A Dialog Between A Bernie Sanders Supporter And A Hillary Clinton Supporter

bernie-and-hillary

A Bernie Sanders supporter on Tumblr wrote:

People who endorse Hillary Clinton: we need a women president! #WhiteFeminism

People who endorse Bernie Sanders: we need this man to win to take money out of politics, to promote and campaign for progressive politicians nationwide, to champion economic freedom for the poor, to create millions of jobs, we need free higher education to stay competitive and to have a more educated debt-free populace, to improve our infrastructure, to promote small local banks that will not be predatory lenders or ruin our economy, to ask Wall Street and the 1% to pay their fair share, to take drastic and immediate action to save the environment, to not send us to catastrophic wars.

To that,1 let me say:

People Who Endorse Hillary: I’m voting for Hillary Clinton because

1) The next president is likely to appoint at least 2 Supreme Court Justices, and for every domestic policy issue I care about, whether a Republican or a Democrat chooses those two or more SC Justices is actually the single most crucial decision to be made by the President. So I’m voting for the candidate who is most likely to be able to beat whomever the GOP nominates.

2)
The President can do relatively little domestically without Congressional approval (but see point 3 below), but is relatively unfettered when it comes to diplomatic policy. Hillary Clinton has a long history of significant diplomatic accomplishments, Clinton was instrumental in changing US policy towards Burma from one of isolation and sanctions to one of active engagement, which arguably played a major part in the military government allowing the transition to representative government to actually happen (so far). As Obama’s Secretary of State, Clinton is responsible for the successes of the administrations work on the loose nukes issue, making the world much safer. As first lady, Clinton took a large role in the negotiations with China over MFN status, and is probably still the most respected American politician in China today. Relations with China will be very important for the next President. (I plagiarized all these arguments from comment writers on an earlier post, btw – thanks, Kate Charles and Ben!)2

Sanders, in contrast, has no diplomatic experience, and on the campaign trail shows an irresponsible lack of interest in or knowledge of foreign policy. Since managing foreign policy is arguably the largest and most important thing a President does, it’s hard to endorse a candidate who doesn’t even seem to take these issues seriously.

3) If the next president is a Democrat, then on issues outside of foreign policy, they are guaranteed to face an obstructionist Republican Congress – Democrats have no chance of retaking the House in the next election, and little chance of retaking the Senate. So the next President will have to be an expert at wielding the limited powers of the White House to do whatever can legally be done without Congress’ cooperation.

In other words, experience in the executive branch matters. Knowing every legal loophole the White House can use to thread some decent policies past Congress, matters. Sanders may have better views than Clinton on many issues – but what matters most isn’t what the President would do if they had an imaginary wand they could wave to write policy, but what they will actually be able to accomplish despite the GOP Congress. And it seems unquestionable that when it comes to knowing those pragmatic loopholes, Clinton – a major player in two different President’s administrations – is a much better choice than Sanders.

4) After 43 male presidents in a row, it really is time for a woman to be president. I don’t mean to say that I’d vote for anyone as long as she’s female. But if I had an otherwise equal choice to make, being a woman would be a good reason to vote for Hillary.

But if their sexes were reversed, I think I’d still be voting for male-Hillary over female-Bernie, because it’s not an equal choice; Hillary is the better candidate.3

People Who Endorse Bernie: See? SEE? The only argument Hillarybots make is “we need a women president!”

  1. #NotAllBernieSupporters []
  2. The truth is, I don’t agree with all the pro-Hillary arguments above – I think Clinton’s diplomatic accomplishments are put in shadow by the danger of electing a president who supported the Iraq War and was instrumental in Obama’s disastrous Libya policies, and I’m very skeptical of “electibility” arguments, since if Bernie manages to win the Democratic primary despite Clinton’s huge advantages that would indicate to me that he probably has the skills needed to win the general election as well. (And, besides, “electability” arguments are what gave us John Kerry.) But they are definitely arguments I’ve seen people make. []
  3. Actually, I will probably vote for Bernie in the Democratic primary, because I think he’s doing valuable work by pushing Hillary to the left, although damn I wish he’d push her much more on foreign policy. But by the time I get to vote here in Oregon, probably the Democratic primary will be over, even if Bernie is still on the ballot. []
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30 Responses to A Dialog Between A Bernie Sanders Supporter And A Hillary Clinton Supporter

  1. 1
    toby deutsch says:

    You offer a cogent summary of why I will vote for Clinton. In addition, we should not downplay executive experience; Obama’s first term illustrated the pitfalls of an idealist in the White House. I want to stand up and cheer whenever I hear Bernie speak, but as you point out the president isn’t given a magic wand on inauguration day.

