2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumOn Bill and Hillary's first date in 1971, they crossed a picket line.
http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/18841/hillary_rodham_bill_clinton_and_the_1971_yale_strikeYale Law School students Hillary Rodham and Bill Clinton were both members, alongside future Connecticut senator Richard Blumenthal and Bill Clintons eventual Secretary of the U.S. Department of Labor Robert Reich, of the Yale Law School Students Committee for Local 35, the university's blue-collar worker union, and signatories, during the week before the union went on strike, to a statement asserting WE BELIEVE THE UNION DESERVES THE SUPPORT OF YALE STUDENTS AND FACULTY." Bill Clinton was even, former UNITE HERE President John Wilhelm would note decades later in his eulogy for Vincent Sirabella, the Voter Registration Chairman of the Sirabella for Mayor Campaign.
And yet, on her first date with classmate Clinton in 1971, Rodham would later recall:
We both had wanted to see a Mark Rothko exhibit at the Yale Art Gallery but, because of a labor dispute, some of the university's buildings, including the museum, were closed. As Bill and I walked by, he decided he could get us in if we offered to pick up the litter that had accumulated in the gallery's courtyard. Watching him talk our way in was the first time I saw his persuasiveness in action. We had the entire museum to ourselves. We wandered through the galleries talking about Rothko and twentieth-century art. I admit to being surprised at his interest in and knowledge of subjects that seemed, at first, unusual for a Viking from Arkansas. We ended up in the museum's courtyard, where I sat in the large lap of Henry Moore's sculpture Drape Seated Woman while we talked until dark.
The relationship between Rodham and Clinton, two instrumental figures in the decoupling of the Democratic Party from the priorities of the mainstream labor movement, thus began with the crossing of a picket line.
Indepatriot
(1,253 posts)What a heartwarming tale of disregard for the working class!!!
Ichingcarpenter
(36,988 posts)London Review of Books Archives:
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v18/n11/christopher-hitchens/a-hard-dog-to-keep-on-the-porch
I placed this in Good Reads ......... because it is
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016144552
Octafish
(55,745 posts)In addition to being there he put it to paper for history.
There almost certainly is a relation between Clinton the man and Clintonism as politics, though it may not be as obvious as it seems. If one had to nominate a hinge moment, it would probably be the last days of the George McGovern campaign, in Texas, in 1972. Clinton was sent down to the Lone Star state, along with his friend Taylor Branch, at a moment when the Nixon forces seemed almost unstoppable. (A subsequent post-Watergate myth has depicted the press as anti-Nixon during this period. In point of fact, the general refusal of the media to discuss Nixons illegal use of state power was one of the most striking features of the election.) Taylor Branch, later the outstanding biographer of Martin Luther King, remembers the dying days of McGovernism very clearly. The Texas Democratic Party was riven with faction, and generally uninterested in the pro-civil rights and anti-war position taken by the young volunteers from up North. More time was spent in hand-holding, log-rolling and back-scratching than on the issues. But as Branch suddenly noticed, his friend Bill was very good indeed at the back-slapping and palm-greasing bit. As the vote drew near, senior Texas Democrats like Lloyd Bentsen and John Connally either deserted the McGovern campaign or joined the front organisation calling itself Democrats for Nixon. It was from this sort of timber that Clinton and others were later to carpenter the Democratic Leadership Council. He evidently decided, for whatever mixture of private and public reasons, never to be on the losing side again.
Thank you, Ichingcarpenter. That is a must-read.
Ichingcarpenter
(36,988 posts)put your comment on that thread in Good Reads
I think it is fitting and illuminating to the conversation there.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)brooklynite
(94,737 posts)Awe, what a story. That was then. They sold out unions and the middle class in the 1990s as they entered the elite. Once Bill Clinton left the White House did he and HRC take the path of Jimmy Carter's post presidency? No, their goal was to see how much money they could rake in as a former President and 1st Lady. And from the looks of it they made out like bandits selling access and favors.
Lunabell
(6,110 posts)Nothing else mattered.
restorefreedom
(12,655 posts)"Watching him talk our way in was the first time I saw his persuasiveness in action. We had the entire museum to ourselves."
conning his way through life already. not to mention the privilege that oozes from having the muesum all to themselves
two grifters taking advantage of everyone for what they want. match made in.....well, not heaven i am guessing
Feeling the Bern
(3,839 posts)Support all labor actions at all times! Solidarity!
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)Sophiegirl
(2,338 posts)Of do whatever it takes to get what you want and ignore everything and anyone else.
Good times.
restorefreedom
(12,655 posts)PonyUp
(1,680 posts)Donkees
(31,454 posts)Skwmom
(12,685 posts)Generic Other
(28,979 posts)Clintons WRONG!
libdem4life
(13,877 posts)who didn't even know he was going to his death, put to death. That's even more "romantic", ya think?
That's puts them in the Bush League...execution time...ha ha ha. Another one of those "Hard Choices"?
What are her supporters, especially on this board, thinking?