AOC Hails President Biden As 'A Good Faith Partner'

[betsuni]

57. A very different time. "The Crime Bill Debate Shows How Short Americans' Memories Are."

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/09/joe-biden-crime-bill-and-americans-short-memory/597547/

2/3 of the Congressional Black Caucus voted for it, had the support of many black leaders.

Rep. James Clyburn describes the reaction of the audience when running for Congress and opposing mandatory minimum prison sentences:

"Those people darn near lynched me in that meeting, and there wasn't a single white person in the room. The atmosphere back then -- the scourge of crack cocaine and what it was doing to these African American communities -- they were all for getting this out of their community."

Charles Rangel opposed the bill, but said he could do so because he was in a safe blue district: "The only thing people wanted from us was to do something." "When you go to town-hall meetings, people just demand that you explain what the hell you're going to do to reduce crime."

Because it was bipartisan, the White House agreed to harsher punishments "to win the Republican votes needed for the passage in the face of conservative Democrats' opposition to the assault weapons ban." Clyburn says they planned to build on the positive things in the bill: "But then we lost in 1994 and all the punitive stuff, the Republicans kept all that and got rid of some of the good stuff."

Of course things changed and politicians' positions change. For example, Bernie Sanders voted for the bill, with reservations, but as many said about the epidemic of organized crime at that time, action was needed. Communities demanded it:

"I think there is no disagreement among all of us that we need strong law enforcement ... clearly there are people in our society that are horribly violent, who are deeply sick and sociopathic, and clearly these people must be put behind bars in order to protect society from them."

AOC said she and Biden would be in different parties in 2020, not 1994.