Do you ever have those moments when your mom or grandma tries to post something hip to Facebook or Twitter that just makes you cringe at the FUBARn00biness of it all?
Welcome to the Hillary vs. Bernie: Who's Progressive Twitter fight! Samantha Lachman has all the details, but I want to focus on the rhetorical fail by Hillary.
Bernie lays down the bern with his tweet including a word-picture of all the "progressive positions" Hillary has taken in her career:
It's a brilliant meme, as it touches on so many things that would turn off a progressive like me:
- Calls herself moderate - not my label!
Wall Street SuperPAC - not my campaign finance! Fracking - not my environment! Opposes Medicare for All - not my health care! Blamed homebuyers for crash - not my economy! Supported Wall Street bailout - yeah, again, not my economy! Opposes Glass-Steagall - OK, again, not my economy! Unclear on Social Security age - not my retirement! Unclear on Social Security cuts - yeah, again, not my retirement! Iraq vote - not my foreign policy! Syria - yeah, again, not my foreign policy! Libya - OK, again, not my foreign policy! NAFTA - not my trade policy! TPP - yeah, again, not my trade policy! PNTR - OK, again, not my trade policy! USA PATRIOT ACT - not my privacy! Opposes free college - not my education! 1996 welfare reform - not my poverty! Death Penalty - not my criminal justice! Deport kids - not my asylum! DOMA - not my gay rights! DADT - yeah, again, not my gay rights! 3 Strikes - yeah, again, not my criminal justice! Border Fence - not my immigration.In other words, Bernie gives me two dozen reasons to doubt Hillary's progressive bona fides. Within those, there are three items (economy, foreign policy, trade policy) with three entries and three items (retirement, gay rights, criminal justice) with two entries, giving me fifteen different subjects on which Hillary and I disagree.
So Hillary's retort to the meme was a meme of her own, questioning Bernie's "progressive positions":
You may detect a certain theme to her retort, let me spell it out for you:
- Gun background checks - not my gun policy!
Gunmaker liability - yeah, again, not my gun policy! Immigration reform - not my immigration policy! Anti-immigrant militias - Um, is this immigration or militias? Missed PP vote - But he didn't vote TO defund PP, right? And didn't she skip the vote to strip retroactive immunity from the cell phone companies that let Bush spy on us? And hasn't she missed more votes in her 2008 presidential run than Bernie's 2016 run? Gun dealer accountability - OK, again, not my gun policy! Gun violence research - Right, we get it, not my gun policy! Charleston shooter's gun - Yes, we heard you, not my gun policy! Obama primary - Well, he has turned out to be a corporate centrist, hasn't he?There you go. Hillary's killer retort to Bernie questioning her on progressive identity, campaign finance, environment, health care, economy, retirement, foreign policy, trade policy, privacy, education, poverty, criminal justice, asylum, gay rights, and immigration is nine lines questioning Bernie on guns (five times), immigration (twice), missing a Senate vote, and doubting Obama's progressivism.
In art, they say the negative space is the key to aesthetic appreciation of the form. In jazz, they say it's the notes you don't play that make all the music. But in social media memes, the paucity of Hillary's response only amplifies the power of Bernie's meme. The fact she couldn't come up with more than four issues and, really, only one that is going to seriously turn off progressives, says a whole lot about how much she is feeling the Bern.
Hillary, you just pulled the George Costanza "Jerk Store" of progressive social media comebacks!
P.S. As a progressive originally from Idaho, I appreciate the fact I won't have to defend the gun issue at the same time we're trying to get universal healthcare, free college tuition, break ups of the "too big to fail" banks, descheduled marijuana, and all the rest of Bernie's progressive platform. Hillary overestimates how much traction she'll get with the gun issue and underestimates how much it will cost her in a general election. Those Ohio / Pennsylvania / Virginia / Colorado-type swing states kind of like their guns...
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