Ready For Las Vegas Democratic Debate: Key Differences Between the Clinton & Sanders
/The 6 biggest policy differences between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton VOX News
One of our favorite media perspectives comes consistently out of VOX. Perhaps because the team is younger, they aren't quite as jaded. More importantly, they make an attempt at objectivity and fairness in discussing Hillary Clinton that is absent from most sources.
In advance of tonight's debate in Las Vegas, Andrew Prokop outlines key differences between the candidates.
1) Money: Sanders attacks the rich; Clinton wants to raise money from them
2) Trade: Sanders is extremely skeptical of new agreements, while Clinton has waffled
3) Foreign policy: Clinton is more of a hawk than Sanders -- and most other Democrats
4) Health reform: Sanders wants single-payer -- but likely couldn't get it through Congress
Clinton said earlier this year that she wants to build on "what works" in Obamacare — the basic framework of which was very similar to her 2008 campaign's health reform proposal. Notably, she said back then that over her 15 years of work on the issue, "I never seriously considered a single-payer system." Her reasons were pragmatic. "Talking about single-payer really is a conversation ender for most Americans, because then they become very nervous about socialized medicine," she's said.
In 2008, Clinton did support one key proposal that never became law — a public option to let people choose government-provided insurance. And she suggested that if it was popular, it could lead to a more extensive overhaul of the system. "Let Americans choose. And what better way to determine that than letting the market have some competition and, you know, see where it does lead to," she said.
5) Spending: Sanders wants big spending
. . . Clinton — wary of being tarred as a big-spending Democrat, like her husband was in the beginning of his administration — is one of them, generally proposing that increases in spending would be paid for by other spending cuts or tax hikes.
Not Sanders. His speeches are filled with calls for dramatic increases in government spending. Pay for the first two years of college at any public university! Spend $1 trillion on infrastructure! Move to single-payer health care!
Overall, he downplays the deficit as a problem, as his appointment of Stephanie Keltonas the top Democratic economist on the budget committee shows. "She thinks that, in many cases, government surpluses are actively destructive and balancing the budget is very dangerous," writes Dylan Matthews. When Sanders does discuss pay-fors, he talks about cutting defense or hiking taxes on the wealthy (not the middle class).
6) Clinton has more frequently pushed for gun control measures