Unless she changes course, Hillary Clinton may lose the election.
She must get herself more on television and into newspapers. While she appears somewhat more now in the media than a few weeks ago, it is still too much Trump, Trump, Trump. She must also effectively defend herself, and lay out her vision. This is especially important in the upcoming debates.
Why has she not been more on television, or for that matter more in the pages of newspapers.
On Fox news, this is because many of the moderators of programs and commentators support Trump. On other stations, some moderators have publicly said that Trump is more interesting--presumably both to the viewers and the people in charge. But it is difficult to imagine that if she offers to be interviewed, she wold be refused.
But some of the moderators of news channels say that Clinton does not make herself available. If that is the case, why would that be? She might have thought, on the basis of Trump's earlier performance, that he will destroy himself. But Trump has become less wild, more substantive. Even if the substance is problematic, it is not sufficiently challenged and is less likely to turn people off than his earlier proclamations.
She might be worried that interviewers will focus on the e-mail issue, which she has handled very badly. But she can address it much better. Even more than her use of a private e-mail server, the major problem is how she has handled questions about it. It is time for her to say, what seemed to be the case, that at the beginning she did not take the issue seriously, did not believe it was really a problem. In her early responses she blew it off, perhaps because her use of a private e-mail server had no evident harmful consequences. It is the reactions of the country--not only the Republicans--that made her realize how serious an issue it was. Once this became evident she said confusing things, at times contradicting what the Director of the FBI said on the basis of extensive interviews with her.
She should now be truthful about not taking the issue seriously at first, be consistent in acknowledging that her use of private e-mail, especially for classified material, was a serious mistake, and express regret. If she can, she should publicly draw some lessons from it. Then in response to continued attacks about this, she can repeat this.
On other issues, she needs to asserts herself more. For example, some have attacked the Clinton Foundation for taking money from people in countries that are for many in the U.S. problematic, like Saudi Arabia. Indeed Saudi Arabia incites terrorism with its extreme version of Islam. But Saudi Arabia is also a U.S. ally, and is good enough for the U.S. to provide it with billions of dollars in military equipment, which has just been approved by Congress. But money to help reforestation in Africa, one of the Foundation's activities, should not be accepted from individual Saudi Arabians?
Hannity on Fox News and others talk about how little of the money the Foundation receives is given out in grants, certainly knowingly ignoring the fact the the Foundation is not primarily a grant giving Foundation, but an "operating" Foundation, its own staff doing most of its work. Does Secretary Clinton wants to go down in history like Mr. Dukakis, who did not defend himself against accusations? Where is the Hillary Clinton of the Benghazi Congressional hearings, where for more than 10 hours she effectively defended her record--and having listened to all but one hour, I was more exhausted than she seemed to be.
it is important that instead of primarily attacking Trump, she talks about substantive matters, her policies and how she plans to execute them. In addition to telling the truth about all matters to the maximum possible degree, and effectively defending herself as much as possible, she needs to do what she is best at, talk about policy, giving specifics. She should get coached by her husband, a master at this, to do this in interesting ways. As part of this, she should articulate a vision for the country. As the example of Bernie Sanders has also shown, people are attracted to and get committed to ideas or visions, which can give rise to powerful feelings. A vision of cooperation among all segments of society, greater equality, the United States articulating and following a moral vision at home and abroad, all of which she presumably believes in, and talking about ways to pursue these aims, could gain her a lot of support. All this is of great importance to articulate both in the debates and other media appearances.
Ervin Staub taught and Harvard and is now Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Founding director of the doctoral program on the Psychology of Peace and Violence at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He has studied the origins of group violence, worked in countries around the world on reconciliation after violence, and has written about creating caring societies. His most recent book, published in 2015, is The roots of goodness and resistance to evil: Inclusive caring, moral courage, altruism born of suffering, active bystandership and heroism. For more information about his work, other publications, and downloads of articles, go to www.ervinstaub.com