A Snapshot of the Clinton Psychosis

This morning I had to stop my audit of the newspaper abruptly. Once I had completed Amy Chozick's "Midterms, for Clinton Team, Aren’t All Gloom" I had to comment.

It was entirely predictable that the big-money players who control the Democratic Party were going to respond to the midterm debacle by banging the drum for Hillary's presidential candidacy rather than address obvious voter concerns, foremost of which is an economy that is as unequal as any going back to the 19th-century era of the Robber Barons.

"Psychosis" is a general psychiatric term signifying "a loss of contact with reality," and this is what is on full display in Amy Chozick's frontpage story.

Chozick provides an insider account of  the "Hillary for President" campaign readying to launch from the smoking rubble of the Democratic Party's collapse. The Hillary exploratory committee will wait until after Mary Landrieu's political corpse is ushered to the charnel house on December 6, the date of the runoff election in Louisiana against Republican Rep. Bill Cassidy.

The first passage from the Chozick piece that has to be mentioned regards the staging of a "listening tour" as a way for Hillary to reintroduce herself to a miserable, sullen electorate that now consistently polls at super-majority levels of disapproval for government and concern over the economy:

But before any campaigning begins, Mrs. Clinton will first embark on a listening tour that echoes what she did first as a candidate for the Senate in New York and then as a freshman senator, gathering ideas and advice from a cross-section of influential people about their concerns.

“She’ll slow down a bit, get off the radar, get ready for this, and ready includes being a good freshman senator, with a legal pad and lots of conversations,” said one person with direct knowledge of her plans who spoke on condition of anonymity because the plans have not been made public. 

Meanwhile, the people around Mrs. Clinton will speed up their efforts to vet potential campaign aides, casually connect with donors and begin to help Mrs. Clinton craft a clearer message, especially on the economy. Although Mrs. Clinton’s midterm campaigning schedule took her to Iowa, Pennsylvania, Colorado, North Carolina and other important 2016 states, she did not spend much time getting to know the specific concerns of voters, something she would need to do ahead of a presidential campaign.

So what we are to understand is that Hillary, who has been barnstorming across the country for candidates during the midterms, is unaware what "specific concerns of voters" are. It is hard to take seriously. In fact, it can't be taken seriously. It is all just part of the dramaturgy of repackaging a bloated, tired, wealthy, famous defender of the Deep State as somehow concerned with what voters think. Hillary knows what voters want. They want jobs, and they want an end to interminable foreign wars. But Hillary has no intention of giving the people what they want; hence, the necessity of the listening tour to create the impression, the optics of a leader solicitous of the governed.

The next absurdity immediately follows from where the last quote leaves off:

Exit polls from Tuesday are being pored over for signs about what voters’ opinions could mean for Mrs. Clinton’s message and approach. Midterm voters expressed frustration with government, but also economic unease. 

“One of the questions for 2016 is: Which of those will 2016 be about? Will it be about the size and cost of government, or will it be about who the economy works for?” Mr. Garin asked. “If it’s an election about who the economy works for, then the Democratic nominee will be in a much better position to win,” he added.

Really? I thought that's what Obama's low approval rating was all about. People have given up believing he is going to do anything about economic inequality. "Obama bamboozled us for two elections. He ain't gonna bamboozle us anymore," the thinking goes. How is Hillary going to make people believe that she -- a rich old mean white lady -- is going to be any better?

Then, to return to the underlying theme of pychosis, what was Clinton's track record during the midterms? As highlighted in the first quote block, Hillary actively campaigned in bellwether states of Iowa, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Colorado, not to mention Arkansas and Kentucky. In Kentucky she worked for Clinton family friend Alison Lundergran Grimes in her attempt to unseat the ghoulish Mitch McConnell; in Arkansas, for Clinton family friend Senator Mark Pryor. All Hillary had to show for her effort was failure, not a clarion call for 2016:

During the midterm campaign, Mrs. Clinton raised more than $10 million for Democrats, and she and former President Bill Clinton attended at least 75 events on behalf of more than 30 candidates, building and rebuilding the relationships she and her husband are known for. 

The Clintons worked hard on behalf of Alison Lundergan Grimes, a candidate for Senate in Kentucky, and Senator Mark Pryor of Arkansas, and were somewhat startled by their double-digit losses. But it was former Gov. Charlie Crist’s loss to Gov. Rick Scott of Florida that carried the biggest implications for a 2016 presidential campaign, as the Clintons had hoped for Democratic leadership in a critical battleground state.

Chozick, a smart cookie who used to cover the media industry for the Gray Lady prior to receiving the assignment of exclusively reporting on Hillary, no doubt relished writing this story; intended by Hillary backers as a whetting of the public appetite, it comes off, thanks to Chozick's skillful construction, as a study in perverse delusion.

