Scandals Only Make the Clintons Stronger

Scandals Only Make the Clintons Stronger

The Republican plan to defeat Hillary Clinton is doomed. It's time to go easy on her.


By Matt Latimer
June 7, 2015
Politico Magazine


One has to wonder: When Republicans gathered earlier this year to scheme the defeat of Hillary Clinton, who was the genius who stood up and said, “I know. We’ll challenge the Clintons’ pristine record on ethics. They’ll never see that one coming.”

But of course they did. We all did.

A little newsflash about our past (and probably future) First Family, who pundits, long predicting the Clintons’ coronation, are now suddenly beginning to count out: Scandal surfing is what they always do. They skip the top of the waves, sometimes even giving the impression they might succumb to them. But they never do.

The Clintons have been sent off to their certain doom more times than Tyrion Lannister. During their last sojourn on Pennsylvania Avenue, operators all but installed a new message on the White House switchboard, “If you’re calling with a subpoena for the Clintons, please press 7 now.”

Yet whatever the storm—from blue dresses to funny money from China to an actual impeachment trial—Bill and Hillary are this generation’s Six-Million Dollar Man (and Woman). They always rebuild faster, stronger, and a hell of a lot richer than ever.

Much is now being made of a CNN poll finding that a majority of Americans—57 percent—do not believe Hillary Clinton is honest or trustworthy.  But is that really news? Roughly half of the country has felt that way for a long time.  Forty-three percent of Americans said that a year ago. And forty-six percent said that back in 2007.

Under the headline, “Hillary Clinton’s honesty problem,” an earnest reporter for The Hill newspaper asks, “Is it possible to win the White House if more than half the electorate thinks you’re dishonest?” Uh, of course, it is, people. The Clintons do this all the time.

Clinton’s margins against her potential Republican contenders is thin, to be sure, but not much different than they have been for months. And, by the way, even in purplish New Hampshire, she’s still beating them all—from Bush to Walker to Rubio. Nationally, CNN has her beating Washington’s favorite Republican, Jeb Bush, by eight points.

If history is any guide, the latest series of Clinton scandals will only end to their advantage. Just like they always do. Indeed, it’s long past time for the GOP to learn this lesson before the Clintons whip them again. (Spoiler alert: They won’t.)

Time and again, it’s the Clintons’ accusers who end up humiliated, run out of town, ruined by sex scandals, or left to write soft-porn memoirs about supposed romantic dalliances that read like a letter to a trashy magazine. (“Dear Penthouse, I can’t believe this happened to me…”)

From the day he announced his candidacy for the White House in 1992, the litany of charges against Bill Clinton never stopped—he was a liar, a draft dodger, an adulterer, he had an illegitimate African-American son. Then-President George H. W. Bush himself made a not-to-subtle claim that Clinton might have had pro-Soviet tendencies while a student at Oxford.

Hillary fared no better; she was an alleged drug runner, a hater of marriage and family run amok, a co-conspirator in homicide. A list of the Clintons’ supposed murder victims is still making the rounds on the Internet—right next to other baffling mysteries, like the Loch Ness monster and the plot line of “Revenge.”

Losing to the Clintons in 1996, a frustrated Bob Dole yelled, “Where’s the outrage?” Of course, he yelled that to the very voters who couldn’t care less about Clinton sleaze. They’d heard it all before—again and again.

The Clintons are often fortunate in their opponents—an assortment of professional prudes and ethical hypocrites who push too hard, who revel in it too much, and who focus not on one charge that might stick but a hundred that go in more directions than a Tolkien novel. Which scandal are we on now? Benghazi? Erased emails? Clinton Cash? The death of Vince Foster? An outrage to be named later?

And have no doubt, lurking somewhere in some GOP strategy room at this very moment is a folder fat with new details on that Ny-Quil of Clinton political scandals, Whitewater.

“What is Whitewater?” asked absolutely no one.

Well, back in 1993, a man named David Hale claimed that back in 1978, two other people named Jim and Susan McDougal and the Clintons got into a land deal in Arkansas and then in 1985 they…. (you can’t possibly still be reading this sentence, can you?). Fear not.  Whitewater will be back to bore you to tears for at least one more election cycle.  At least, we’ll have Caitlyn Jenner’s wardrobe to keep us otherwise occupied.

I suppose it’s possible that this year voters will wipe their hands of the Clintons once and for all and move on to other candidates. Or that someone will finally have footage of Hillary Clinton setting an American flag on fire while smoking a crack pipe at a Nazi appreciation meeting with Kim Jong Un.

But just in case the Republicans actually decide to win an election for a change without waiting for the Clintons to totally implode, a few pointers:

Suggestion #1. Pull a Costanza. In one of Seinfeld’s iconic episodes, George Costanza resolves to do the opposite of every impulse or instinct he’s ever had. As Jerry sagely advises him, "If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right.”

For decades, the GOP has virtually knocked over people to run to a microphone with attacks on Bill or Hillary, only to see it blow up in their face. Imagine what independents or persuadable Democrats might think of a GOP nominee who says something completely unexpected about the latest Clinton scandal—something that runs totally opposite of their every instinct. Something like, “You know, it’s easy to pile on the Clintons, but I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt and hope that the media does its job. My focus is on my campaign and my message to the voters, which is blah blah blah.” (Note to candidates: You’ll have to fill in the blah, blah, blah yourselves.)

Suggestion #2. Study Thy Enemy. Has anyone else noticed that Hillary Clinton is suddenly wearing a lot of green? And no, not green like the color of money. Just a vivid, eye-popping, deep hue.

She wore green at her Benghazi hearing and when she went to Iowa right after announcing for president. As Secretary of State, she memorably wore green at a G-12 summit.

I mention this because there is little that the Clintons do, at least in the presidential context, that is unplanned. These are people, after all, who infamously polled where they should vacation.

Hillary Clinton’s team is very proud of their efforts to portray their boss as confident, calm, and soothing—like a pastoral green meadow, perhaps? And Secretary Clinton has hired someone with that very task in mind. That the former diplomat has calmly weathered a deluge of scandals that would drown lesser men (word choice intentional) only bolsters that image. Even now, as her polls numbers droop, she still scores well as a strong leader, far ahead of her rivals. It’s as if the Clinton camp is telling voters, if Hillary has the steel to withstand all of this mess, you can trust her to take on whatever ISIS throws at her.

Maybe GOP candidates might give similar thought to their own demeanor and even their wardrobe. Do they come across to voters as serious, future-oriented, or presidential? Or do they instead favor weird turtlenecks or wear large round glasses that we last saw on our high school science teacher?

Suggestion #3. Out-Clinton the Clintons. Notice what the Clintons do when serious allegations surface. They go out and give speeches. About campaign finance reform. Or juvenile justice reform. The key word, of course, is “reform.” As in change. As in the future.

They don’t worry about Washington-manufactured crises— such as counting how many times Hillary Clinton has answered questions from the press. (The latest pseudo-Clinton scandal.) They only care about that if it has an impact on people outside the Beltway. And then they adjust and adapt.

Bill and Hillary Clinton learned long ago what should be obvious to anyone spending a day in politics: Voters care about their own lives, their own futures, far more than they do about the latest Washington feeding frenzy. Ideas trump innuendo. This is why the Clintons keep winning.

Until the GOP gives us its obsession with the former First Family. Until it positions itself as the party of the future and the Clintons, implicitly, as relics of the past, then the party is going to be in for another shock next year—this one even bigger than 1992.


Article Link to Politico:

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/scandals-clintons-stronger-2016-foundation-president-118683_full.html?print#.VXYWV8-6fDc

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