    I wish there wasn’t so much Hillary-bashing by many of Bernie’s supporters, though; they should make a positive case, which they do have. I’ve seen references to Foster!

    If Bernie somehow wins the primaries, to me it will show that this country’s misogyny is so virulent people will vote for a Jewish socialist over a woman.

  2. 2
    MJJ says:

    If Bernie somehow wins the primaries, to me it will show that this country’s misogyny is so virulent people will vote for a Jewish socialist over a woman.

    It seems to me that this is essentially the same accusation as “The only argument Hillarybots make is ‘we need a women president!'” but in reverse.

    Essentially, you are saying that the only reason large segments of people prefer Bernie to Hillary is that he’s a man.

    I think what turns a lot of people off of Hillary is the fear that the Clintons seem to be intent on cashing in on their political position, and that this opens them up to corruption. Certainly she seems to have been more friendly to Wall Street than Bernie. And regardless of who is behind them, her email revelations have not made her seem more trustworthy to people.

    Of course, that isn’t necessarily the most important consideration. Certainly most people would rather have someone they do not think they can trust to do the right thing, instead of someone whom they are certain they can trust to do the wrong thing. But I do not think any significant number of those who are supporting alternatives to Hillary are doing so because of sexism.

  3. 3
    LTL FTC says:

    The “imaginary conversation” format lends itself to some pretty brazen strawmanning, and that’s certainly what we have here. But hey, it ain’t my blog.

    I wish it were as simple as “man with policies I like vs. woman with policies I don’t like as much,” but the pesky electability thing mucks it all up and doesn’t allow us to really have the conversation about the value of identity politics and representation many in both camps seem to want.

    Seven years into the Obama administration and it’s not as if we have made much of a leap in race relations. In fact, its axiomatic in race-politics circles that citing the first black President as a sign of progress reveals you to be part of the problem. If anything, despair on the issue is in vogue in a way it has never been before. Why should we expect different from the first woman president?

    Me, I’ll hold my nose and vote for Hillary. The project to rehabilitate the word “socialist” in the minds of median American voters seems both impossible and unnecissary, and you’re right that the next Democratic president will give us four years of massive partisan gridlock and two Supreme Court justices, so electability should be paramount.

  4. 4
    Sebastian H says:

    I’m not sure foreign policy experience is such a great thing when your foreign policy experience appears to be mostly warmongering. If you were to contrast Bush II rather than Clinton II with Sanders would you say that foreign policy experience was crucial? And aren’t the foreign policy wins rather cherry picked? Clinton was very much more in the “intervene in Syria” side of the debate, which she fortunately lost in the Obama administration. She was also very much the “intervene in Libya” side.

    I’m not convinced about the electability argument either. She has essentially never won a strongly contested election, she has always been about playing back room games in the Democratic Party to try to box out opponents. That is why she was the Senator from New York (where she had never lived). She tried to avoid a contested election in the Democratic Primary but failed and lost to Obama.

    “In other words, experience in the executive branch matters. Knowing every legal loophole the White House can use to thread some decent policies past Congress, matters. Sanders may have better views than Clinton on many issues – but what matters most isn’t what the President would do if they had an imaginary wand they could wave to write policy, but what they will actually be able to accomplish despite the GOP Congress. And it seems unquestionable that when it comes to knowing those pragmatic loopholes, Clinton – a major player in two different President’s administrations – is a much better choice than Sanders.”

    This is the least persuasive argument to me. It is essentially the John Yoo, torture memo rationale. We don’t need a president who is going to break the system more in the favor of non-accountability.

