The centrist Democratic Leadership Council, which fought and largely won a battle for the soul of the Democratic party in the 1990s, is on the verge of bankruptcy and is closing its doors, its founder, Al From, confirmed Monday.
The group’s decision to “suspend operations” marks the conclusion of a long slide from its peak of relevance in the Clinton era, and perhaps the beginning a battle over its legacy, as the organization’s founders and allies argue that it has been a victim of its own success – and its liberal critics are already dancing on its grave.
“A taproot of contemporary centrist ferment is no longer in business,” said Will Marshall, who co-founded the DLC and its allied think tank, the Progressive Policy Institute. PPI, which Marshall still runs, spun off from the DLC in 2009 and is one of a small handful of self-styled moderate groups seeking the DLC’s mantle as the true home for moderate Democrats. …Politico
That comes from exactly five years ago, almost to the minute. A lot of us wanted that suspension to take place during the Clinton administration. The DLC was the more — much more — important stain on the Clinton presidency than the stain on the blue dress. The ties with Wall Street and corporate America turned out to be shackles for many honest Democrats. The chubby fleshiness of Clinton’s face and body seemed to represent the self-satisfaction of the man. These were the days before we all got to know Karl Rove. When he appeared on the front line of national — not just Texas — scene, he had the same kind of pink and chubby self-satisfaction written all over him.
It’s 2016, Hillary’s turn again. Bill is back and with him the DLC and angry stabs at Bernie Sanders, a lean wiry man with none of the pro-corporate markings of the DLC. The flushed, energized former president is, it seems, pretty damn mad.
Now, as Hillary Clinton — who barely won the Iowa caucuses last week — seeks to seize momentum from Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont in his own back yard, days before the New Hampshire primary, that moment of truth has come. The former president, uncharacteristically quiet in recent weeks even as Republican contender Donald Trump called him “an abuser,” lashed out at Sanders on Sunday, according to reports from Bloomberg Politics, Politico and the New York Times, while campaigning for his wife in New Hampshire, leveling charges that the senator is hypocritical and that some of his followers are sexist.
The former president appeared to get the most mileage out of his criticism of “Bernie Bros” — the name given to some supposed young male supporters of the senator. Bill Clinton did not use the term — but he offered quite the critique. As Politico noted, Clinton accused these people, some of whom have been denounced by Sanders, of sexist behavior online.
“People who have gone online to defend Hillary, to explain why they supported her, have been subject to vicious trolling and attacks that are literally too profane often, not to mention sexist, to repeat,” Clinton said, according to the Times. …WaPo
The troll, it would seem, is Clinton himself. Why? Was Hillary supposed to be alone and unchallenged in this race? Did we miss the coronation ceremony? What’s going on here? A democratic election process? Or yet another of those annual meetings of a corporations whose shareholders are allowed to have an opinion but are discouraged from urging any changes in the status quo ante?
Is Hillary grateful to Bill. Or horrified? I hope it’s the latter.
Cross-posted from Prairie Weather
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