2016 Postmortem

The current climate makes me appreciate it more.

Hillary said she occupies the center but as FJT reminded me in another thread, this election was her coming back to her roots. During her husband's tenure she was to his left, and often clashed with his aides who believed in third way politics. Hillary was far more strident.

I try not to lump all centrist democrats in the same basket, maybe this appeals to me because of my own view which I described- I'm not a two dimensional voter.

Yes, we are dealing with complexities and I agree politicians should be more forthright. In fact, I wished Hillary had released her speeches earlier and defended her positions, despite the double standard of her meeting transparency standards we have come to expect from those running for the presidency while her opponents did not, but I also don't think we had the luxury last year to be finicky, we're a minority. You can't expect Democrats to behave as though they have the numbers to push through what they want, they are in Congress to work and get whatever they can for their constituents - compromise is the nature of legislative politics. And, most importantly, if we want FDR type programs passed, we have to give a Democratic President FDR majorities.

As for lobbying, it's been around since the earliest days of the republic. No politician can completely extricate themselves from this process since everyone has the right to petition on behalf of their interests. The issues with lobbying is simply that corporate interests dominate lobbying in D.C. and there needs to be a greater balance with competing interests but this is not a Democratic* or Republican issue, but a systemic issue that's metastasized over a couple decades. Focusing on which Democrat is in the pocket of a lobbyist is futile and doesn't change the situation.