Budowsky: Hillary’s big trust problem

Hillary Rodham Clinton should throw all of her consultants out of the room and watch Lyndon Baines Johnson push through the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in the fabulous HBO film “All The Way.”

Then she should ask herself: “What could I do as president that would be as grand, noble and historic for the times we live in?”

{mosads}This, not shouted speeches or consultant-produced videos attacking Donald Trump in response to his slanderous attacks against her, should be the driving force of her campaign.

If the former secretary of State appeals to voters as yet another candidate wrestling in the mud by the end of the campaign, the politically living will envy the dead, the next president-elect will wake up as among the most disliked and distrusted in American history, nothing will change about everything Americans dislike about politics, and frustrated, angry voters will await the next “change election.” 

David Brooks wrote in The New York Times this week that the reason so many voters dislike and distrust Clinton is that she is a workaholic. He misses the point. The reason that so many voters dislike and distrust Clinton is not that she works too hard but that voters do not know or trust whom or what she is working for.

While controversies such as her paid speeches to Wall Street bankers and use of a private server for State Department emails have contributed to a dangerous deficit of trust, Clinton has shown no understanding of how to overcome this burden that persists after many months of campaigning.

With economic inequality the great cause of our time, economic anxiety a powerful sentiment throughout our society, and anger against insider establishments the dominant mood of the electorate, Clinton should issue a clarion call for change and policies — similar in scope to Roosevelt’s New Deal and Kennedy’s New Frontier — to lift the economic lives of our people.

It is not enough to offer periodic comments, poll-tested slogans or focus-group-approved sound bites followed by news stories that she is “moving left.” Voters who distrust her suspect that at a future point, when it suits her interests, she will be “moving right.” This is what leaves the former first lady so widely distrusted.

The Clintons have done much good for America, but they suffer from a Stockholm syndrome of sorts. They spend so much time among wealthy individuals and corporations, and among consultants who service them when they are not servicing politicians, they have become tone-deaf to the cry for economic help from citizens who are struggling far more than misleading economic data suggests.

Trump gets it, in a sick way. The presumptive GOP nominee may be a liar, a braggart, a phony and a slanderer, but a vote for Trump is an “F you” against the forces that voters blame from their problems. Trump does not offer solutions. He exploits pain and offers revenge.

The antidote to the poison of Trump is not to wrestle in the mud with him but to explain the road map to the better life that voters crave.

Clinton should give the kind of speech that President Johnson gave to a joint session of Congress about the moral imperative of the nation. She should dramatize the moral imperative of ending the destruction of democracy from the Citizens United decision, explain how that decision promotes the evils voters that detest about politics, and propose a clear and powerful agenda of an economy that lifts all American boats.

Clinton should relentlessly promote this agenda for seven straight days, with town hall meetings, interviews and making herself directly available to millions of voters through regularly scheduled social media chats in a modern version of FDR’s fireside chats.

If Clinton trusts voters enough to initiate an intelligent conversation about the future of America, voters will come to increasingly trust her and will chose a president to lift their lives above a demagogue who peddles hatred and blame.

Budowsky was an aide to former Sens. Lloyd Bentsen and Bill Alexander, then chief deputy majority whip of the House. He holds an LL.M. in international financial law from the London School of Economics. He can be read on The Hill’s Contributors blog and reached at brentbbi@webtv.net.