Take Chozick's last paragraph. (A few paragraphs prior she had described Sean Wilentz's assistance to Hillary. The odious faux-left academic historian was deployed during Hillary's 2008 presidential run to accuse Obama of race-baiting, and he is now helping her to craft her stump speech.)

As the outline for a campaign is drawn, Mrs. Clinton’s supporters describe what they envision as a “New Clinton Map” that they believe could create a winning coalition for 2016, drawing on the white working-class women who have long supported Mrs. Clinton and the young voters and African-Americans who helped elect Mr. Obama.

Yes, that's right. The Clintons, as guilty of playing the "negrophobia" card as any other politician (think Sister Soulja), are relying on black people and students to turnout in 2016. (Remember, it was Hillary who shepherded through the favorable EIS on Keystone XL when she was head of the State Dept.) That's chutzpah.

If Democrats buy this load of malarkey there might be some substance to the thought that the party of Jackson will crater sooner rather than later, an outcome favorable to the future of the planet.

Keystone XL Rallies

Last night rallies opposing the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline were held throughout the country. The pipeline, if all phases of the project are completed, will run from Hardisty, Alberta to Port Arthur, Texas and transport daily 830,000 gallons of heavy crude oil extracted from bitumen deposits in Canada. At least 100 spills are projected over the lifetime of the pipeline.

The rallies were called because the State Department released its final environmental impact statement (EIS) on Keystone on Friday (when news meant to be buried is usually released) and it was interpreted by most of the mainstream press to signal an approval of the pipeline by the Obama administration.

Secretary of State John Kerry is slated to make the call since Keystone crosses an international border, and then three months after that Obama will make the final decision; the Wall Street Journal reports that a final decision could come as early as this June.

The reason why the final EIS is being seen as a green light for the project is its conclusion that the dirty oil, absent Keystone, will find its way to market anyway by means of rail. Here's how Coral Davenport of the New York Times put it in this past Saturday's frontpage story:

The State Department released a report on Friday concluding that the Keystone XL pipeline would not substantially worsen carbon pollution, leaving an opening for President Obama to approve the politically divisive project. 

The department’s long-awaited environmental impact statement appears to indicate that the project could pass the criteria Mr. Obama set forth in a speech last summer when he said he would approve the 1,700-mile pipeline if it would not “significantly exacerbate” the problem of greenhouse gas emissions. Although the pipeline would carry 830,000 barrels of oil a day from Canada to the Gulf Coast, the report appears to indicate that if it were not built, carbon-heavy oil would still be extracted at the same rate from pristine Alberta forest and transported to refineries by rail instead.

Bill McKibben of 350.org and others pushed back on this reading, saying that ample evidence exists in the EIS to justify Obama blocking the project. This from a story, "Pipeline Opponents’ Hopes Now Rest Largely on Kerry," that appeared the same day by Sarah Wheaton and Coral Davenport:

Still, opponents of the pipeline found some encouragement in the report, in passages that subtly vindicated their warnings.

“This report today reflects some grudging movement,” said Bill McKibben of 350.org, a group that has made opposition to the pipeline its signature issue. 

Activists pointed to a line in the report contending that the “total direct and indirect emissions associated with the proposed project would contribute to cumulative global greenhouse gas emissions.” 

In a conference call with reporters, Mr. McKibben said, “This report gives President Obama everything he needs in order to block this project.”

I had RSVP'd to attend the rally last night at the Federal Building downtown. But in a display of weakness, which is a recurrent pattern with me when it comes to attending political gatherings, I opted instead to get some takeout food and go home. After an unusually mild January, the weather has turned cold again, dipping down into the mid-30s; plus, I was feeling a little sleep-deprived from listening to the street revelry following Seattle's Super Bowl victory on Sunday night.

Anyhow, I'm sure I was not the only one to no-show; an ill omen, I would think. Without a huge display of popular opposition, it is a safe bet that Obama will approve Keystone XL. Signs point in that diecrtion. A couple key Democrat Senate seats (oil politicians Begich of Alaska and Landrieu of Louisiana) and possibly control of the Senate apparently hang in the balance of a green light.

The danger of approving Keystone is more existential for Democrats. What is remarkable about the anti-Keystone campaign is the extent to which all the big, mainstream environmental organizations -- NRDC, Sierra Club, FOE, League of Conservation Voters -- are on board and actively mobilizing their memberships. If Obama goes ahead and approves the pipeline he will be doing so based upon the tried-and-true reasoning that all these people -- vital Democratic constituents -- will fall back into line with the next election. Why? Because they have nowhere else to turn. This has been the pattern for decades, not only for conservationists but for labor unionists as well.

But we are now entering into different territory. Planetary crisis is a reality of which people are mindful. Labor is dying, and so too apparently are the days when go-along-to-get-along rules at the big enviro groups.

Next steps? Massive direct action coupled with a third-party political movement.

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UPDATE: Here is a link to some Monday rally photos.