The agenda Democrats began rolling out on Monday actually shares some ideas — job training, lowering drug prices, help for working families — with the Republicans’ stated but so far unrealized priorities.
.. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump’s campaign promise for a $1 trillion infrastructure overhaul, a job-creation effort Democrats are eager to talk about, goes nowhere.
.. And why isn’t Mr. Trump, who is counting bills to rename post offices as legislative achievements, turning to Democrats for help on initiatives they and he support?
.. Democrats want to help 10 million Americans find work by expanding paid apprenticeship and work-based job-training programs... Democrats want to give Medicare Part D the power to negotiate lower prescription drug prices for its 41 million enrollees; our deal maker in chief once thought that was a good idea, so he might want to pick up the phone... Party leaders realize, as Senator Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, wrote on Monday, that they’ve lost the last two elections in part because they “failed to articulate a strong, bold economic program for the middle class and those working hard to get there.”
The Banality of Change
..Trump speaks to this man’s situation and makes him feel heard. But when you think practically about which candidate could improve his life, it’s clear that Clinton is the bigger change agent.
.. To create political change, you have to work within groups and organize groups of groups.
.. Now, if you wanted to design a personality type perfectly ill suited to be a change agent in government, you would come up with Donald Trump: solipsistic, impatient, combative, unsubtle and ignorant.
.. None of us should be under any illusions. Wherever Clinton walks, the whiff of scandal is always by her side. The Clintons seem to have decided that they are righteous and good, and therefore anything that enriches, empowers or makes them feel good must always be righteous and good. They surround themselves with some amazing people but also some human hand grenades who inevitably blow up in their faces.
Passing legislation next year is going to be hard, but if Clinton can be dull and pragmatic, and operate at a level below the cable TV ideology wars, it’s possible to imagine her gathering majorities behind laws that would help people like that guy in Idaho:
- an infrastructure push, criminal justice reform,
- a college tuition program,
- an apprenticeship and skills program,
- an expanded earned-income tax credit
- and a bill to secure the border
- and shift from low-skill to high-skill immigration.