  5. 5
    Glaurung says:

    Let’s see. I can vote for someone who supported Bush’s bid to go to war in Iraq, or I can vote for Saunders. I can vote for someone whose policies have been bought and paid for by their corporate masters, or I can vote for Saunders. I can vote for someone whose politics are more or less to the right of centre, or I can vote for the first genuinely left wing US Democratic presidential candidate I can remember in my lifetime. So Saunders it is. Definitely in the primary, and if he should be so lucky, in the general election as well.

  6. 6
    LTL FTC says:

    So Saunders it is.

    You do get your first woman President, and I do like the occasional Ab Fab marathon, but I’m fairly sure she isn’t a U.S. Citizen.

  7. 7
    RonF says:

    Reason #1 is why I will vote for the GOP candidate – and very likely hold my nose doing so – regardless of who it is.

  8. 8
    closetpuritan says:

    MJJ:
    It seems to me that this is essentially the same accusation as “The only argument Hillarybots make is ‘we need a women president!’” but in reverse.

    Agree. I’m not confident enough of the exact number of Bernie supporters who are more passionately sexism-influenced-anti-Hillary than pro-Bernie to say that it’s insignificant, but I’m confident that they’re decidedly in the minority.

    Amp:
    if Bernie manages to win the Democratic primary despite Clinton’s huge advantages that would indicate to me that he probably has the skills needed to win the general election as well. (And, besides, “electability” arguments are what gave us John Kerry.)

    This is important, I think. By choosing a more centrist candidate, you may gain independent voters but lose on energizing the base and getting good voter turnout from them. “Vote for Clinton to keep a Republican out of the White House” sounds an awful lot like “Vote for Kerry to keep GW Bush from getting a 2nd term”.

    Somewhat related: The electability argument carried a lot of weight with League of Conservation Voters, and they’ve received a lot of pushback on it. Worth noting that besides his slightly higher voting record score from LCV, and Clinton’s fracking promotion as Secretary of State, Sanders named climate change as our biggest national security threat at the last Democratic debate.

  9. 9
    Jameson Quinn says:

    I’m with MJJ et al.

    Electability: There are reasonable arguments to be made on either side. In this cycle, with the Republicans’ extended crush on Trump, Carson, and Fiorina, I really don’t see the “experience=electability” argument as decisive. And the fact is, Bernie polls better against the probable opponents than Hillary.

    Foreign policy: Iraq. And even if it weren’t for that, I trust Bernie’s instincts better. I wouldn’t want Bernie as secretary of state but I have no doubt he can find someone qualified.

    3. Congress matters. Thus, coattails matter. Sanders’s constituencies are less-reliable voters than Clinton’s, so motivating them is more important to having long coattails.

    4. Yes, it is time for a woman. Remember how the same people who are supporting Sanders now were trying to recruit Warren earlier? But if we’re making this about the symbolism, then… can you really say that Clinton would be where she is if she weren’t married to whom she is?

  10. 10
    Ben Lehman says:

    And the fact is, Bernie polls better against the probable opponents than Hillary.

    I’ve seen Sanders supporters say this repeatedly, but I haven’t found a decent source [1]. The polling aggregates I’ve looked at show Sanders noticeably behind Clinton in head-to-head polls vs Republicans, although both are scarily close.

    Honestly, I don’t think these polls are worth very much, at this point, so I wouldn’t consider it particularly meaningful data other than “Trump is way more electable than most people think.” But, since you bring it up, it’s worth addressing that, no, Clinton does better in such polls than Sanders.

    yrs–
    –Ben

    [1] You can cherry pick individual polls and come up with nearly any narrative, which may be where this particular line comes from. Aggregates are much more trustworthy, though.

  11. 11
    Ampersand says:

    But if we’re making this about the symbolism, then… can you really say that Clinton would be where she is if she weren’t married to whom she is?

    Nor would Bill Clinton have gotten where he is without being married to Hillary Clinton; she’s clearly been essential to his career.

