The Curious Myth of Hillary Clinton's Senate Effectiveness

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Frankly, I'm tired of listening to Senator Clinton portray herself as being in the solutions business -- as boasting a nice, fat resume of accomplishments -- while mocking Barack Obama for being a rhetorical empty suit.

Is she truly a beacon of experience? Because I couldn't think of a single piece of legislation that has her name stuck proudly on the front of it, no equivalent of McCain-Feingold, for example, I headed straight for her campaign website to see what glorious aspects of her vaunted experience I was missing.

Actually, I was missing nothing. There is not one single example of any legislation with her name appended to it. In fact, the page devoted to her Senate biography is a mush-mash, a laundry list of good intentions. When she talks about "sponsoring" and "introducing" and "fighting for" legislation that obviously hasn't passed, that's a smokescreen for failure. By introducing all that legislation that never makes it out of committee, she's guilty of what she accuses Senator Obama of: confusing "hoping" with doing.

Consider these examples:

• "...{she} worked with her colleagues to secure the funds New York needed to recover and rebuild."

• "...she fought to provide compensation to the families of the victims."

• "She is an original sponsor of legislation that expanded health benefit to members of the National Guard and Reserves."

• "Some of Hillary' proudest achievements have been her work to ensure the safety of prescription drugs for children, with legislation now included in the Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act." (What in God's name does that mumbo-jumbo mean?)

Yes, it's true that for many years, she was in the minority. But if she is the effective legislator she claims to be, she'd be able find co-sponsors across the aisle who share her commitment to specific issues, in the same way that John McCain found his doppelganger, Russ Feingold.

But an inability to get legislation passed is just the beginning of Senator Clinton's shallow record. For many of the bills she introduced, she couldn't even get a cosponsor in her own party!

Below are some perfectly fine, liberal, progressive bills that she introduced, but was unable to attract a cosponsor of any party, according to the Library of Congress.

Note that while her website proclaims that "She is an original sponsor of legislation that expanded health benefit to member of the National Guard and Reserves", she wasn't able to rustle up a single cosponsor for legislation that would have extended military retirement credit for National Guard Members called up after 9/11.

So Senator Clinton is right when she claims to be the experienced candidate, although it's not the experience she would like us to believe. It's a track record of legislative failure and futility.

89. S.4065 : A bill to direct the Attorney General to conduct a study on the feasibility of collecting crime data relating to the occurrence of school-related crime in elementary schools and secondary schools.
Sponsor: Sen Clinton, Hillary Rodham [NY] (introduced 11/16/2006) Cosponsors (None)

88. S.4029 : A bill to increase the number of well-educated nurses, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Sen Clinton, Hillary Rodham [NY] (introduced 9/29/2006) Cosponsors (None)

90. S.4103 : A bill to prevent nuclear terrorism, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Sen Clinton, Hillary Rodham [NY] (introduced 12/7/2006) Cosponsors (None)

77. S.3909 : A bill to amend the foreign Assistance Act of 1961 to provide assistance for developing countries to promote quality basic education and to establish the achievement of universal basic education in all developing countries as an objective of United States foreign assistance policy, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Sen Clinton, Hillary Rodham [NY] (introduced 9/18/2006) Cosponsors (None)

59. S.2993 : A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to impose a temporary oil profit fee and to use the proceeds of the fee collected to provide a Strategic Energy Fund and expand certain energy tax incentives, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Sen Clinton, Hillary Rodham [NY] (introduced 5/23/2006) Cosponsors (None)

26. S.1144 : A bill to provide military retirement credit for certain service by National Guard members performed while in a State duty status immediately after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Sponsor: Sen Clinton, Hillary Rodham [NY] (introduced 5/26/2005) Cosponsors (None)

50. S.2260 : A bill to amend titles XVIII and XIX of the Social Security Act to make improvements to payments to Medicare Advantage plans and to reinstate protections in the Medicaid program for working families, their children, and the disabled against excessive out-of-pocket costs, inadequate benefits, and health care coverage loss.
Sponsor: Sen Clinton, Hillary Rodham [NY] (introduced 2/8/2006) Cosponsors (None)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/adam-hanft/t...la_b_87613.html

[Dan J 277]

Ouch

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Ouch

Yeah. The Hillbots should know now, that it's on like donkey kong

[Alex+R 0]

This is what I keep saying. Thanks for the proof to back it up.

Honestly, with all the #######-kissing she's been doing privately and publicly with Republicans, you'd think she could pull off a dayum bill or two.

