Senator Clinton’s VP Talk Seems Misguided

Please click here to see my updated thinking on this issue.

I said many months ago that if Hillary Clinton were the nominee of the Democratic Party, I would vote for her.

I said I would even though the Clintons are somewhat centrist for my views, and even though I still resent the loss of Congress in 1994.

Just what could these people do to make up for the damage of 12 years of Republican control of Congress?

And it’s all still true—I’m still not a fan of Hillary Clinton, and I would still vote for her if she were the nominee.  

The bottom line is winning the election.

Now that it seems very likely she has lost the nomination fight, Senator Clinton is saying she would accept the Vice Presidential nomination.

You know what—I’ll accept it as well if offered.

The thing is the nominee makes this call.

Supporters of Senator Clinton are good people and I have no fight with them. The time is long overdue for a woman President. I’m sorry that many good people are so disappointed in the outcome of this race.

However, I’ve found comments by Senator Clinton about hard working white Americans and about Robert Kennedy’s killing somewhat difficult to accept.

If Senator Obama picks Senator Clinton, I will be on board. I hope though he chooses another path.  

Below is former Vice President Nelson Rockefeller of New York. ( The link to the U.S. Senate essay series on Vice Presidents is very good.)  Mr. Rockefeller was the last New Yorker to serve as Vice President. His term in office was 1974-1977.

  

Political Parties Take Advantage Of All Core Voters

Many white Democratic women are feeling shut-out by a Democratic Party now rallying around Barack Obama.

That is what I am reading.

It makes sense that someone, man or woman, waiting a long time in life for a woman President, would be upset by Senator Hillary Clinton’s apparent loss in the nomination fight.

Someone waiting a long time for a Black President might feel the same way. 

Some of these women—It’s not clear how many–say that they just won’t line up and support the Democratic nominee. They say that women—white women in this case—have been an important group for Democrats at the polls and this fact should be recognized.    

Okay. Folks have that right to vote for John McCain.

But political parties “use” core constituencies all the time.

They use them in two ways. One way as a natural result of the pluralism in American society, and in one way less benign.  

When you have two major political parties for 300 million people, the fact is that some people are going to be left out for the top spots in any given election cycle.  And policy choices are going to made by governing majorities in legislative chambers that reward some core groups of political supporters more than others. 

To some extent, this is the way it has to work.

Less benign, is the expectation that reliable voters will vote for a party no matter what.

I’ve said a number of times in this blog that as a lifelong city dweller, I have, like the majority of others in the two cities I’ve lived in as an adult, always voted for Democrats at the local level. I’ve often not seen very much in return. 

In honesty, if I ever see a viable option at the polls at the municipal level, I might take that option.

What have Black voters gained over the last 20 or 30 years from 90% support for the Democratic Party? 

Has the Republican Party delivered for rural voters and Evangelicals? I bet many would tell you they have been used as well.  

I believe in political parties. They provide voters with a shorthand to navigate a very complex set of issues in our very big and complex country. 

Political races are, in my view, about issues.

But it is also so that politics is an industry with office-holders, staffers, and campaign professionals who want to keep things as they are for their own benefit.

It’s up to voters and activists to change this fact.

For people on the left side of the aisle and upset about Senator Clinton’s apparent loss, this election is going to come down to either winning and moving ahead, or losing and wasting yet more years of our lives in a country not making progress.

People can decide what they want to do.