One of the claims made by the Clinton campaign is that she has experience, and knows how to get things done.
I’m not quite sure how this makes sense.
She has no experience in an executive elected position, and Bernie Sanders was mayor of Burlington for 8 years.
She was in Congress for 8 years, Bernie for 25 years.
What’s more, all through his legislative career, he has managed to make significant legislative accomplishments despite his status as a party outsider:
As Democrats cobbled together a sweeping overhaul of the nation’s immigration law three years ago, Senator Chuck Schumer of New York was clear about one thing: His party could not suffer a single defection.
But one naysayer remained — Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who had opposed a similar effort in 2007 and once again did not like provisions in the new bill that he thought would displace American workers. And he had a price, a $1.5 billion youth jobs program.
Through wheeling and dealing, shaming and cajoling, Mr. Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, got his wish, and his favored provision was grafted incongruously onto a tough-minded Republican border security amendment and paid for by higher visa fees for some foreign travelers.
………
Yet in spite of persistent carping that Mr. Sanders is nothing but a quixotic crusader — during their first debate, Hillary Clinton cracked, “I’m a progressive, but I’m a progressive who likes to get things done” — he has often been an effective, albeit modest, legislator. He has enacted his agenda piece by piece, in politically digestible chunks with few sweeping legislative achievements in a quarter-century in Congress.
Over one 12-year stretch in the House, Mr. Sanders passed more amendments by roll call vote than any other member of Congress. In the Senate, he secured money for dairy farmers and community health centers, blocked banks from hiring foreign workers and reined in the Federal Reserve, all through measures attached to larger bills.
………
His congressional relationships with Democrats and Republicans have been largely legislative and not loving. A backscratcher he is not. Mr. Sanders is far more likely to be found alone in his apartment watching cable news than out for Chinese food with other members of Congress.
“He is not Ted Kennedy, who managed to have these personal relationships that come from the day in and day out working the halls,” said Representative Peter Welch, Democrat of Vermont, who replaced Mr. Sanders in the House. “The way he works is consistent with his temperament and his skills.”
Counter to his reputation as a far-left gadfly, Mr. Sanders has done much of his work with Republican partners, generally people with whom he has little, but sometimes just enough, in common.
And Hillary Clinton’s accomplishments?
Voting for the Iraq invasion, destroying Libya, installing a failed puppet regime in the Ukraine, and supporting every other ill conceived American imperial adventure over the past 15 years.
What experience is there to see?
Nepotism is not experience, see Bush, George Walker and Bush, Jeb.