    I don’t think this is a concern at all; Clinton is by now a well-established political figure with years of high political positions (Senator, SoS) that she obviously earned on her own. Nor do I think the “we should avoid electing this woman because she has a famous spouse” position actually works at all as an anti-sexism position. (To put it mildly.)

    (Yes, name recognition certainly helped her get elected to the Senate – but if name recognition alone were enough, then we would constantly see celebrity candidates winning, when in fact they usually lose.)

  12. 12
    Lee1 says:

    Agree with Amp – at this point Hillary Clinton has enough of a resume that she doesn’t need to ride on Bill’s coattails.
    Also, maybe I’m being naive and stupid, but I have to think/hope that when the Republican primaries play out Trump, Carson, and Fiorina will be left by the side of the highway. They say so many breathtakingly ignorant/offensive/dishonest things (less so with Fiorina as near as I can tell, but she’s said plenty – see Planned Parenthood) that Republicans will wise up and realize they don’t want one of them as their nominee. Not that I’m hoping for a strong Republican nominee – I’d like to see Clinton win – but it would be disheartening to think that half the country (or whatever percentage…) really thinks Trump or Carson would make a good president. They’re buffoons.

  13. 13
    Lee1 says:

    I should add that in 2008 I said I would never vote for Clinton in a million years – her vote for the Iraq invasion and her justification of that vote were absolutely pathetic. But she’s kinda/sorta acknowledged that, and from what I can tell she did a fantastic job as secretary of state. Thinking about her as president vs. Trump or Carson as president is like a bad Saturday Night Live skit. It might be a “hold your nose” vote, but if one of them is running against her it’s a no-doubter for me.

  14. 14
    JutGory says:

    I don’t want a Bush or a Clinton on the ballot, even though they are both qualified.

    I don’t like Clinton because I can’t believe a word she says.

    I won’t vote for Sanders because he means every word he says.

    No Trump.

    No Carson.

    Fiorina? Meh, but no. We have had 8 years of on the job training as President and it has not been pretty.

    Kasich is probably the most qualified candidate, if not Sanders, but he will not likely get nominated.

    Huckabee? Qualified, but please no (!).

    -Jut

  15. 15
    LTL FTC says:

    JutGory:

    I think that leaves Martin O’Malley. Maybe now he will have too many supporters to fit them all in a phone booth.

  16. 16
    JutGory says:

    LTL FTC:

    Who?

    -Jut

  17. 17
    LTL FTC says:

    JutGory:

    Martin O’Malley is a fictional character from The Wire, based on Baltimore Mayor Tommy Carcetti, who somehow assumed corporeal form, became governor of Maryland and now wants to be President.

  18. 18
    Lee1 says:

    Ooh, we need more characters from The Wire coming to real life! (I mean except for the drugs and violence thing – but who wouldn’t love to see Kima and McNulty and Bunk as real people?)

  19. 19
    Jake Squid says:

    I, for one, have no desire to see McNulty IRL. I have an active desire not to see McNulty IRL. I have a less active desire not to see Bunk IRL.

  20. 20
    desipis says:

    I’m not American, but I think this video sums up why I would support Sanders based on what I’ve seen.

  21. 21
    LTL FTC says:

    Very relevant article about “Bernie Bros,” feminist critics of Hillary and the generally terrible quality of debate about what says about everyone involved:

    http://thebaffler.com/blog/my-kind-misogyny

  22. 22
    Harlequin says:

    LTL FTC, I wouldn’t describe that article as having anything to say about “the generally terrible quality of debate”. As far as I can tell, the thesis is this:

    The left feminist critique of Hillary Clinton is being intentionally ignored by high­-profile feminists because its very existence contradicts a thesis they hold dear: that criticism of Hillary Clinton—even from the left—is primarily the domain of misogynistic men who hate to see a strong woman succeed.

    So that’s a pattern: prominent feminists note criticism from Hillary from misogynist men, and only note criticism from those corners. Then it makes an incorrect argument: it supplies supporting evidence for the first thing, that feminists talk about Bernie Bros, but it doesn’t provide any real evidence that they don’t talk about other kinds of criticism. Which it can’t, because they do. The closest thing it comes to addressing the second thing–that they ignore other kinds of criticism–is this:

    When asked why she overlooked feminist critiques of Hillary that would complicate her argument, Traister replied, “But if any of you want to do followup on all the women using sexist language, I’d read!”

