Bill Clinton Ended Welfare and Paved the Way for MAGA

https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/07/27/clinton-welfare-trump-big-beautiful-bill/

297 points · 85 comments · view on lemmy.world

85 Comments

Asafum@lemmy.world · 108 pts · 18d (12 replies)

Hmmm... So you're telling me the president that followed the "let's cater to the conservatives to woo them over" turned out to be devastating to the Democratic party...

Let's see what the Democrats are doing now as they obviously learned that lesson...

...wait... They learned that lesson right?

(Insert Padame & Anikin meme here)

Rooskie91@discuss.online · 21 pts · 18d (4 replies)

This book explains what happened and why it's still happening pretty well. They've basically created a social bubble that includes rich people and politicians, and excludes everyone else. Now, they're in too deep to admit they were wrong, and fascists are taking advantage of that.

Maeve@kbin.earth · 11 pts · 18d

They weren't wrong. They accomplished exactly what they intended to accomplish.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 17d (2 replies)
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DudleyMason@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 17d (1 reply)
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EVOTravel@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 17d
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not_IO@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 4 pts · 18d (1 reply)

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 17d
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EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -7 pts · 17d (4 replies)
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njm1314@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 17d (1 reply)

Buddy we get it, you're an unhinged weirdo. How many comments do you need to prove it?

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 17d
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Asafum@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 17d (1 reply)

I'm not sure how you got that out of my comment.

If Dems didn't move to the right under Clinton we'd have had a better shot at avoiding this. They still have this obsession with catering to "moderate conservatives" as opposed to the left wing of their support group.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 17d
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SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 89 pts · 18d (14 replies)

Don't forget the Telecommunications Act of 1996 which allowed for the mass media consolidation we see today.

DagwoodIII@piefed.social · 54 pts · 18d (5 replies)

You mean the Act that came after 12 years of GOP attacks on the Fairness Doctrine and the FCC? The one that passed after the GOP retook both Houses?

Yes, that was all Clinton's fault.

SwingingTheLamp@piefed.zip · 36 pts · 18d (4 replies)

He signed it. Hell, I guess he had to sign it, because they had the votes in the Senate to override a veto. Because lots of Democrats supported it, including Al Gore. And ol' Bill had plenty of praise to heap upon it.

Yes, it's as much his fault as anybody's.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 17d (3 replies)
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DudleyMason@lemmy.ml · 2 pts · 17d (2 replies)

Lol, when we talk about Blue MAGA, you're exactly who we mean. And I'll bet any amount of money that if you actually reply, whatever insipid nonsense you reply with will absolutely prove that point.

Zaktor@sopuli.xyz · 2 pts · 17d

It's a week old troll account.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 17d
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ragebutt@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 20 pts · 18d (1 reply)

Also working to repeal glass-steagal for his Wall Street buddies which set in motion the collateralized debt that created the 2008 recession

Also DMCA which led to weaponizing copyright against fair use with basically no recourse (and even a path to easily dox people by invoking it, though this was unintended)

And wrt the op shifting the welfare burden onto the disability system. Since the changes in 1996 disability claims have significantly increased year after year (especially claims related to mental health, which are impossible to quantify objectively) which has led to it becoming substantially more difficult in most states for the disabled to receive benefits.

At this point in my state it is basically well understood that if you are claiming disability for any mental illness (including things like autism and intellectual disability) unless you’ve spent years in residential inpatient you should anticipate being denied and having to do a lengthy appeal. It’s also highly recommended to get a lawyer involved which is either costly (typically they take 25% of back pay, max $7200, so if the appeal took two years and payments would’ve been $1100 a month they get $6600 of the 26,400 that is owed to you and you likely desperately need as someone who has had no income for at least 2 years (possibly ever). Or you can get legal aid but qualifications for that are very strict and you’ll likely wait awhile as they’re always slammed

SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 6 pts · 18d

I have one of these lawyers for my cancer disability claim.

Also that amount that is owed to you is disbursed into small quantities at first. Initially a check for around $2000 every six months and then a final lump sump payment a year after the initial payment. Basically so the Fed can continue to get interest on it for a year.

I learned that from my ex's mental health disability claim which finally went through.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -7 pts · 17d (5 replies)
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UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 17d (4 replies)

I can’t believe Clinton wrote and passed that legislation.

40 Senate Democrats and 97 House Democrats seemed happy enough to put their signatures on it.

He also wrote a lot of blue MAGA pro Trump stuff

Unironically.

