Warren and Webb
December 17, 2014 - by
Conventional wisdom says only two people can stop Hillary Clinton from the nomination in 2016: Hillary herself and Bill Clinton.
But two other people embody a potential problem: Senator Elizabeth Warren and former Senator Jim Webb. Warren and Webb are vastly different individuals, but are making much the same critique of Washington. The message appeals to many Democrats and, at least indirectly, criticizes the Clintons. It’s anti-Wall Street, when the Clintons have close Wall Street ties and deep Wall Street wallets. From Webb, it’s also anti-war, when Hillary has a reputation as a hawk.
As Carter noted this week (“Cross of Gold”), Senator Warren rang even conservatives’ bells with her floor speech against a budget-bill provision that “put taxpayers back on the hook for the bailout of big banks.”
Webb, who served one term in the Senate from Virginia, wrote this in 2010 about the 2008 bailout (“We Helped the Bankers. Now It’s Their Turn.”): “The financial sector recovered rather quickly, but not without a vast amount of help. The time has come to include taxpayers in the rewards of a recovery that would never have happened without their money.”
Warren is a Massachusetts liberal, sort of a Howard Dean (without the scream) appealing to “the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.” Webb is an odd duck, a white Southern populist of the type that has nearly disappeared.
He’s a Naval Academy grad, a Marine and Vietnam combat veteran, twice-wounded and much-decorated. He’s a great writer, of novels, history and memoirs. He was President Reagan’s Secretary of the Navy, but he stayed a Democrat, unseated George Allen in 2006, then left the Senate after one term.
He has the military cred to oppose the Iraq and Afghan wars and to question an interventionist foreign policy. On the economy, he says things like:
“Walk into some of our inner cities if you dare, and see the stagnation, poverty, crime, and lack of opportunity that still affects so many African Americans. Or travel to the Appalachian Mountains, where my own ancestors settled and whose cultural values I still share, and view the poorest counties in America – who happen to be more than 90 percent White, and who live in the reality that ‘if you’re poor and White you’re out of sight.’ The Democratic Party used to be the place where people like these could come not for a handout but for an honest handshake, good full-time jobs, quality education, health care they can afford, and the vital, overriding belief that we’re all in this together and the system is not rigged.”
On today’s market, it’s unlikely either Webb or Warren will stop Hillary. Warren says she’s not running. After Obama, the party isn’t likely to nominate another first-term Senator. Webb has formed an exploratory committee, but, culturally and viscerally, he probably gives a lot of Democrats the hives.
Looking over the two of them now may be akin to kicking the tires on sports cars when you know you’ll probably go with that reliable Clinton Family Truckster. But strange things can happen on the road to the White House.
In 1996, Bill Clinton talked about “building a bridge to the 21st Century.” Twenty years later, Hillary will have to build a bridge between her record and Democrats who yearn for a newer, more exciting ride.
Posted in National Democrats
Warren and Webb
December 17, 2014/
Conventional wisdom says only two people can stop Hillary Clinton from the nomination in 2016: Hillary herself and Bill Clinton.
But two other people embody a potential problem: Senator Elizabeth Warren and former Senator Jim Webb. Warren and Webb are vastly different individuals, but are making much the same critique of Washington. The message appeals to many Democrats and, at least indirectly, criticizes the Clintons. It’s anti-Wall Street, when the Clintons have close Wall Street ties and deep Wall Street wallets. From Webb, it’s also anti-war, when Hillary has a reputation as a hawk.
As Carter noted this week (“Cross of Gold”), Senator Warren rang even conservatives’ bells with her floor speech against a budget-bill provision that “put taxpayers back on the hook for the bailout of big banks.”
Webb, who served one term in the Senate from Virginia, wrote this in 2010 about the 2008 bailout (“We Helped the Bankers. Now It’s Their Turn.”): “The financial sector recovered rather quickly, but not without a vast amount of help. The time has come to include taxpayers in the rewards of a recovery that would never have happened without their money.”
Warren is a Massachusetts liberal, sort of a Howard Dean (without the scream) appealing to “the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.” Webb is an odd duck, a white Southern populist of the type that has nearly disappeared.
He’s a Naval Academy grad, a Marine and Vietnam combat veteran, twice-wounded and much-decorated. He’s a great writer, of novels, history and memoirs. He was President Reagan’s Secretary of the Navy, but he stayed a Democrat, unseated George Allen in 2006, then left the Senate after one term.
He has the military cred to oppose the Iraq and Afghan wars and to question an interventionist foreign policy. On the economy, he says things like:
“Walk into some of our inner cities if you dare, and see the stagnation, poverty, crime, and lack of opportunity that still affects so many African Americans. Or travel to the Appalachian Mountains, where my own ancestors settled and whose cultural values I still share, and view the poorest counties in America – who happen to be more than 90 percent White, and who live in the reality that ‘if you’re poor and White you’re out of sight.’ The Democratic Party used to be the place where people like these could come not for a handout but for an honest handshake, good full-time jobs, quality education, health care they can afford, and the vital, overriding belief that we’re all in this together and the system is not rigged.”
On today’s market, it’s unlikely either Webb or Warren will stop Hillary. Warren says she’s not running. After Obama, the party isn’t likely to nominate another first-term Senator. Webb has formed an exploratory committee, but, culturally and viscerally, he probably gives a lot of Democrats the hives.
Looking over the two of them now may be akin to kicking the tires on sports cars when you know you’ll probably go with that reliable Clinton Family Truckster. But strange things can happen on the road to the White House.
In 1996, Bill Clinton talked about “building a bridge to the 21st Century.” Twenty years later, Hillary will have to build a bridge between her record and Democrats who yearn for a newer, more exciting ride.
Posted in National Democrats