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Hillary meets the anti-war left: booing at progressive conference
Hillary Clinton is supposed to have some of the most dedicated factions of the Democratic Party in her corner, but there's a new interest group competing for power in addition to minorities, the teachers' unions and feminist activists: the anti-war left.
And by the often tepid and sometimes hostile response she received at the "Take Back America" conference Tuesday -- including booing -- she has a long ways to go to win over liberals outraged over the war. ( Some lefties even speculated that she welcomed the outrage as her "Sister Souljah" moment to build up her credibility with the general public.) The line that drew that strongest negative response was this effort to create the appearance of centrism in her position on Iraq: "I do not think it is a smart strategy either for the president to continue with his open-ended commitment, which I think does not put enough pressure on the new Iraqi government, nor do I think it is smart strategy to set a date certain. I do not agree that that is in the best interesets of our troops or our country."
That spurred either mostly silence or booing, some of it led by members of the direct action group Code Pink.
In contrast, Senator John Kerry, offering yet another apology for supporting the war and offering a fiery attack on Bush's failed war policies, won strong applause and some favorable online commentary.
But no new politician-hero of the left has emerged at the conference, even as some progressives hungered for the return of the supposedly new and improved Al Gore, riding a crest of (perhaps deluded) hope in his candidacy from a left that is, as Neil Young sings, "Looking for a Leader." On the final day of the conference, Senators Barack Obama and Russ Feingold, one of the left's favorite candidates, address the crowd.
See and hear for yourself what some of the politicians and activists had to offer by going to this complete list of speakers (scroll down to Tuesday for Clinton, Kerry, Pelosi and others), with some videos and transcripts provided.
Hillary has been rushing to get in front of the parade of public opinion, but she is unable to follow its zigs and zags. She supported the Iraq War, not out of principle, but out of ambition and because it played well to some of her constituents in New York. When the war started going badly, Hillary called for more troops, children of the poor, lower middle class, most from the red states (not her daughter or the children of her anti-Arab constituents who cheered for the war). Then she backs a constitutional amendment to make the flag a quasi religious icon. Then she works against the interests of the poor and lower income Americans by supporting the invasion of aliens from the South. The phony mantra that they are taking jobs no American wants is a lie -- they're taking construction jobs, for instance that the working middle class relied on and they are taking the jobs of unskilled Americans. The Senate bill gave these aliens rights above Citizens, for example paying only whatever three of the five years of back taxes. The legislation prohibited scrutiny and challenging aliens' falsified documents. Hillary doesn't explain that the costs of the retroactive Social Security benefits (the aliens used identity theft to give employers social security numbers) given these aliens will place a bankrupting burden on the Social Security system just as baby boomers start to claimn benefits from their life-long legal employment. Hillary is an enemy of working and middle class citizens.