It's the economy, stupid and Hillary is going to win

[angus]

I have been expounding on a theory with the people I work with and they are so enthralled by it, I thought I would shoot it out here in DU and see if you guys agree.

Recently, a few polls suggested that Hillary had widened her lead on Rudy by 51-48, or something like that. (look it up on cnn.com, it happened last week) Anyway...I noticed that these recent polls have coincided with some of the worst news about our economy in the past few years. From an economist's standpoint, I think that--regardless of political party--we are about to enter a recession and our economy is on the brink of taking a hit.

If you look at my subject line, you will see I referenced James Carville's great soundbite that helped propel Bill Clinton to victory--"It's the economy, stupid." Despite my feelings toward Carville and his DLC leanings--I have to wholeheartedly agree that the man has a point--or should I say had a point and continues to have a point.

Let's look at a recent example. Bush Sr. lost to Clinton just months after having launched a successful and supported invasion which propelled him to an astronomical approval rating. Like him or not, Bush Sr., was indeed somewhat of a moderate. Rove hadn't entered the picture quite yet, so the Delay-esque towing the party line mantra hadn't hit full swing. In other words, a year or so before the 1992 election--Bush Sr. was quite popular...among everybody.

But then the economy started to suck--and I mean really suck.

Clinton wins.

My theory is this: Take your Iraq war, take your gay marriage, take your abortion, civil rights, etc, etc, etc. and they don't sway as many people as we would like to think. All the DU'ers probably live and die by these issues as do their polar opposites on the extreme right; however, nothing really starts to happen significantly until the economy starts to tank--UNTIL THE AVERAGE JOE STARTS TO FEEL THE PINCH IN HIS WALLET. And what happens then? No matter what party they are registered with, the predominant feeling of this powerful middle America that everybody courts is that "we need to throw the current crew out". That's it--no more, no less. When the economy tanks in America, it's time for regime change. So my feeling is, if the economy keeps continuing this way, Hillary is in. She's the frontrunner for the party that's not in the oval office, and middle America is done with the party that's in the oval office.

[Lucinda]

1. Good point! And welcome to DU! n/t

[Richard Steele]

2. Damn, did I sleep through the Primaries?

[Hardrada]

3. I know now we're doomed. It's the Day of the Hillbots!

[Richard Steele]

4. Show no emotion! (for other candidates)

[Hardrada]

11. Love it! I'm going to keep that pic of the Hillpod chap.

[Swamp Rat]

12. Here ya go:

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. Me too... is it November of '08 already?

and did we go to war with Iran or not?

I have a year to catch up...

:evilgrin:

People forget that until that poll is held, yes the primaries, it is not in stone

And national polls are not necesarily the same as STATE polls for Iowa Caucus Goers

[bridgit]

5. welcome to du, angus, and yeah...is *that* going to piss some folks off around here...

:toast:

[JDPriestly]

6. The problem is that Hillary is not the best person to handle the economy.

She would do better than any of the Republicans, but Edwards and Kucinich are much better on economic issues. Hillary voted for the trade agreement with Peru. It is my understanding that trade agreement provides that anyone who loses money because Peru de-privatizes its social security system in the future can sue Peru in international courts. Privatization of social security is a cruel joke. It is just a means for transferring the hard-earned and meager savings of the poor into the coffers of the wealthiest people in the world. Obama also backed this Peru deal. It's a bad deal all the way around. We need to renegotiate all of our trade deals to insure that they protect workers here and in the countries of our trading partners. The Peru agreement is yet another give-away to huge, soulless corporations.

NAFTA was Bill Clinton's baby, and it has harmed American workers and helped to decimate the American middle class. Edwards in particular wants to build and strengthen the middle class. He is far stronger than Hillary in this respect.

[MonkeyFunk]

7. NAFTA was George H. W. Bush's baby....

[Hardrada]

10. And the Clintons were the adoptive parents.

[MonkeyFunk]

13. "The Clintons"?

Was Hillary president in '94?

[cuke]

14. And Al Gore its white knight

[ShortnFiery]

9. The only Americans who will win with HRC, The DLC and their beloved Third Way ...

Are the Corporate Democratic elites within the investor class. :thumbsdown:

[earthlover]

15. That phrase is so 90's....

I must say, calling people stupid seems to be a fitting slogan for the Hillary backers, I see that a lot these days.

If 9/11 had occurred before 1992, I am not sure "it's the economy, stupid" would have even worked then. It was another time.

The economy tanking would certainly not be good for the Republicans, but we also have to remember that the economy being good did not lead to Gore winning by a steal-proof margin in 2000.

In 04 we tried to make the economy the main issue, and if we would have been able to succeed, Kerry would have won by a steal-proof margin in 04. But at least in 04, the economy played second fiddle to other issues.

Iraq is the dominant issue. So still is security/terrorism. This issue has played for the Reps before. We have to nominate, first and foremost, a candidate who is viewed as strong on national security/defense/foreign policy. With this in the bank, we can concentrate on the economy, health care, and other issues that are good issues for us.

Yes, it is true, that the Reps have fucked up foreign policy,and this has itself made our economy worse.

My point is, however, that unless we put people at rest in trusting us on security, we won't be able to point the issue to the economy.

That is one of the reasons I like Biden. More so than the others, he has an appearance of strength on foreign policy. I think the Reps could try to (and with some success) portray the others as wimps, but this would have difficulty sticking with Biden.

I think this is, rightly or wrongly, one of the reasons Hillary has tried to tow the line supporting Iraq, Iran, etc. I can see how they could portray Obama as being weak (I see it here on these boards, all thils talk about him not being ready, etc so I am sure the Reps would do it too) and Edwards doesn't have a lot of foreign policy credentials either.

I am not endorsing any candidate yet, so I don't have an axe to grind. But this is how I see it. We need to talk about the economy, and structural change. Edwards seems to be best able here, expecially structural change. But we need to nail the defense image, or it may not even get on the radar screen of issues in 08.

[Toots]

16. So all Americans care about is themselves and their money?

Yes I think I would have to agree with you on that point and the world as a whole knows it to be the truth..