Hillary Lost Because ...

[Martin Eden]

122. "she was placed in a no-win situation regarding ..."

Last edited Fri Nov 25, 2016, 05:20 PM - Edit history (1)

I agree Hillary was placed in a couple of no-win situations, but it wasn't due to the "personal invective" nastiness of this election. She is tough as nails and very smart, capable of putting a vile demagogue in his place.

On the economy, the rust belt blue collar workers were the deciding factor in this election. They perceived that bad free trade agreements were the biggest factor in the "giant sucking sound" (quote from Ross Perot) of good paying industrial jobs out of our country. Bill Clinton signed the NAFTA deal, and like it or not Hillary is tied to his administration. It doesn't help that she initially called TPP the "gold standard" of trade deals until she saw a populist uprising against it. It also doesn't help that Bill signed financial deregulation that essentially repealed Glass Steagall, or that Hillary garnered huge fees with speeches to Wall Street elites. If she wanted to be the leader of a Democratic Party that truly represented the interests of the 99% and to make voters believe it, her time would have been better spent stumping for the kind of policy changes that would make a positive difference in their lives.

On national security, Hillary was in a no-win position because she voted to give GW Bush authority to invade Iraq. Trump's strategy was to paint a horrific picture of ISIS in Iraq (it is horrific) and Islamic terrorism, then blame it all on Obama/Clinton. It is, of course, overwhelmingly the fault of Bush/Cheney, but Hillary was in no position to make that argument because of her vote to empower them. If, instead, Senator Clinton had stood up and spoke truth to power against that war of choice based on lies, her foreign policy credentials would have been by orders of magnitude a stronger asset in this election.