Former United States President Bill Clinton asserted that the legislation strengthened "the rule of law by cracking down on illegal immigration at the border, in the workplace, and in the criminal justice system—without punishing those living in the United States legally". However, IIRAIRA has been criticized as overly punitive and intensifying border militarization. With IIRAIRA, all aliens, regardless of legal status, were liable to removal and it expanded types of transgressions that could lead to removal.

Hardly a secret that the 80s/90s was the peak of "Both Sides" politics, given that both parties seemed to be marching in lockstep to send the whole country over a cliff.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 17d (3 replies)
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UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 17d (2 replies)

Don’t pretend that Clinton didn’t write this

I doubt Clinton wrote it. Why would he need to when Congress had an army of lobbyists to write it for them?

Please vote R to support Bernie

I mean, you say this, but if the hard left turn in NYC is any indication, it really does seem to help the Socialist cause when you've got fascists running things. Neoliberals like Clinton, Obama, and Biden can tread water for a minute and keep the lights on. But it takes a failson reactionary like Bush or Trump to really fuck up the imperial core hard enough to spur a revolution.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 17d (1 reply)
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FudgyMcTubbs@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 17d

He was a roads scholar

*Rhodes, you dunce.

rhythmisaprancer@quokk.au · 48 pts · 18d (2 replies)

Bill Clinton pulled out a saxophone to make liberal economics sexy and unfortunately it worked.

CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 18d (1 reply)

I was baffled watching the right wing freak the fuck out all during the 90s about a version of Bill Clinton that only seemed to exist in their heads.

They kept acting that because he and Hillary apparently were what they thought of as boomers/60s hippie activists that it meant Stalin was in the WH. It was all so fucking ridiculous THEN, it looks positively braindead in retrospect.

Clinton was not even a centrist, for fuck's sake.

prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 4 pts · 17d

They kept acting that because he and Hillary apparently were what they thought of as boomers/60s hippie activists that it meant Stalin was in the WH

They did it again 8 years later with Obama. There was a (more than) little twist of racism there to help it along, so it actually kind of worked. Remember the scary black preacher who said 9/11 was chickens coming home to roost (he was right, by the way)? Remember Bill Ayers? Remember how they tried to bring out that photo of him looking fly as hell smoking a fat joint (lol that one backfired)?

That's why half the country will call you a liar to your face when you tell them that Obama deported more people than Trump did in his first term (into the beginning of his second), no matter what data you have to back it up.

Once you get an idea into these people's minds (especially if it plays into their xenophobia and racism), they will believe it until the day that they die. They will eschew their own familial relationships in order to keep believing a lie that has been disproven over and over for decades.

It's fucking tragic.

KulunkelBoom@lemmus.org · 44 pts · 18d (6 replies)

Please... maga has been on its way since Reagan.

FenrirIII@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 17d

Newt Gingrich is the biggest POS who pushed us to where we are

village604@adultswim.fan · 10 pts · 18d

I think you mean Jefferson Davis. Dude got a bunch of poor white guys to fight for a cause that helped the wealthy and didn't benefit them at all.

Maeve@kbin.earth · 4 pts · 18d (2 replies)

Carter wasn't the saint we think he was

UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 17d

Paul Volcker, history's greatest monster.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 17d
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nexguy@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 17d

*civil war

prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 28 pts · 18d (2 replies)

Clinton did a lot of stupid shit, but he didn't "end welfare". For one, welfare still fucking exists, so...

Dude was an orator and he said we were going to end it as we know it. Are people this dense?

There's a lot to criticize Clinton for, so let's not just make shit up

PalmTreeIsBestTree@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 17d (1 reply)

He did start the work requirement bullshit though…

girthero@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 17d

To appease the majority Republican congress at the time. They did attempt an half ass with the first lady to implement Medicare for all

DeathsEmbrace@lemmy.world · 25 pts · 18d

You bet he did. Encouraged child rapists and made sure the #1 government policy is protect the pedophiles over a certain income.

very_well_lost@lemmy.world · 24 pts · 18d (1 reply)

Blue Reagan

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 17d
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Bakkoda@lemmy.world · 22 pts · 18d (1 reply)

DMCA.

prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 0 pts · 18d
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VinegarChunks@lemmus.org · 21 pts · 17d (20 replies)

If you become skilled at writing articles to even slightly plausibly blame the outcomes of Republican conservative policies on Democrats, you can develop this into an extremely lucrative career.

DudleyMason@lemmy.ml · 6 pts · 17d (18 replies)

And if you become skilled at ignoring all the things Democrats actually do when they have power to plausibly act like their rhetoric matches their policy, you can develop that in to lots of Internet points.

