Nixonian Clinton strikes again
By Ed Rogers
September 28, 2015
The Washington Post
Hillary Clinton had another week where some of her various lies seemed to be uncovered, including a substantial revelation about how “directly involved” she was with senior aide Huma Abedin’s unusual employment status within the State Department. But Team Hillary doesn’t just lie about the big things. It appears the campaign can’t even resist skirting the rules about her super PAC coordinating with the campaign. It may seem trivial, but over the weekend, Clinton campaign spokeswoman Karen Finney and Correct the Record head Brad Woodhouse both tweeted out the exact same inane tweet — within 20 minutes of each other — about Clinton’s “Meet the Press” appearance. While the Federal Election Commission has yet to release a verdict on whether or not this kind of coordination actually violates the “Internet exemption” and is therefore illegal, it “certainly violates the law’s spirit.”
And why would they even have to break this rule? It’s not as though without guidance from the Clinton campaign, her super PAC would have suddenly announced that there are plenty of unanswered questions and many more shoes to drop in the various Clinton scandals. The Clintons are proving they don’t think anything is too small to lie about and that no rule that should be left unbroken. If there is a way to get around the prohibition on campaigns and super PACs coordinating, leave it to the Clintons to show us the way.
It is bad enough we have such a convoluted campaign system, but when a super PAC is essentially laundering talking points so that the campaign and the super PAC can say the same dumb things, we have reached a new low. Like everything else with Clinton, I am sure they will rely on the defense that it was “legal at the time” or that it is “allowed.” But this behavior plays exactly to Clinton’s negative stereotype; that she is shifty, used to ignoring the rules and dishonest. If you can’t even be honest about how you issue pedantic talking points, what can you be honest about?
The Clinton campaigns’ instinct for deception and bias toward skirting the rules — even on simple things — probably says a lot about how Clinton would govern as president. Clinton seems to think that politics is all about lies. It’s a very Nixonian mentality. It appears if there is a forthright way to do something and a sneaky way to do something, she will always pick the sneaky way, no matter how innocuous the issue. Would it be so hard for her to even occasionally give the appearance of trying to do things in an uncontrived, matter-of-fact, honest way? Maybe the Clintons have reached a new level, where they hope voters will become numb to all the lies and start to think that one more doesn’t matter.
Hillary Clinton had another week where some of her various lies seemed to be uncovered, including a substantial revelation about how “directly involved” she was with senior aide Huma Abedin’s unusual employment status within the State Department. But Team Hillary doesn’t just lie about the big things. It appears the campaign can’t even resist skirting the rules about her super PAC coordinating with the campaign. It may seem trivial, but over the weekend, Clinton campaign spokeswoman Karen Finney and Correct the Record head Brad Woodhouse both tweeted out the exact same inane tweet — within 20 minutes of each other — about Clinton’s “Meet the Press” appearance. While the Federal Election Commission has yet to release a verdict on whether or not this kind of coordination actually violates the “Internet exemption” and is therefore illegal, it “certainly violates the law’s spirit.”
And why would they even have to break this rule? It’s not as though without guidance from the Clinton campaign, her super PAC would have suddenly announced that there are plenty of unanswered questions and many more shoes to drop in the various Clinton scandals. The Clintons are proving they don’t think anything is too small to lie about and that no rule that should be left unbroken. If there is a way to get around the prohibition on campaigns and super PACs coordinating, leave it to the Clintons to show us the way.
It is bad enough we have such a convoluted campaign system, but when a super PAC is essentially laundering talking points so that the campaign and the super PAC can say the same dumb things, we have reached a new low. Like everything else with Clinton, I am sure they will rely on the defense that it was “legal at the time” or that it is “allowed.” But this behavior plays exactly to Clinton’s negative stereotype; that she is shifty, used to ignoring the rules and dishonest. If you can’t even be honest about how you issue pedantic talking points, what can you be honest about?
The Clinton campaigns’ instinct for deception and bias toward skirting the rules — even on simple things — probably says a lot about how Clinton would govern as president. Clinton seems to think that politics is all about lies. It’s a very Nixonian mentality. It appears if there is a forthright way to do something and a sneaky way to do something, she will always pick the sneaky way, no matter how innocuous the issue. Would it be so hard for her to even occasionally give the appearance of trying to do things in an uncontrived, matter-of-fact, honest way? Maybe the Clintons have reached a new level, where they hope voters will become numb to all the lies and start to think that one more doesn’t matter.
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