As Jake Tapper argues, there's really no dispute as to whether Hillary Clinton is distorting Barack Obama's statements on Reagan. She is. And so is her husband. But she's arguing for her campaign, and in that context, statements do get pulled out of context and refashioned as cudgels. That's politics. You take your opponent's plowshares and beat them into swords. Her husband, however, is arguing for his legacy. Bill Clinton's take on this was that Obama "said President Reagan was the engine of innovation and did more, had a more lasting impact on America than I did. And then the next day he said, 'In the 90s the good ideas came out from the Republicans. Which it'll be costly maybe down the road for him because it's factually not accurate.” Check out the "I" in there. As the argument is presented, this is about him, not her. Obama's implication was that Clinton was a managerial, rather than transformative, president. Clinton, stung, is slightly shifting the language, asserting that he had "a more lasting impact" on America than Reagan did. But what's the evidence for that? Reagan's changes to the tax code, his massive amnesty, and his struggles and negotiations with the Soviet Union, were pretty meaningful, and we hear their echoes today. He's also commonly credited with pushing the country far to the right, though whether he instigated that change or simply profited from an existent shift in our politics is, I think, an open question.By contrast, Clinton's great achievement -- the balancing of the budget -- was literally a clean-up of Reagan's mess. It was reactive, not proactive. Welfare reform was the logical end point of a political argument most closely associated with Reagan, who pursued "workfare" policies as governor of California. Clinton's foreign policy was competently handled, but he governed in a time far less dramatic than the age of Gorbachev, perestroika, and Yeltsin. Had he passed health care, maybe then Clinton could argue he had a more lasting programmatic impact, but health care failed, and the Congress fell, and that was really the end of Clinton's ability to pursue large initiatives. I'll say, for the record, that I thought Clinton was a good president operating under tough circumstances. But for reasons both in and out of his control, it's hard to argue he had a greater impact than Reagan.(Image used under a Creative Commons license from Idiolater.) CLINTON V. REAGAN.
As Jake Tapper argues, there's really no dispute as to whether Hillary Clinton is distorting Barack Obama's statements on Reagan. She is. And so is her husband. But she's arguing for her campaign, and in that context, statements do get pulled out of context and refashioned as cudgels. That's politics. You take your opponent's plowshares and beat them into swords. Her husband, however, is arguing for his legacy. Bill Clinton's take on this was that Obama "said President Reagan was the engine of innovation and did more, had a more lasting impact on America than I did. And then the next day he said, 'In the 90s the good ideas came out from the Republicans. Which it'll be costly maybe down the road for him because it's factually not accurate.” Check out the "I" in there. As the argument is presented, this is about him, not her. Obama's implication was that Clinton was a managerial, rather than transformative, president. Clinton, stung, is slightly shifting the language, asserting that he had "a more lasting impact" on America than Reagan did. But what's the evidence for that? Reagan's changes to the tax code, his massive amnesty, and his struggles and negotiations with the Soviet Union, were pretty meaningful, and we hear their echoes today. He's also commonly credited with pushing the country far to the right, though whether he instigated that change or simply profited from an existent shift in our politics is, I think, an open question.By contrast, Clinton's great achievement -- the balancing of the budget -- was literally a clean-up of Reagan's mess. It was reactive, not proactive. Welfare reform was the logical end point of a political argument most closely associated with Reagan, who pursued "workfare" policies as governor of California. Clinton's foreign policy was competently handled, but he governed in a time far less dramatic than the age of Gorbachev, perestroika, and Yeltsin. Had he passed health care, maybe then Clinton could argue he had a more lasting programmatic impact, but health care failed, and the Congress fell, and that was really the end of Clinton's ability to pursue large initiatives. I'll say, for the record, that I thought Clinton was a good president operating under tough circumstances. But for reasons both in and out of his control, it's hard to argue he had a greater impact than Reagan.(Image used under a Creative Commons license from Idiolater.) 
