I've been as outspoken as anyone over the last week in pointing out Hillary Clinton's dishonesty, but theWall Street Journal's glee over Clinton's emerging reputation as a serial exaggerator is incredibly disturbing :
Hillary Clinton's been all the news this week, after she "misspoke" about Whitewater, Travelgate, missing files, suspicious pardons, Johnny Chung and cattle futures. Oh wait, after she "misspoke" about Bosnia. Oh wait, same thing.I take no pleasure in pointing out the hypocrisy of the Clinton campaign. In fact, I've even found myself invoking a Democratic version of Reagan's 11th Commandment, biting my tongue instead of leveling criticism, lest I find myself in a situation in November in which I support a candidate that I've spent months slamming. As an Obama supporter who has written multiple posts highlighting Hillary Clinton's dishonesty, let me go on the record as saying the characterization above is absolutely false.That's one way to make sense of the unrelenting, unforgiving, 24/7 news coverage of Mrs. Clinton's fictional telling of Bosnian sniper fire and the subsequent debunking of her every word. In a nasty primary battle that has already featured racial slurs and Chicago slum lords, missing tax documents, and a "monster," you might expect this slip-up to have been yet another blip in the media cycle.
But that would have been to deny the press, the pundits, Democrats, and even Barack Obama, the catharsis of finally -- finally! -- getting a chance to confront the Clintons' questionable mores. Hillary's and Bill's scandals have been the elephant in the primary room ever since she first signaled a run. Yet up to now everyone has been too scared, or too loyal, or too weary to touch the ugly past. Her Bosnia misspeak is now serving as proxy for all the truths about the Clintons' non-truths, allowing even liberals to break free from their Clinton dependence.
There's a big, big difference between the criticism that Clinton is receiving now and the nasty, prurient, partisan muck of the 90s. The fact that there are people who have been breathlessly waiting for a return to the days of the Whitewater, Travelgate, and the Lewinsky scandals is a de facto admission of sleazy and trivial journalistic instincts that are better suited to write Penthouse Letters than grace the op-ed pages of the most influential media outlets in our nation. Indeed, the threat of a return to this gossipy media landscape is one of the reasons I feared a return to the Clinton years in the first place.
Having said that, with Clinton's recent embarrassment regarding Tuzla, NAFTA, and others, she's simply being hoisted by her own petard. Put aside the biggest difference (that these new charges are true and the older ones are almost universally false), the fact is that Hillary Clinton has based her own campaign around her (a) toughness and (b) experience. That her campaign is now being tripped up by the latest string of revelations is a good indicator that both claims are hollow.
Taking the "toughness" claim first, Hillary has spoken endlessly on the campaign trail about how she's been sent through the ringer by the right-wing noise machine and that she questions whether or not Barack Obama is tough enough to win a general election. While this is undeniably true (see above), the implication is that Clinton isn't easily tripped up by personal attacks. Yet here we are seven months before the general election and Clinton has been making one demonstrably untrue statement after another on the campaign trail. Considering how well documented her life has been since 1992, lying about her accomplishments is incredibly stupid. These are the kinds of mistakes you'd expect of a political rookie, not someone who claims 35 years of experience.
That "experience", upon which she's built her entire campaign, is the trait she's used to take out her Democratic rivals, so when it's revealed that she's been lying on her resume, it's the kind of hypocrisy that's fair game, especially in the no holds barred style of politics in which Clinton excels. The experience candidate lying about her experience is every bit as relevant as an anti-gay crusader trying to get laid in an airport men's room or a straight-talkin' campaign reform maverick letting lobbyists run their business from his campaign bus. Clinton's lies aren't merely embarrassing. They contradict the core reason for her candidacy.
