This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
At the second presidential debate, Donald Trump once again played down the recording of his vile comments bragging about sexual assault as "locker-room talk." But as the fallout from the tape continues, the Republican Party has essentially become a locker room divided, with many members of the red team abandoning their quarterback and scrambling to save themselves.
For some progressive voters who supported Sen. Bernie Sanders in the primaries, however, the latest revelations do little to ease their concerns about Hillary Clinton. They clearly recognize that Trump is — in every way imaginable — egregiously unfit to be president. They know that, on issue after issue, Trump is a bitter enemy of progress. But they also don't trust Clinton to advance the important causes that Sanders forced into the debate.
This skepticism is understandable, especially after a hard-fought primary battle that left many feeling alienated from Clinton and the Democratic establishment. Yet as the Nation, which endorsed Sanders in the primary, argued in our endorsement of Clinton last week, there are many compelling reasons for staunch progressives to get behind her — not merely as the default choice or the strategic choice but also, on her own merits.
Throughout her life, Clinton has been a determined fighter for women and children who are too often disempowered by society. Early in her legal career, Clinton advocated for kids with disabilities and against racial segregation in schools across the South. As first lady, she helped provide health care for impoverished children and put the issue of health-care reform on the policy agenda. She boldly proclaimed that "women's rights are human rights" in Beijing at a time when such a statement was still controversial. More recently, we have seen her standing with the children of undocumented immigrants who fear seeing their parents deported and with African-American mothers whose sons were wrongfully killed by police.
At a time when flash often trumps substance, Clinton is a serious student of government and policy. The sheer number of plans she has put forward has sometimes been reduced to a punch line, but it's refreshing to see a candidate who is genuinely passionate about the details of her proposals. In addition, she has responded to the populist mood across the county by embracing many of the policies that Sanders campaigned on, including debt-free public higher education and a $15 minimum wage. While Sanders and his supporters clearly applied the necessary pressure, Clinton should be commended for listening to their ideas and actively working to pass the most progressive platform in the history of the Democratic Party.
Clinton isn't perfect. I remain worried, in particular, about her hawkish foreign-policy tendencies. Though she has admitted that her vote for the Iraq War was a mistake, she has since taken ill-advised positions supporting intervention in Libya and Syria. During her campaign, she has doubled down on dangerous tough talk about Russia, which the United States needs as a partner to take on global threats such as the Islamic State and climate change. Meanwhile, the leaked transcripts of Clinton's closed-door speeches on Wall Street serve as a reminder that her long-standing ties to the financial industry remain a concern that will require vigilance moving forward.
At the same time, though, it's important for progressives to recognize just how far we've come. Since her last campaign eight years ago, Clinton has moved considerably to the left on a number of issues in response to movements for change. In the first debate, when the stakes were at their highest, she talked about her commitment to affordable college, Medicare for all, and combating institutional racism. That is something to celebrate. As president, she will fight for paid family leave, affordable child care, and a woman's right to choose. We can have disagreements and still believe that she is going to move us forward.
For progressives who remain wary of Clinton, the answer is not to vote for a third-party candidate. While he gets some issues right, Johnson's economic plan is a more extreme version of the Republican economic agenda, and he seems totally ignorant of world affairs. Stein has helped advance many progressive issues, but until we make the electoral reforms needed to open up the two-party system, neither the Greens nor other third parties can truly serve as an effective vehicle for their ideas. And voting for either Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson or Green Party candidate Jill Stein is a poor way to send a message when there is any chance, no matter how small, that it could lead to a President Trump.
Clinton is clearly the best candidate in the race. She also offers progressives the best chance to advance our issues and vision for the country — but only if we keep applying pressure and holding her accountable. As the Nation wrote last week, "Over the past eight years, progressives have learned the hard way that voting for hope and change doesn't always deliver hope and change. So while voting for Clinton may be necessary, it is hardly sufficient." That's why, the day after we elect her president, we must redouble our efforts to push for the platform that progressives helped create.
Take it from Sanders himself. "On many, many issues, her views are progressive. In many areas, they are awesome," he recently said of Clinton. "Where they're not progressive, we've got to push her."
Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor and publisher of the Nation magazine, writes a weekly online column for The Post.