    Which sounds pretty damning until you note that the article Traister wrote that the original tweeter responded to contains this paragraph:

    To be clear, anti-feminist condescension does not come from the majority of Hillary Clinton’s critics or Bernie Sanders’s supporters. While summer polls showed a big gender divide between Bernie and Hillary fans, that gap has become pretty negligible. Plenty of women (including me) are Bernie fans, and some are as vivid in their loathing for Hillary as any man. Likewise, there are plenty of guys capable of engaging in reasoned discourse about Clinton’s shortcomings and Sanders’s strong points without descending to disdain for feminist concerns they don’t agree with.

    And I think that’s why the weasel word “primarily” is in the quote from the article I used up top. The problem isn’t that high-profile feminists aren’t addressing the points the author wants addressed; it’s that they’re not addressing them as much as she would like. And when the article isn’t “high-profile feminists ignore feminist criticism of Hillary Clinton” but “high-profile feminists talk about something more than another thing and I think they should talk more about the second thing instead”, it no longer represents a blind spot in the world view of feminists, just a personal preference on the part of the person writing the article.

    Then the second half of the article is just the author’s opinions on why Sanders is better than Clinton. Which: fine! Good that she’s making her points, and I found some of them persuasive (others less so). But it has little to do with the “terrible quality of the debate”, as you put it, LTL FTC.

  23. 23
    Mandolin says:

    I support Sanders in the primary as a Californian, which mostly means I can vote for the person I agree with ideologically without having to worry about electibility, in the same way that Barry gets to.

    I think the rhetoric about Clinton is weird and sometimes sucky. I thought it was particularly sucky last election cycle when both Clinton and Obama supporters decided to go after the other candidate with a vigor that seemed pointless. The two were much more similar on policy than most people seemed to acknowledge.

    Clinton isn’t as liberal as I’d like–almost no one in elected office is–but given the constraints of what you can actually get in elected office, I think she’s accomplished, intelligent, and experienced. I won’t be holding my nose.

  24. 24
    Deb says:

    I can’t vote for Clinton because she’s a weather vane with no apparent morality of her own. She voted for Iraq because it was popular, she was against gay marriage until it was supported by a majority of Americans, and she’s spent this entire campaign offering watered-down versions of Sanders’s proposals because she recognizes that he has actual grassroots support. The only thing she seems to be consistent on is getting America involved in foreign entanglements, which I’m firmly against.

    I’d like to point out that I was one of those who was in favor of Warren before Sanders entered the race. To be perfectly honest neither Warren nor Sanders are left enough for me. But I see that Sanders is still walking the picket lines, still doing his job in the Senate, and still fighting hard for Americans every day. I don’t see that same intensity and commitment from Warren or Clinton, although in Clinton’s case that seems to be because she’s a moderate conservative and not at all invested in the struggles of working people. At least Warren cares, albeit in a detached college professor sort of way. So I’m happy for Warren to stay in the Senate and for the White House to be occupied by a real progressive for once. As he himself has said, he can’t do it alone, but thankfully his plan is to build a grassroots organization that will function outside of his campaign. That means getting new voters in local and state elections, not to mention Congress. That means activism after Inauguration Day, not having everyone go home and leave politics to the political class. He’s talking about a real political revolution, not just empty words. That I can get behind, even if I disagree with him on a few points. And hey, isn’t it about time that this country had a Jewish president?

  25. 25
    Ampersand says:

    Deb, if you don’t mind my asking: When you say you “can’t vote for Clinton,” do you mean in the primary, or do you mean that if she wins the primary, you wouldn’t vote for her in the general election?

    I don’t especially mind voting for weather vanes, within reason; I want politicians to be at least somewhat responsive to the preferences of their base. (Isn’t it good that Clinton and most other elected Democrats changed their mind and now favor same-sex marriage, for example?) On most domestic issues, Clinton or Sanders would be too constrained by political realities for the relatively small policy differences between them to matter.