So going back to the WSJ piece, let me once again "reject and denounce" (to quote Obama) the implication that the world has been waiting to relive the mainstream media, scandal-of-the-week circlejerk of the Clinton years :
Reporters have dug up every last person who accompanied her on the sedate trip to pour a little more salt in the wound. "The Audacity of Hoax," yelled a blog posting in the liberal Nation magazine, which innocently asked: "What else is she fibbing about?" Bill Burton, Barack Obama's spokesman, gleefully noted that Mrs. Clinton's recent attacks on his candidate were designed to deflect attention away from her "made up" Bosnia story. Heavy emphasis on the "made up" part. No need to mention Vince Foster, Red Bone, Marc Rich or Webster Hubbell. All this will do.Ummmm...no. I know you guys have been waiting for the opportunity to return to the tabloid-a-go-go 90s, but you and your army of Maureen Dowds will have to find some one else to gossip with. Don't use the "enemy of my enemy" trick to draft Obama supporters into your vast right wing conspiracy. As much as I dislike the Clinton campaign now, it's nothing compared to the seething contempt I have for the pseudo-journalistic scum who dragged this nation through the mud in the 90's.
Harry Truman had a great line about Dick Nixon when Nixon was a congressman: Nixon would tell a lie when the truth would do more good just to keep his hand in. This could be written about Maureen Dowd.
I'm beginning to hope neither Obama nor Clinton have enough delegates to win on first vote. All elected delegates are then free to vote their conscience. Maybe we could end up with Feingold after all.
Yer jus' another rethug troll, nazigul (sic).
That is one of the reasons why she would not be a good nominee unless she found a way to rise above it in a prssidential manner and acknowledge and address the charges in an honest and transparent manner.
Like Obama did with the Rev Wright.
If Clinton could have moments like that, that help those who really want to support her feel good about doing so, then she could have my vote.
I wish she wouldn't be working so hard to burn every bridge. She could be a powerful and effective force in the senate if she had just gracefully exited the race when it became clear that Obama would be the nominee. She wouldn't have to watch those she considered to be friends and allies make the choice to support Barack Obama.
I wonder if you can point your deep inside as efficiently at the hypocrisy of the Obama campaign, that started to play the race card and the throwing of home appliances? Yep, right, I already thought that you would be too busy...
I hate to say this: the WSJ piece is more on target than Greg Saunders may wish to admit. We have to accept that this candidate is what she has demonstrated herself to be and stop defending her. Didn't we all hate it when those on the right kept defending Dubya's lies?
I saw an MSNBC report about how documents show, and witnesses remember, Hillary lobbying to pass NAFTA. This, after what seemed like righteous anger at having her stance "misrepresented." (Yup, I believed her -- foolish me). I thought back to her false claims about cattle futures, missing files that mysteriously show up, and Bill's philandering. And I have to conclude that Hillary Clinton is, indeed, a serial liar.
The trouble with catching someone in lie after lie after lie: how can you tell when a liar means what she says? She is what she is and the sooner we face up to it and reject her, the better for the country and for the hope of a Democrat in the White House come Jan 2009.
Now, Obama puts out an ad that claims she was lying. Was she? No. Was his negative ad effective? Well, it was inasmuch as he gave the press some quick examples to trot out over and over as "evidence" that she's unethical. Is it true? No. Whose the liar then? Obama.
Hillary actually has a very solid reputation as a straight shooter. Her Bosnia gaffe was just that. It played right into his attack tactics of the past 6 weeks on her character. She misstepped big. Too bad for her. I thought his NAFTA gaffe was worse. He got called a liar by the Canadian PM. He managed to confuse the story. Many press people are so biased that they repeat the confused tale to keep from admitting how wrong they were.
That's all this amounts to about HIllary's "trust" quotient. It's pride on the part of the press who have taken sides
Quit spinning the thing about Canada too please, the truth is out there, you can go read it if you like.
She did not gaffe the Bosnia thing. You keep writing about it but you are in the minority that it was an accident. It was insulting to service men and women, if you don't understand why then you and Hillary share more than a penchant for ludicrous spin.
I don't want the media getting in a frenzy about gossip, but they need to balance what they think may be too much and getting the truth out. Hillary is running for the POTUS, anything about her life is fair game because we can't afford another idiot president. The world gets smaller everyday, America is in decline, our environment is in jeopardy, and we need real people to fix it. I just don't see her as that person.
But you do have to get beyond the superficial.
NAFTA is good and bad.
He's the one who tried to hook up with the pocket-book Dems by scapegoating her.
It didn't work.
Her base is even more solid after his attack than ever.
*yawn*
Move on, guys. Her base is solid. And it's the little guys.
Imagine that........she's the populist. Not Obama. He's the elitist.
I'm glad i"m not you. I'd hate being behind the Washington elite.
*blech*