How will Hillary Clinton campaign against Donald Trump? Clinton strategist Joel Benenson previewed some of the big arguments for Greg Sargent, and they are, as Sargent observed, “oddly conventional.”
… he brushed off much of the conventional wisdom about the race, arguing that no matter how creatively Trump has employed his celebrity and business alpha-prowess, he’d succumb to an attack revealing that he isn’t actually on the side of ordinary Americans, and that ultimately, voters would choose Clinton over him on the economy for the simple reason that her policies and priorities are better.
“His entire life, he’s been in it for himself — he’s a self promoter,” Benenson said, adding that Trump’s bankruptcies would provide fertile ground to demonstrate this vividly: “The reality is he’s left in his wake small business contractors and working people who worked on a lot of these jobs.”
Now, those small business contractors and working people left in Trump’s wake could be used to portray Trump (truthfully) as a cruel, exploitative liar. But as much as one might value the fact that Democrats have better economic policies than Republicans and generally speaking campaign on solid policy ground rather than false promises, Democrats who lived through 2000 and 2004 might be a little nervous at this approach:
“She’s the only candidate who’s talked about a real jobs plan, with manufacturing and small businesses at the center of it; a real approach to competing and winning in a global economy, where we make more goods here that we sell to 95 percent of the consumers who live outside the United States; about a plan to raise wages; and a plan for equal pay for women,” Benenson said. “This isn’t about bluster. It’s about having real plans to get stuff done. When it comes to the economy, Hillary Clinton is the only candidate with plans that have been vetted and will make a difference in people’s lives.”
Maybe it’s too cynical, but how sure are we that having concrete, meaningful plans is more appealing to voters than having big promises? Then again, maybe it’s naive to imagine that Benenson is describing a polite, wonky campaign. There could be some hard punches thrown over exactly the policies he’s describing, and, of course, Clinton Super PACs are already making ads showing how vile and sexist Trump is. But it’s really difficult to believe this election will be won on policy alone, however strong the policy argument is.