Sean Wilentz and Julian E. Zelizer, who teach US political history at Princeton University, do not actually endorse Sen. Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid in their Sunday WaPo op-ed, “A Rotten Way to Pick a President.” But their complaints about “our badly flawed system” for picking presidential candidates sound as though Clinton could have been giving them dictation.
Their criticisms? Caucuses can be highly undemocratic. Michigan and Florida may be disenfranchised. “Open” primaries and caucuses (in which anyone can vote, not just registered party members) empower outsiders hoping to game the system, to the detriment of rank-and-file party members. Primaries tend to favor highly committed voters from the extremes of both parties, who are much more likely to turn up than moderates (though the authors do not want independents voting in them). The primary system took power away from the party barons and gave much of it to the news media — “now driven by national outlets that prefer sensationalism, scandal and sound bites to substance, nuance and balance.”
These are the academic version of the Clinton talking points as to why her campaign wins are entitled to more weight than those of Sen. Barack Obama.
Neither the authors nor the WaPo bothered to disclose that Wilentz is an open Clinton booster who made the case for Hillary and criticized Obama at Newsweek:
So you don’t find Obama’s meta-arguments against “politics as usual” particularly convincing?
You cannot have a president who doesn’t like politics. You will not get anything done. Period. I happen to love American politics. I think American politics is wonderful. I can understand why people don’t. But one of the problems in America is that politics has been so soured, people try to be above it all. It’s like Adlai Stevenson. In some ways, Barack reminds me of Stevenson.Why?
There’s always a Stevenson candidate. Bradley was one of them. Tsongas was one of them. They’re the people who are kind of ambivalent about power. “Should I be in this or not… well, yes, because I’m going to represent something new.” It’s beautiful loserdom. The fact is, you can’t govern without politics. That’s what democracy is. Democracy isn’t some utopian proposition by which the people suddenly rule. We’re too complicated a country for that. We have too many interests here. You need someone who can govern, who can build the coalition and move the country forward. You hit on something that’s really my pet peeve about the others…
Zelizer has been less openly pro-Hillary, but you can find him in the media with quotes like this:
But delivering on the rhetoric is the real challenge, says Princeton historian Julian Zelizer, and that’s apparently one reason that Obama faded last week. Many voters, in the end, agreed with Clinton that Obama was offering too many bromides and not enough details. There is also the problem of zealotry. “When asked, ‘What are you going to do?’ it’s hard to outline something very bold without seeming very radical,” says Zelizer. That is a problem shared by both Obama and John Edwards.
He also blogs at the HuffPo, echoing Wilentz:
Another tradition comes to us through Senator Barack Obama: the tradition of anti-politics. This tradition has less to do with ending economic inequality or promoting radical foreign policy. Instead, candidates like Obama promise new approaches that supposedly move beyond existing debates while remaining pure. Democrats from this tradition have appealed to independent voters who are alienated from what they call “politics as usual.” Adlai Stevenson ran in 1952 and 1956 with campaigns that shunned what Stevenson considered crass political appeals. In 1976, Jimmy Carter tried to shake America free from the ghosts of Watergate by telling voters they could trust him.
Anti-politics can exert powerful appeal in a political culture that tends to distrust politicians. The tradition has built support for reforms that vastly improve our democratic system. Yet anti-political Democrats have frequently been defeated when they face candidates who understand that cynical voters generally find bread-and-butter issues more important than assurances of a whole new style of politics.
More important, those anti-politics Democrats who win have had trouble achieving very much. Carter’s agenda, for example, remained largely unfulfilled as he found himself in conflict with Democratic legislators…
None of which means that Wilentz and Zeliser do not have an argument. But presenting themselves merely as disinterested historians when they are not will allow people to attack their credibility, rather than the merits of their argument.
(h/t HotAir.)
Update: Insta-lanche! I note that the Perfesser also has a link up about Obama as McGovern, so you might want to check my take on that, too.
Well put.
Besides, Can her touch cure scrofula?
I heard Rush yesterday expounding to Texas Primary voters to cross over and vote for Obama. “Take her out and end all doubt”, the catchphrase.
Might take a stake.
Sean Wilentz and Julian E. Zelizer teach U.S. political history at Princeton University.
Why do they turn to academics, especially historians, to discuss things like this? they cannot even be trusted to accurately describe what has already happened, why should we care what they say about what is to come?
“Our” badly flawed system for picking presidential candidates? Sounds like sour grapes now that the Clinton’s attempts to manipulate the Democrat primaries for their purposes have failed.
Heh. Tomorrow’s History Today!
Tomorrow’s history…?
Can’t argue with that. The future just isn’t what it used to be.
The Bill and Hillary have spent a lifetime “gaming the system”. Exploiting every strange privilege, exemption, exception or quirk in the rules that can be bent, twisted, spindled,or mutilated for the furtherance of their own power.
I even now wonder what little known section of the Democratic Party Rules about primaries, delegates and candidate selection they will pull, like “a rabbit from the hat” to insure her win.
“Yet anti-political Democrats have frequently been defeated when they face candidates who understand that cynical voters generally find bread-and-butter issues more important than assurances of a whole new style of politics.”
I thought Reagan was the anti-political Republican and he did quite well. Must be that it is hard to run a winning anti-political campaign when you are part of the party that loves large government.
Hey. Why didn’t no one tell me about this? It just says everything.
Oh. Almost everything. This says the rest.
::sigh:: It’s a shame that “historians” are so anxious to toss the legacy of George Washington in the dumpster.
