Hillary Off Course
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
Senator Clinton’s decision to use the turmoil and tragedy of the killings at the World Trade Center on September 11 to put a hold on the nomination of President Bush’s pick for head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Mike Leavitt, doesn’t bode well for her role in the coming political season. As the second anniversary of the attacks nears, the senator representing the victims and many of their families has made it her priority to demand hearings on the notion that the White House may have issued overly soothing statements about whether it was still safe to breathe in Lower Manhattan the air that still bore the stench of our dead.
What, exactly, would Mrs. Clinton have had the White House do? Should Mr. Bush have done his utmost to set off a panic in the already economically devastated neighborhood? Even the EPA inspector general’s report, on which Mrs. Clinton relies, states that, “Because of numerous uncertainties — including the extent of the public’s exposure and a lack of health-based benchmarks — a definitive answer to whether the air was safe to breathe may not be settled for years to come.” Mrs. Clinton argues that we have to be able to trust our government most in times of crisis. But to refrain from erring on the side of alarmism in a time of crisis was no doubt the right decision. New Yorkers had greater concerns, as did the nation. The senator may be engaging in some grandstanding. But it is a particularly tone deaf bit of it.
Better for Mrs. Clinton to explore the territory sketched out in the Washington Post on Sunday by her and her husband’s pollster, Mark Penn. In an article titled “Progressive Centrism,” Mr. Penn lays out a vision for liberalism going forward that includes a muscular foreign policy, a commitment to free trade, environmental consciousness, and a commitment to cutting taxes on the middle class. In particular, Mr. Penn seems concerned with pulling the Democratic Party back from the folly of Deanism. It strikes us as good advice for Mrs. Clinton at a time when her competitors within the Democratic Party are skittering leftward. If she stuck to the center, that would do far more to clear the air.