Bill Clinton absolutely bears a huge amount of responsibility for Trump. Both because he helped create the material conditions that made Trump viable, but also because he and Hillary used their influence over the party to stuff every position power from local precincts to the DNC chair with devotees of their Third Way Neoliberal Ghoul politics to ensure the party would never correct course or fix the damage they'd done.

MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 17d (1 reply)

Fucking Lemmy moment bullshit.

Smaile@lemmy.ca · -2 pts · 16d

you just cant accept that clinton was not acting for the people best interests.

Tiral@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 17d (14 replies)

Jokes on you, Demarcates don't do shit when they're in power.

Nalivai@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 17d (5 replies)

Last time they were in power they gave tens of millions of americans access to healthcare. You can say it's bad because it's bad access, bad healthcare, it's bare minimum, and yada yada, but millions of people alive today who wouldn't otherwise, and that's not nothing.

Zaktor@sopuli.xyz · -3 pts · 17d (4 replies)

Obamacare? Democrats have been in power since then.

Nalivai@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 17d (2 replies)

Wait, do you think "in power" means whoever is the president?

raze2012@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 17d

Power these days generally means government trifecta. 2009 was indeed the last time Dems had that. 2010 had it lose congress majority, the I believe 2018 had it lose SCOTUS majority.

Zaktor@sopuli.xyz · 0 pts · 17d

No.

MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 17d

So you didn't pay attention during Biden's term?

MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 17d

They do, a lot happens. You just don't pay attention.

TheGoldenV@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 17d (2 replies)

That’s completely incorrect. When Dems are in power they complain… that they don’t have the power to fix anything.

They also get bent for the MAGAts while putting on a sad face.

MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 17d

That’s completely incorrect.

Healthcare coverage expanded under Obama, so yeah, he was correct.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 17d
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Tujio@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 17d (3 replies)

Democrats don't do shit. Republicans do evil shit. Take your pick.

MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 17d (2 replies)

"Democrats don't do shit" because their governance is more stable (at least compared to Trump-era Republicans) which means it's more boring which means stupid people don't pay attention and then just ASSUME nothing is happening.

lightnsfw@reddthat.com · 2 pts · 16d (1 reply)

We really needed Bidens presidency to not be boring. He should have been aggressively cleaning house to wipe the insurrectionists out. Instead he sat on his hands while the DOJ pissed around and accomplished nothing. If he'd done his job Trump wouldn't have been an option for the next election.

stylusmobilus@aussie.zone · 1 pts · 16d

It wasn’t as if the public weren’t urging him to either, many of them were. Spot on observation

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -10 pts · 17d
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MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 17d

And get plenty of attention around these parts.

Republicans are innocent, it was the mean ol' Dems that did everything.

MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 17 pts · 17d (3 replies)

Clinton "paved the way" for MAGA 16 years before it happened. Got it.

Also he "ended" welfare which continues to exist.

Lemmy gold.

deft@lemmy.wtf · 4 pts · 17d (2 replies)

Lemmy has gotten so pathetic in their politics these days. It always was very political but it's pathetic now

SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 17d (1 reply)

So politics are now political?

deft@lemmy.wtf · 1 pts · 16d

Sounded way cooler in your head

ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 14 pts · 18d (6 replies)

Our government on both sides sucks donkey dick. They're all bought and paid for. The fucking Democrats in there went against like 78% of their base and voted to keep funding Israel, siding with virtually all the republicans

stylusmobilus@aussie.zone · 1 pts · 16d

both sides sucks donkey dick

Yeah nah ones sucking elephant dick instead

Your point is valid though

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -7 pts · 17d (4 replies)
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ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 5 pts · 17d (3 replies)

For the past 50 years Republicans have fucked over the average person more than the Democrats have. Republicans have always gave the rich more tax breaks than the Democrats have. The republicans never stopped backing Trump on anything. For that reason alone I'll never vote for any Republican in office.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -7 pts · 17d (2 replies)
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ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 3 pts · 17d (1 reply)

You sound too stupid to understand the concept of having to choose the lesser of two evils. Until there's an option to do something else besides voting dem or rep, I'm voting dem. Not because they don't suck. Because they consistently suck less than the one other current option.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 17d
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brownsugga@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 17d

The entire government and media apparatus have been inching us back toward fascism ever since they missed their first chance in the 1930s. Socialist upwelling was so strong that the powers that be allowed FDR to win 4 terms versus the alternative, actual dismantling of the capitalist system. Looks like history is repeating, but like with fucking losers

anon_8675309@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 17d

Fucking stop. The heritage foundation was formed in the 70s to “pave the way” to what we have now. Look at how many policies of theirs the presidents since then have supported.