To a very close first approximation we don’t have “parties” in the United States — certainly not the way people in countries using the Parliamentary system do. In most of the world, Party membership is worthy of the capital letter; it’s a contractural relationship. A member of Likud or Labor or the Christian Democrats pays dues and has to be accepted by the other members, like any club. It isn’t like that in the U.S. Our parties are just self-identification labels, and we tend to think that there’s something wrong with a “party loyalist” — such a person ought to self-identify because of agreement with the issues, rather than signing a loyalty oath. I have to believe that’s the way George would have wanted it.
But that isn’t interesting enough for “historians” and “political scientists”. They want to see easily-analyzed rigid Parties with predictable memberships, whose only interaction is at the top level, where the Party Leaders arrange coalitions and compromises and the Party Loyalists go along because it’s, well, the Party. That’s the way it works elsewhere, especially in Europe. It’s even a little attractive to the individual citizen, because having joined the Party one’s only responsibility is to show up and vote for it. Actually paying attention to issues and proposals is not only unnecessary, it’s discouraged. People who encourage that here aren’t trying to propose something beneficial for the country as a whole; they’re lazy and are looking for something easier to analyze for the purpose of writing scholarly papers.
Me, I mean to take advantage of the American Way as proposed by serr8d, and I didn’t have to wait for Rush to propose it; I don’t even listen to Rush.
Regards,
Ric
[Obama is a person] who [is] kind of ambivalent about power
Another tradition comes to us through Senator Barack Obama: the tradition of anti-politics. …new approaches that supposedly move beyond existing debates while remaining pure
Who wouldn’t want to move beyond the existing debate about the Illinois Combine?
Please, go visit Kass.
http://preview.tinyurl.com/2fn856
guinsPen,
Vote for the crook. It’s important.
Regards,
Ric
Wilentz and Zeliser
I not only attack their credibility and the merits of their argument, I attack their timing, as well.
teach US political history at Princeton University
Osama was a punk, relatively speaking.
Seriously. What do folks like that make a year? Ballpark.
Over/Under.
Number of Che flags in Princeton Political Science Offices.
…
Or am I thinking of Sociology?
‘Course there’d be more of a contrast here if we had a party that actually opposed large government.
Winston & Strawn also represented the now-convicted former IL Gov. George Ryan (R) — when the firm was managed by former Gov. Jim Thompson (R).
Just filling out Kass’s scorecard.
BTW, Rezko’s trial starts March 3 — one day before the OH & TX primaries.
I QUESTION THE TIMING!!!
“‘Course there’d be more of a contrast here if we had a party that actually opposed large government.”
Well I hear tell that some Republican politicians at one time did oppose large government. The breed is getting thin lately. On the Dem side they have been extinct for a long time.
Pen. To be fair, Illinois republicans in political office are oftentimes indistinguishable from their democratic counterparts. Really the only way to tell is CUI or NCUI. Currenty under indictment or not currently under indictment.
That would be the Get Offa My Lawn! Party.
We’re not conservative or liberal — we’re Grow-the-@#$!-Up-ist.
McGehee,
I’ll bet mail sent there bounces back undelivered.
Good thing Clinton {coughs whitewater, cattle futures, filegate, travel gate, etc…cough} is never associated indirectly with criminals/thugs whose relationship to her have been thoroughly vetted by the local media.
Hers are all DIRECT links. Just ask her campaign manager Maggie Williams–hopefully better at running a campaign than “finding” files at Vince Foster’s house.
Open primaries have long been advocated by the Left. No problems with the caucus system either for lefties until now. Now that they don’t work for a certain candidate, that is.
Just another example of the Left’s lack of principles.
guinsPen,
Yeah, the Che flags are more likely in the Sociology Dept. Profs in history, politics and Wilson School are too invested in the current system – if only on one side – to have any interest in tearing it down.
But presenting themselves merely as disinterested historians when they are not will allow people to attack their credibility, rather than the merits of their argume
This same ploy is being used all over. I’ve mentioned it before with Debbie Dingall. She endorsed Clinton, and then withdrew her endorsement to fight the battle to count the Michigan delegates (she’s a super as well). I heard an interview on Mitch Albom’s show (hate him) – and he NEVER questioned her on that. Her argument was presented as if she didn’t have a horse in the race.
The party rents a post-office box.
Unlike the Democrats and Republicans, it learns from its mistakes.
Arguments of convenience are commonly being elevated to the level of principle. It is convenient for Hillary’s supporters for the Florida and Michigan delegates to be seated, and therefore it is an important principle that such key states not be unrepresented at the convention. Obama is in the lead, so it is an important principle that (as suggested by Kos) the delegates from those states be allocated 50-50. Super Delegates should vote according to the popular vote say the Obama fans, while the Hillary supporters say, yes, but we must include Florida and Michigan in that tally as well.
Man, you guys are smart!
*returns to lurk mode*
[…] Wisdom notes an undisclosed Hillward slant among WaPo […]
As much as Wilentz and Zelizer are foursquare in Camp Hillary, isn’t putting an editorial in the WaPo called A Rotten Way To Pick A President as close to a robust endorsement of holistic Baracky hopeychange as you can get really? They must think most people are going to actually read their piece. That’s cute.
Certainly the Democrats can find time to debate and fix election matters *BEFORE* an election and not after things didn’t go their way.
you got it wrong. Limbaugh was pushing for voters to back Hillary with “Leave her in it So we can win it. it was a caller who pushed the opposite with “Take her out and end all doubt”. Do a search under the words in quotations and you will see the Limbaugh conversation as well as my own blog on the matter. w walker
[…] goes on (as others have) to compare Obama to Adlai Stevenson: Like Stevenson, he speaks fluently and often eloquently […]
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