A Reassessment of Hillary Clinton

Historically, I have not been a fan of Hillary Clinton and, as the 2016 presidential campaign I decided to back her because (i) I thought she was more electable than Bernie Sanders in the general election, and (ii) she was the lesser of the two evils given those running for the GOP nomination.  Once Trump won the GOP nomination, the latter factor became all the stronger for me. Now, a funny thing has happened.  As the campaign circus has progressed, I have come to sort of like Hillary.  She doesn't leave one warm and fuzzy, but candidly, that is not a factor that should matter in deciding who is competent to lead the country and face the complexities of the world today.  The idea of wanting a president one could" have a beer with" is, in my opinion, the height of idiocy.  Do you want a surgeon who is competent or one that you can go drinking with?  It is the same concept.  A column in the New York Times looks at why Hillary is winning so far and why she id the competent answer as to who should be elected on November 8, 2016.  Here are highlights:

Hillary Clinton is a terrible candidate. Hey, that’s what pundits have been saying ever since this endless campaign began. You have to go back to Al Gore in 2000 to find a politician who faced as much jeering from the news media, over everything from claims of dishonesty (which usually turn out to be based on nothing) to matters of personal style.

Strange to say, however, Mrs. Clinton won the Democratic nomination . . . . How is that possible?

The usual suspects are already coalescing around an answer — namely, that she just got lucky. If only the Republicans hadn’t nominated Donald Trump, the story goes, she’d be losing badly.

But here’s a contrarian thought: Maybe Mrs. Clinton is winning because she possesses some fundamental political strengths — strengths that fall into many pundits’ blind spots.

First of all, who was this other, stronger candidate that the G.O.P. might have chosen? Remember, Mr. Trump won the nomination because he gave his party’s base what it wanted, channeling the racial antagonism that has been the driving force for Republican electoral success for decades. All he did was say out loud what his rivals were trying to convey with dog whistles, which explains why they were so ineffective in opposing him.

And those establishment candidates were much more Trumpian than those fantasizing about a different history — say, one in which the G.O.P. nominated Marco Rubio — acknowledge.

How many of them [GOP candidates] really believe that tax cuts have magical powers, that climate change is a giant hoax, that saying the words “Islamic terrorism” will somehow defeat ISIS? Yet pretending to believe these things is the price of admission to the club — and the falsity of that pretense shines through.

When political commentators praise political talent, what they seem to have in mind is the ability of a candidate to match one of a very limited set of archetypes: the heroic leader, the back-slapping regular guy you’d like to have a beer with, the soaring orator. Mrs. Clinton is none of these things: too wonky, not to mention too female, to be a regular guy, a fairly mediocre speechifier; her prepared zingers tend to fall flat.

Yet the person tens of millions of viewers saw in this fall’s debates was hugely impressive all the same: self-possessed, almost preternaturally calm under pressure, deeply prepared, clearly in command of policy issues. And she was also working to a strategic plan: Each debate victory looked much bigger after a couple of days, once the implications had time to sink in, than it may have seemed on the night.

Oh, and the strengths she showed in the debates are also strengths that would serve her well as president.

Furthermore, there’s one thing Mrs. Clinton brought to this campaign that no establishment Republican could have matched: She truly cares about her signature issues, and believes in the solutions she’s pushing.

I know, we’re supposed to see her as coldly ambitious and calculating, and on some issues — like macroeconomics — she does sound a bit bloodless, even when she clearly understands the subject and is talking good sense. But when she’s talking about women’s rights, or racial injustice, or support for families, her commitment, even passion, are obvious. She’s genuine, in a way nobody in the other party can be.

So let’s dispel with this fiction that Hillary Clinton is only where she is through a random stroke of good luck. She’s a formidable figure, and has been all along.

New Orleans Times-Picayune: Hillary if the Only Choice for President

The parade of major news papers in deep red states endorsing Hillary Clinton (some of which have almost never endorsed a Democrat) continues.   Now, the New Orleans Times-Picayune, the largest paper in in Louisiana has endorsed Hillary Clinton as "the only choice for president" despite her flaws.  The other side of this coin is that no major newspaper - that is correct, none - has endorsed Donald Trump.  Here are highlights from the Times-Picayune endorsement:

The president of the United States has a sacred obligation to the people of this nation: to carry the torch for our ideals. The promise of America is that your class, race, religion or gender won't limit your opportunities. Every president should be committed first and foremost to that principle. If not, how can we claim to lead the free world?

Our next president will inherit an economy that has yet to fully recover from the 2008 recession. Jobs have grown over the past eight years, but wages for many Americans are significantly lower than they were pre-recession. More people have health care today, but the costs are rising. There is a sense for many that their lives are not on stable financial ground.

In an election that has become more about "least dangerous" than "most inspiring," which candidate is better qualified to confront the complex challenges facing us? Our choice is Hillary Clinton.

Mrs. Clinton has a long record of public service. She proved her dedication to equality when she traveled to south Alabama as a law student in 1972 to uncover government-sanctioned racial discrimination at private schools.

When her husband Bill Clinton was president of the United States, she worked to get Congress to provide health care services for millions of poor children. As a U.S. senator representing New York, she helped secure $21 billion from the federal government to help New York rebuild after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Louisianians certainly can understand how important that was to her constituents.

As secretary of state for President Barack Obama, she negotiated a ceasefire in Gaza and got China, Russia and the European Union to agree to sanctions against Iran. She also made women's rights across the world a priority.

Mrs. Clinton is a seriously flawed candidate. Many voters don't trust her, and with good reason. . . . . But Mrs. Clinton's failings can't compare, in scale or in number, to Republican nominee Donald Trump's.

Mr. Trump has proved himself wholly unsuited to be president. He has spent this campaign denigrating women, Muslims, Mexicans, refugees, disabled people, the parents of a soldier who died in Iraq and essentially anyone who questioned him. He has suggested that an African-American protester at one of his rallies should be "roughed up," made gross generalizations suggesting that all black people live in poor, violent neighborhoods, expressed support for racial profiling by police. And he threatened in the last debate to jail his political rival if elected.

Mr. Trump's go-to move is the insult. His combative style would be disastrous on the world stage, where poorly chosen words can incite violence and cost lives. His affection for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and use of Russian propaganda to attack Mrs. Clinton are a frightening signal of what his approach to foreign policy would be.

The recording that surfaced Oct. 8 of Mr. Trump bragging about forcing himself on women and grabbing them between the legs is abhorrent. His characterization of the episode as mere "locker room talk" bespoke a pathological inability to acknowledge, and repair, his mistakes.

Also troubling is Mr. Trump's refusal to release his tax returns, which is unprecedented in recent political history. What is he hiding?

Although he routinely attacks Mrs. Clinton as a "Washington insider," her experience in and around government is clearly an asset. She is a policy wonk with a detailed vision of what she wants to do and a unique understanding – as a former first lady, U.S. senator and secretary of state – of how to achieve it. 

As for which candidate is better for Louisiana, there is no contest. Mrs. Clinton is committed to investments in infrastructure, including ports, that would benefit our state. She also wants to offer preschool to every 4-year-old, something that fits Louisiana's goal of expanding and improving the quality of early childhood education.

But for New Orleanians, perhaps the most compelling contrast between Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton is his intolerance and her inclusiveness. New Orleans has diversity in its DNA. A president who routinely degrades African-Americans, Hispanics, Muslims and women could not, and would not, represent us.

We don't believe Hillary Clinton is everything America needs in a president. But we have no doubt that she is the best choice on the 2016 ballot to move the country forward.