Question three: the financial-crisis question. The worst financial crisis in U.S. history erupted under President George W. Bush. Democrats won’t let voters forget that. But the key decisions that enabled the crisis were made during the Clinton years: the decision to allow federally insured banks to enter investment banking; the decision not to regulate derivatives trading; the decision to relax mortgage-credit standards at Fannie Mae, the federally backed mortgage agency. The bank that received more bailout funds than any other, Citigroup, was chaired by former Clinton Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin at the time of the crash. Rubin earned more than $115 million during his tenure there, a period in which Citigroup received some $45 billion in bailout dollars.
In her speeches on the financial crisis, Senator Elizabeth Warren gently reminds her Democratic audiences that the catastrophe was at least as much Clinton-made as Bush-made. “Three of the last four treasury secretaries under Democratic presidents have had close Citigroup ties. The fourth was offered the CEO position at Citigroup, but turned it down.” Maybe Warren is not the only Democrat to remember. As the debate over the Bush record intensifies, so will attention to the vulnerable portions of the Clinton record.
The more Democrats hear the 2016 race compared to 1992, the more they’re liable to wonder: Shouldn’t the party be able to offer something a little more fresh?
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