Open Left: Time to Outclass Clinton

[Pirate Smile]

Time to Outclass Clinton

by: Matt Stoller
Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 23:38:58 PM EST

Josh Marshall covers the crap that Bob Johnson is putting out there. Johnson isn't just the billionaire who called the estate tax racist, he also recently lobbied against equalizing taxes on hedge funds by going after all the Presidential candidates.

Democratic presidential hopefuls are "playing the class warfare card" by supporting tax increases on private-equity and hedge-fund managers, says Robert L. Johnson, the billionaire founder of Black Entertainment Television, who warns the hike would hit minority-run investment firms.
"I believe there's a tendency of certain members of the Democratic Party to pursue tax changes as part of some soak-the-rich strategy without thinking about the longer-term consequences to the overall economy," Johnson told The Hill.

Of course, these remarks came only a few years after Johnson set up his own hedge fund in a deal with Deutsche Asset Management. Johnson is simply a corrupt corporate type, and it's amazing that Clinton would dispatch him as a surrogate.

Obama should use this moment to go after big media and outclass Clinton with substantive and sharp distinctions on policy that show him as a forward-looking and deep candidate. He is already out with the policy that diversity of media ownership is critical to a healthy media system, now is a good moment to make that explicit and go after the media monopolies.

Better that than continue this identity fight, which, because of the stereotypes being thrown around, he will probably lose. He's doing much better in the recently released Washington Post poll, that shows the race nationally at 42-37-11. Obama has already garnered increased support from African-Americans because of the Clinton campaign's attacks combined with his Iowa victory, leading to Clinton practically pulling out of South Carolina. It's time to get back the white liberals. Moving off of racial identity and on to some substantive and noticeable fight would be a way to do that.

http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=3219

[Pirate Smile]

1. kick

[cali]

2. excellent suggestion for the Obama campaign

I hope it's been brought to their notice.

[karynnj]

3. I agree and I hope that the Clintons will find that the country is sick

of swiftboating - and they will be seen as the ones doing it in the primaries. My fear ever since I read the Wolfson comment in 2005 that as swiftboating works, they have to use it was that just as the public sickened of it, the people looking like they were doing it would be the Democrats, not the Republicans. I was naive enough to think he meant the general election.

In 2006, the electorate rejected the swiftboating that was used against some veterans, now freshmen Congressmen, who were defended by Senator Kerry.

[mod mom]

4. estate tax racist? Protecting low taxes for Private Equity? WTF