MiddleAgesModem@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 17d

Welfare still exists, right?

BradleyUffner@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 17d (2 replies)

Yeah, he wasn't great, but I'd still vote for him over ANY Republican.

100_kg_90_de_belin@feddit.it · 2 pts · 17d (1 reply)

I'd vote Abraham Lincoln over Bill Clinton.

BradleyUffner@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 17d

True, but only if he were running under the reputation that Republicans had during his lifetime. If he still chose to run as a Republican today, after seeing what they have become, well I don't think he would do that.

VitoRobles@lemmy.today · 5 pts · 16d (1 reply)

These weird ass articles talking about "paving the way" have the same energy as "Why did you make me hit you?"

underisk@lemmy.ml · 0 pts · 16d

Unfortunately the state of the world axtually is an unbroken progression of cause and effect. The actions of those in the past shape the future. Pointing this out doesn't equate to victim blaming.

I'm sorry you had to find out this way.

Smoogs@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 15d

"wahhh why did you make me vote so poorly. what i did is your fault. i dont wanna be culpable to myself for my own bad decisions"

-what you sound like right now.

melsaskca@lemmy.ca · 0 pts · 17d

Let's not forget that before trump came onto the political scene america was a bubbling cauldron of corruption, just not so much blatant and out in the open as it is nowadays. It's greed and capitalism that makes america what it is.

Hikermick@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 18d (4 replies)

There was not more welfare? I don't believe that

DudleyMason@lemmy.ml · 2 pts · 17d (2 replies)

Those of us old enough to remember when you didn't have to have three kids and no limbs to be able to get welfare know that OP is correct and you are wrong.

Hikermick@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 17d

My in-laws collected welfare. No kids

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 17d
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EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 17d
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Smoogs@lemmy.world · -3 pts · 18d (6 replies)

idiots continue to blame dems for reps make their own bad adult choices as if dems are some sort of palliative nurse that keeps losing their unrestrained patient.

i wonder if these be the same idiots that yell about how voting lesser evil is not a choice.

still not as idiotic as the both-sides crowd. close tho.

anything but hold the voters responsible for voting for this stupid shit to happen.

UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 17d (2 replies)

idiots continue to blame dems

With Democrats like these, who needs Republicans?

the both-sides crowd

There's two sides, alright. But it's not a partisan split. John Fetterman has more in common with Donald Trump than nearly any of his constituents.

NauticalNoodle@lemmy.ml · 2 pts · 17d

it's two sides of the same shit-smeared coin

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 17d
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knife@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 17d (2 replies)

what are you even trying to say with this comment?

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 17d (1 reply)
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Smoogs@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 16d
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TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world · -14 pts · 18d (11 replies)

Obama bailed out banks instead of people which paved the asphalt for their runway.

Earthwormjim91@lemmy.world · 44 pts · 18d (2 replies)

No, he didn't. The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 was passed and signed into law by Bush a month before the 2008 election even happened. The only thing you can really say is that Senator Obama was one of 70 yes votes on the bill in the Senate.

Obama signed the American Rescue and Recovery Act of 2009, which was heavily focused on stimulus and assistance to individuals and working families. He also signed Dodd-Frank which put a ton of new restrictions on the banks.

Basic facts matter.

tacosanonymous@mander.xyz · 7 pts · 18d

That and Citizens United really drove the last nail in the coffin. What an awful era.

Maeve@kbin.earth · 2 pts · 18d

He advised it.

SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 40 pts · 18d (1 reply)

More importantly, Obama's justice department declined to even really investigate Bush or Cheney for war crimes... Setting the stage for letting Trump get away with as much and now more.

He also legalized, codified, and expanded the drone war, kickstarting the modern drone war state of war.

Maeve@kbin.earth · 7 pts · 18d

Obama enacted the first extrajudicial killing of a United States citizen.

Corvidae@lemmy.world · 40 pts · 18d (2 replies)

The bank bailout was signed into law by GW Bush.

Maeve@kbin.earth · 3 pts · 18d (1 reply)

Obama advised it.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 17d
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dogslayeggs@lemmy.world · 20 pts · 18d

I don't think you have your timeline correct. That happened under Bush.

Maeve@kbin.earth · 5 pts · 18d

And car companies instead of investing in public transportation.

EVOTravel@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 17d
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