[garya505 2]

OK then, so neither Hillary OR Obama have really accomplished anything?

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

Classic!

[SteveLaura 0]

If she were McCain, she could tout a long history of legislative success on key issues and herald her ability to pass bills and engineer progress. But she hasn’t done that. She hasn’t walked the walk so now she cannot talk the talk.

As a first lady, Hillary’s sole important legislative involvement came during the first two years of her husband’s presidency when she sought to pass her ill-conceived health care reform, an effort that failed so miserably that it cost her party control of the House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years. Between 1995 to 1997, she was largely absent from the White House, traveling the world, promoting her best selling book and helping to raise funds. She never attended strategy meetings and her only intervention in the singular legislative achievements of Bill’s administration — welfare reform and the balanced budget deal — was privately to urge a veto of the former and to oppose the latter because it provided for a cut in the capital gains tax. Hillary returned to the White House in 1998 to oversee the defense to the Lewinsky scandal and the impeachment attempt, but the Clinton administration essentially folded its legislative efforts during those years and hung on for dear life. No portfolio of accomplishments there.

In the Senate, she has largely spent her time raising funds for herself and other Democrats (in hopes of attracting the votes of super delegates) and promoting her best selling memoir Living History. In part because of a lack of attention and also because of the Democrats’ minority status during much of her Senate tenure, she has passed very, very little of note.

Her legislative accomplishments in her first term in the Senate were almost entirely symbolic. She renamed a courthouse after Justice Thurgood Marshall. She passed a resolution honoring Alexander Hamilton and another celebrating the win of a Syracuse University lacrosse team. She renamed post offices, founded a national park in Puerto Rico and expressed the sense of the Senate that Harriet Tubman should have gotten a federal pension 150 years ago.

Her only actual legislation included one bill to increase nurse recruitment, another to aid respite time for Alzheimer’s care givers and another to expand veterans’ health benefits, a paltry output for six years’ service.

In her second term, she has spent full-time campaigning for president and has the worst attendance record of the three senators now still in the presidential race.

So who is she kidding? If she wants to hit Obama with a negative based on his inexperience and limited legislative record, she should go right ahead. But to pretend that she is the “solutions” and “answers” person while he gives speeches is absurd.

Source

Of the 100 bills brought to the floor by Clinton this year, 6 have been enacted into law:

1. support for the goals and ideals of "National Purple Heart Recognition Day"

2. a concurrent resolution recognizing the 75th anniversary of the Military Order of the Purple Heart

3.a bill to recognize the goals of Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month

4. a bill to urge a international organization to allow access to Holocaust archives

5. a resolution calling for Hamas and Hezbollah to release Israeli soldiers held captive

6. recognition of the uncommon valor of Wesley Autrey, the man who jumped on to the subway tracks and saved a man's life ...

Of Obama's proposed legislation, 3 bills passed in 2007.

1. a resolution celebrating the life of Bishop Gilbert Earl Patterson.

2. the designation of July 12, 2007 as "National Summer Learning Day."

3. a condemnation of Zimbabwe's governmental oppression of its citizens.

The takeaway from all of this? It's much easier to pass non-binding, symbolic laws than ones that actually do much to change the world. Congress is a team sport, after all. One could do a similar treatment of John McCain's past year, too. What' is really instructive about all of this is the list of items each Senator sponsored. Both Clinton and Obama are very progressive. Both have introduced bills to protect the middle class, aid veterans, and increase public safety oversight.

So, what of their differences? While it is statistically true to say that Obama and Clinton have voted together over 90 percent of the time, during their overlapping time in the Senate, they have also voted differently 40 times. The important issues, nicely outlined by the Washington Post, have largely to do with energy.

Clinton voted against an amendment in the Energy Bill establishing an ethanol mandate for refineries.

Obama voted for the amendment, which became law.

Clinton voted to expand oil production in the Gulf of Mexico.

Obama opposed the expansion.

Obama voted for an increase in fuel-efficiency standards

Hillary voted against the idea.

Obama voted against funding for pet projects (this one's tricky)

Hillary voted against.

Clinton voted to keep funding TV Marti, the American anti-Cuban station

Obama voted against

Clinton voted in favor of a measure that allowed confiscation of legally-owned hand guns during natural disasters

Obama voted against

So there you have look at the issues. The similarities and the differences. Govtrack considers Clinton the more liberal of the two contenders, but both push the needle toward the blue end of the binary color-spectrum.

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