen select people including Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Jeb Bush, Richard Perle, William Kristol
and Frank Carlucci (of the Carlyle Group). Mr. Marshall doesn't just agree with them, he is intimately involved with them.

Mr. Marshall is also an advisor to the Committee to Liberate Iraq (CLI), who's mission is to "engage in educational and advocacy efforts" in support of liberating the Iraqi people. Translation: it serves as another "authority" to support the PNAC agenda, which it does very well. CLI is loaded with PNAC'ers, including 3 of the board of directors.

Although Will Marshall (and the rest of the DLC/PPI) has been pushing a slightly sanitized, politically correct neo-con-lite agenda for years, it is just recently that he came out of the closet with his official PNAC/CLI affiliations. The PNAC statements were released in March 2003 and CLI was formed in the fall of 2002. Like many of the neo-cons, he seems to be more brazen and open than ever before.

I'm sure at least some of the New Democrats (what DLC members are called) joined on for funding support and without really appreciating what the DLC's agenda and affiliations really are. Most of the DLC's message is spun to sound like it challenges Bush, but look at the core messages and you find them more closely aligned with the neo-cons than it appears on the surface.

When you realize this, Congressional Democratic support for the Bush administration's policies (out of control military budget, tax cuts, rampant privatization and corporatization and war, war, war) makes more sense. Btw, membership in the New Democrat Network (what the DLC membership is called) is cheap (about $50.00) but not easy. Prospective members are thoroughly screened. Here is a description of their process from Robert Dreyfuss in the 4/23/01 issue of The American Prospect (link below):

"To ensure that liberals don't slip through the cracks, NDN requires each politician who seeks entree to its largesse and contacts to fill out a questionnaire that asks his or her views on trade, economics, education, welfare reform, and other issues. The questions are detailed, forcing candidates to state clearly whether or not they support views associated with the New Democrat Coalition, and it concludes by asking, "Will you join the NDC when you come to Congress?" Next, (Simon) Rosenberg interviews each candidate, and then NDN determines which candidacies are viable before providing financial support."

Not only was (is) Bill Clinton the poster boy for the DLC, THIS is the "progressive network" he had to work with. I don't know how much Clinton realized about the evil he was (is?) in bed with, but I do think this is why Al Gore decided not to run - that he didn't want to align himself with the DLC and didn't have enough of a base independent of it.

Four of the Democratic candidates are currently members of the New Democrat Network - Edwards, Gephardt, Kerry and Lieberman. All four addressed the DLC Convention in July 2003. I have sent my concerns about the DLC/PNAC affiliations to all of their campaign offices, as well as to the Dean and Clark campaigns.

In my opinion, getting a Democrat into the White House is only the first step. Once Bush & Co. (in other words, the PNAC'ers) are out they must be exposed for what they are and held accountable for what they have done. Clinton never held the Bush/Regan administrations accountable for what they did - and there was plenty to investigate. Not only that, but he took a lot of counsel and advice from Bush/Regan insiders, especially in national security and military issues. Those insiders include Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Cheney, Perle, etc. In other words, the PNAC rat pack.

I am afraid if another DLC Democrat is elected the PNAC'ers will get away with it - again - and come back to finish destroying our country - again. Please don't dismiss this as a slam toward any particular candidate in favor of another. Whoever the Democratic nominee is, I will fight like mad to get him in office. But I won't hide my concerns about the DLC and I won't slide back into neutral.

DLC website: http://www.ndol.org/

PPI website: http://www.ppionline.org/

CLI website: http://209.50.252.70/index.shtml

PNAC Iraq statements:
http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqstatement-031903.htm

http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqstatement-032803.htm

How the DLC Does It
By Robert Dreyfuss The American Prospect 4/23/01

http://www.prospect.org/print/V12/7/dreyfuss-r.html

New Democrat Network directory

http://www.ndol.org/new_dem_dir_action.cfm?viewAll=1

[KoKo]

24. Excellent Post, Ike, and your links with it. Wish you'd work up a

separate post on this, because many of our younger DU'ers need to read this no matter whom they support.

Until Democrats have the balls to expose the Reagonites and Bushies for what they've done, we won't have a viable party but will be bickering with each other and every Dem President will be attacked the way both Carter and Clinton were. The only way to have strength again is by breaking from the DLC crowd who let us down in 2000 and in the mid-terms. They gave Bush a go ahead on all his cabinet appointments which allowed everything else to fall in to place for the BFEE. They didn't defend Dem candidates during the Mid-terms and have supported the Repugs on everthing they could slip by since. Only the Black Caucus and handfuls of non-DLC'ers have had the guts to try to stand against this.

When Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and Evan Bayh are the most popular Democrats on the Pundit shows, that tells one what the DLC is doing to weaken our party message. The more they stand with the Repugs the more like the repugs the Democratic Party looks to the public, and the rest of us who are not DLC become targeted as the "Liberals" where we are fodder for the Repug Machine and denounced by our own Party. We won't get the change that's needed unless we can stop this by focusing on exactly what the Repugs have done and how our own Party has enabled it.

[IkeWarnedUs]

26. Thank you

I was about to start a thread about this in the 2004 Primary forum when it went down. I just did - here's the link:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=117679

It goes beyond the Washington politicians too. The New Democrat directory includes people in state and local government. More often than not, when I hear about a "Democrat" doing something that defies logic I check the directory and sure enough, there they are. Like Cathy Cox, the Secretary of State of Georgia who keeps defending her total faith and confidence in Diebold electronic voting machines.

[rucky]

23. The Main Criticism from the Left is about Globalism

not welfare reform, etc.

Globalism is like a religion, and Clinton is a believer - pure & simple. Our progressive base has little power to change that, but that base never slept - it was more drowned out than anything. The wheels had been set in motion years ago, and Clinton made an active contribution to that by avoiding the debate about globalism and advertising it as a foregone conclusion.

[Jane Roe]

25. You make it sound like the * admin are (economically) libertarian

I disagree strongly with this implication. I see Bush as more of an FDR, except on the opposite pole of the economic class spectrum.

I would point out that your explanation fails to explain the relative poularity of Bush with the American public. After all, in your view (and mine) he is not well serving the economic interests of most Americans. This is, I think, the real puzzler for European observers.