    You say Sanders has led a more virtuous and consistent political life, and I don’t doubt you. But I’m not convinced that would make him a better president. I think single-payer care is a great idea, but it doesn’t matter to me that Sanders favors single-payer care and Clinton doesn’t, because we’re not getting single-payer care during the next presidency regardless.

    The one area where I think he might be a better president is on foreign policy. But he’s a bit of a wild card there, because he’s never shown much interest in foreign policy, so if he’s elected probably it’ll come down to whoever he appoints and listens to – and we have no idea who that’ll be.

    FWIW, I probably will vote for Sanders – not because I think he’ll win, but because I think voting for Sanders puts pressure on Clinton to move to the left a bit.

  26. 26
    closetpuritan says:

    I had a conversation about Clinton and Sanders recently, and the “will Republicans work harder to obstruct Clinton because they have a long history of hating her, or Sanders because he’s a socialist?” idea came up, and I decided, it doesn’t MATTER. Obama was neither of those things, he worked* really hard to reach across the aisle, and Republicans have pretty much been using every tool in their toolbox to keep Democratic-favored legislation or appointments from passing.

    *ETA: past tense, meaning in his first term, mostly

  27. 27
    Falstaff says:

    I go back and forth on this a little. Not a lot, because I don’t really view who I vote for in the general election as much of a choice (I mean, please, every time I look at the Republican candidates they look a little scarier; anybody’d make a better president than those guys) but because I’ve really grown to dislike Hillary Clinton.

    I really find her foreign policy stances distasteful — inhumane, honestly, for the most part — but I know I have to be realistic: as a Quaker, I know I’m never going to have the opportunity to vote for a major party’s nominee who agrees with me about foreign policy. That’s just never going to happen — I’m too far out of step with the American mainstream.

    I think what it comes down to, for me, is this: I have never forgiven Secretary Clinton for voting for the Iraq War. I genuinely believe that there can only have been two ways she could’ve made that vote — either she was taken in by the Bush Administration’s obvious lies (which would make her a fool, and I don’t think she’s a fool), or she cynically chose to vote in a way that would further her later political career (which would make her even more of an asshole than I’d expect a powerful politician to be, given what the vote was over). Given that, she would never be my first choice for much of anything.

    And I feel pretty strongly about Sanders’ superiority as a politician — I’ve been so delighted to see someone who agrees with me about so many things getting political traction in a national election. I never expected to see such a thing, and it’s exciting.

    All that said, though, so many of the narratives about Clinton are so ugly (Mandolin states this nicely above) and Clinton herself is, I think, a relatively wise and decent politician. I’ll be pleased enough to vote for her in the general election, I suppose.

    I can’t say I wouldn’t be more pleased with Sanders, but that doesn’t look to be in the cards.

  28. 28
    Jameson Quinn says:

    A bit late, but: the point of my “married” comment wasn’t the ridiculous idea that we should discount Clinton because of her husband, but that the purely symbolic value of her win would be lessened. So we should be talking about policy not symbolism. I guess any such argument is self-defeating, though; the way to get us to talk policy more is to do so.

  29. 29
    Crissa says:

    What ‘disastrous’ Libya policies? Honestly, are we counting as a disaster that thousands of people weren’t murdered by an army? What’s the disaster? That their civil war was over relatively quickly, and it’s just down to trying to disarmed the rebels and get everyone under one government – which woud’ve been the same problem no matter what the US did? It’s not like we armed the groups which are problems now, it’s not like they weren’t armed before, what, we should’ve allowed punitive bombing and shelling to continue, in the name of ‘peace’?

    I think Clinton has shown she is more hawkish than Obama – but that she’s learned from his response to this that there are often better, more calm ways of dealing with things. And that’s the reason I voted Obama before.

    And honestly, I think either Clinton or Sanders would make a great President. But I have no illusions that a President Sanders could automagically do anything better than Clinton (there’s no evidence for it) nor is there any that a President Clinton would block anything Sanders would try in Congress.

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