The Latest from the Prospect
 ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌


View this email in your browser
<[link removed]>

 

FEBRUARY 16, 2023

Meyerson on TAP

Feinstein in Retrospect

Her centrist politics made her an outlier among California Democrats

The first time I heard Dianne Feinstein speak in person was at the 1990
California Democratic Party Convention, which I was covering for LA
Weekly. It was not a performance calculated to endear her to the largely
liberal delegates there assembled.

At the time, Feinstein, then mayor of San Francisco, was seeking the
Democratic nomination for governor. The incumbent governor, Republican
George Deukmejian, was termed out of office, and Feinstein was part of
the Democratic field running to replace him. Her chief opponent in the
upcoming Democratic primary was state Attorney General John Van de Kamp,
a dedicated liberal (subspecies patrician).  Feinstein came to the
convention chiefly to make clear her differences with the AG.

In mid-speech, she paused for a moment and then announced that, unlike
Van de Kamp, she supported capital punishment. The delegates, somewhat
stunned and affronted at having their beliefs so baldly rejected, booed
vociferously.

Which was the whole point of Feinstein's address. Her campaign team
had cameras and mics stationed around the hall that captured this round
of call and response, and in short order, Feinstein's pronouncement
and the crowd's response was being repeatedly aired in her ads in all
of the state's media markets. The message was clear: When the libs
behaved like a bunch of wusses, clinging to unpopular positions, she
would unceremoniously reject those positions and own those libs.

I don't doubt that Feinstein actually believed what she was saying
then, but it was also Political Zeitgeist Chasing 101. Four years
earlier, state voters had voted not to retain several Jerry Brown
appointees to the state Supreme Court, chiefly because one of them-the
chief justice-had voted against every death sentence that had come
before the Court during her tenure. Polling at that time showed that the
death penalty commanded about 80 percent support within the state. (The
great in-migrations and out-migrations that were to radically change
California's demographics and politics had yet to occur.)

Feinstein went on to beat Van de Kamp in the June primary, only to lose
to Republican Pete Wilson in the November general election. Two years
later, she was elected to the U.S. Senate, where she has served ever
since. This week, at age 89, she announced she would not seek
re-election when her current term ends in 2024. Not surprisingly, her
announcement has produced a host of columns and editorials praising her
tenure, most focused on how she helped make it both acceptable and
normal for women to hold high office. And to be sure, like her party,
Feinstein has grown more liberal-in her case, moderately more
liberal-during her long Senate tenure (though she's been shaky on
the question of whether she'd vote to abolish the filibuster).
Her most notable achievements were her bill banning assault weapons in
1994 (not renewed, alas, when it sunsetted ten years later) and the
nearly 7,000-page report on the CIA's atrocious detention and
interrogation practices, which she commissioned and oversaw as chair of
the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2014. Twelve years earlier,
however, Feinstein was one of 29 Senate Democrats who joined all but one
Senate Republican in voting to authorize George W. Bush's war in Iraq.
Twenty-one Senate Democrats, including her fellow Californian Barbara
Boxer, voted no, as, on the House side, did most California Democrats,
including her fellow San Franciscan Nancy Pelosi (who actually led the
opposition in the House).

From a California perspective, Feinstein's early years in the Senate
were particularly problematic. While she didn't support Proposition
187 (the ballot measure that would have banned undocumented immigrants
from receiving public services, including the right to attend K-12
schools), she did nod toward nativist sentiment that year in her Senate
re-election campaign. (In 1992, she'd been elected to fill out the
last two years of a Senate seat that had come open.) Her Republican
challenger, Michael Huffington (the fabulously wealthy then-husband of
Arianna Huffington) was one of the last soon-to-be-extinct liberal
GOPniks, holding positions at which one of Difi's campaign ads took
aim. "While Congressman Huffington voted against new border guards,"
her ad proclaimed, "Dianne Feinstein led the fight to stop illegal
immigration."

As the California electorate soon became much more Latino, Asian and
immigrant, Feinstein changed with it. But despite her substantial
achievements, there's no question that when compared to the leading
California Democrats of the past six decades-both Governors Brown, and
current Gov. Newsom; Senators Cranston, Boxer, Harris and Padilla; House
Democrats Burton, Waxman, Pelosi, and a number of current members; and
L.A.'s 20-year Mayor Tom Bradley-Feinstein stands as the most
centrist of the lot. Of her long tenure representing California in the
Senate, history will note that the state moved further and faster left
than she did.

~ HAROLD MEYERSON

Follow Harold Meyerson on Twitter <[link removed]>

[link removed]

[link removed]
Hochul and Senate Clash on Public Power, With Utility Workers on the
Sidelines
<[link removed]>

The New York Power Authority manages resources built half a century ago.
But a plan to make it the vanguard of clean energy could be hamstrung by
labor-environmentalist divisions. BY LEE HARRIS

[link removed] How
Noncompete Agreements Hamstrung America's Pandemic Response
<[link removed]>

When COVID-19 was at its worst, many doctors wanted to go where they
were most needed. Their bosses said no. BY LUKE GOLDSTEIN

[link removed]
Passing the Buck Along the Forgotten Canadian Border
<[link removed]>

The problems posed by migrants seeking entry into Canada from New York
illuminates the tensions over a bilateral immigration agreement that has
outlived its usefulness. BY GABRIELLE GURLEY

[link removed]

 

To receive this newsletter directly in your inbox, click here to
subscribe.  <[link removed]>

Click to Share this Newsletter

[link removed]


 

[link removed]


 

[link removed]


 

[link removed]


 

[link removed]

YOUR TAX DEDUCTIBLE DONATION SUPPORTS INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM
<[link removed]>

The American Prospect, Inc., 1225 I Street NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC xxxxxx, United States
Copyright (c) 2023 The American Prospect. All rights reserved.

To opt out of American Prospect membership messaging, click here
<[link removed]>.

To manage your newsletter preferences, click here
<[link removed]>.

To unsubscribe from all American Prospect emails, including newsletters,
click here
<[link removed]>.