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Hillarysworld -> Bill Clinton Forum -> Bill Clinton’s Revenge (Wall St. Jnl 1/25/10)
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TOPIC: Bill Clinton’s Revenge (Wall St. Jnl 1/25/10)
Jen the Michigander


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Bill Clinton’s Revenge (Wall St. Jnl 1/25/10)
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http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703808904575025620428520574.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Yet for all his undeniable weaknesses, Mr. Clinton does seem to understand something that eludes Mr. Obama: In a center-right nation, a liberal doesn’t want to get too far ahead of the voters. At times (and HillaryCare was one) Mr. Clinton got himself too far out in front—but when he had, he’d generally been careful to respond by scurrying back to the center and appropriating his opponents’ most appealing messages. That’s exactly what he did in 1995, deploying humor and humility with equal effect in his State of the Union. “I know we bit off more than we can chew,” he told Congress.

The following year he declared “the era of big government is over.” He also reached out to Republicans on policy, embracing everything from welfare reform to the Defense of Marriage Act.

In the process, he learned one thing: In a nation where roughly 20% describe themselves as liberal, 40% as conservative, and 40% as moderate, there’s not a high price for shutting out the left. As for history, Mr. Clinton went on to become the only Democrat since FDR to win and serve two full terms as president.

There’s no sign that Mr. Obama buys any of this. His team argues, apparently oblivious to the inherent condescension, that no intelligent American could possibly oppose his health-care agenda on substance.

It’s all just a big misunderstanding, says the White House. We just need to explain it better—like recasting a second stimulus as a “jobs bill,” selling health-care reform as “deficit reduction,” and throwing in a lot of speech references to the “middle class.”

For his part, Mr. Obama is clear. He says he’d rather be a one-termer than give up on his agenda. But this State of the Union, with the president’s approval ratings sinking, Democrats have to be asking themselves: Do Mr. Obama’s chances of getting his agenda through really go up if the congressmen and senators listening to his words come to the conclusion he’s a short-timer?

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Amy Dugan


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this came out at 11:20 pm last night after i fell asleep. glad you posted it.

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Amy Dugan
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That's why Bill is one of the great ones and Obama is going to be a one term joke.

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Jen the Michigander


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Amy Dugan wrote:

this came out at 11:20 pm last night after i fell asleep. glad you posted it.



That's one of the advantages of being an insomniac-- I'm the first to find all the articles that come out at 2 AM. (But no 3 AM phone calls please.) smile

 





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