If you follow politics, you're certainly familiar with Nixon's Southern Strategy. It's "What's the Matter with Kansas" where the GOP has strung along the working class for decades by parsing them out, single-issue by single-issue and then throwing them a bone here and there and forever expounding on the importance of their pet issues. In the meantime, the tax code has been rigged against them, their rights under our labor laws have been decimated, and trickle-down has crushed our middle class through stagnant wages, offshoring, and transferring all of the bounty of increased production to the wealthy elite.
If you've been paying close enough attention to notice that, even if you didn't know it had a name, then you also know that the same scam has been played on us by the Democratic Leadership Council that was formed in the mid 80’s and played a huge role in getting Bill Clinton elected. The only real difference between these two strategies is that they use different issues to string us along while fleecing us and blaming the other party for the theft when the truth is that both parties are in cahoots in the scam. While the DLC is no longer officially a thing, the power brokers from that organization run today’s Democratic Party.
Steve Hendricks has written a brilliant piece illustrating what he has dubbed “The Northern Strategy” and it is on-line at CounterPunch.
The bottom line is that, like the GOP, the Democratic party has been co-opted by the oligarchs that continue to rig our economic system to benefit the few at the expense of the vast working class. This isn't exclusively Hillary's plan. She's just the latest high-profile practitioner. She’s their figurehead, the choice of the old-line DLC Dems like Harold Ford Jr.
That does not mean that both parties are the same. They are certainly not. However, on economic and labor issues, the working class has nary a voice in DC these days. We certainly don’t have a majority voice on the SCOTUS. It is precisely under DLC leadership that the Democrats have simply stopped fighting for labor issues.
This is where Bernie breaks the mold. We thought that President Obama was the one that would break the cycle and no doubt, he has made progress under unprecedented obstruction. However, one look at his economic team and Holder's Justice Department is a testament to this theory of the "Northern Strategy". And you can bet your boots that a Hillary administration will be a continuation of this, employing a cabinet full of like-minded economists and appointing an Attorney General from the corporate world, in the same mold as Eric Holder, unwilling to challenge the banksters or the heads of industry — in fact, doing their bidding.
Back in November, Robert Kuttner predicted what Hillary’s economic team might look like in his Huffpo piece “Who Will Be Hillary's Economic Team?”
I hope I’m wrong. I hope that if I have to hold my nose and vote for Hillary to keep the SCOTUS from being lost for another generation, that she will surprise me and advance Joe Stiglitz and Paul Krugman to the highest echelons of her economic team, but my sincere fear is that they’re just window dressing to string along those of us who understand the game. I fear that labor rights will continue to wane and the middle class will continue on the path of becoming a footnote in US history.
On the other hand, those progressive economists would likely be Bernie’s top picks. In spite of Krugman’s endorsement of Hillary, Bernie still respects him and no doubt would take his consultation very seriously. Bernie’s primary purpose is to once again give voice to labor and to rebuild the middle class. He has the understanding of the problem, how we got where we are, and what needs to be done to turn the ship around. I have no doubt whatsoever that Bernie would appoint an Attorney General that will prosecute white collar crimes and fight regulatory capture.