Hillary Clinton: Left Ideologue or Clueless Millionaire?

By Stanley Kurtz, CP Guest Contributor Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Dr. Stanley Kurtz is a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

I'm amused when liberals like Slate's John Dickerson respond to the revelation of Hillary's fawning correspondence with Saul Alinsky by claiming that it's impossible to be both an out-of-touch super-rich person and a leftist ideologue. Hasn't anyone ever heard of George Soros, Tom Steyer, or Hollywood? Hillary's many defenders ask how a 43-year-old letter can be politically relevant. By itself, it can't.

As I noted the other day, however, Hillary's Alinsky correspondence does serve as a useful reminder of what we ought to know but have forgotten: Hillary has long stood to the left of Bill. More than 20 years after she corresponded with Alinsky, Hillary emerged as the leader of the Democratic Left, pressuring Bill on both policy and tactics from within the White House. This is the story Hillary's defenders don't want to address. There is a continuous line from Hillary's Alinskyite past to her co-presidential leftism. And that little eight-year episode followed Hillary's clueless cattle-futures days, and coincided with a scandal over renting out the Lincoln Bedroom to wealthy, corporate donors.

Neither before nor after her co-presidency has Hillary's hobnobbing with corporate fat cats derailed her leftist aims. And now everything from the state of her party to the way Obama has governed conspires to draw that longstanding leftism out. Should she return to the White House, Hillary will complete Obama's program and like it. She'll be back at the top, but "Clintonism" won't. Even Bill will adapt himself to his party's more leftward tilt, while any remaining differences with Hillary resurrect the co-presidential chaos of the Nineties.

Hillary's defenders assure us that no one will take the idea of a crony-capitalist Alinskyite seriously. Don't be silly. One's president right now. And any serious look at Hillary's life will show that she's lived that paradox for decades.

Stanley Kurtz, Ph.D., is a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. On a wide range of issues, from K-12 and higher education reform, to the challenges of democratization abroad, to urban-suburban policies, to the shaping of the American left's agenda.