The turmoil surrounding the Clintons is a never-ending saga with few sagacious characters. Just when one thinks that the worst is over and that sanity might finally prevail, Bill and Hillary demonstrate once again their careless, restless behavior. I remember well the endless discussion back in 1998 when Bill Clinton’s careless behavior in the Oval Office dominated the news for months. More than once, Alan Dershowitz from Harvard Law School appeared in the media to assure us that the whole matter was really a non-issue. And of course, in a sense he was right. But what a spectacle it was, watching a nationally recognized law professor wasting his time trying to defend the reckless conduct of a president who obviously cared little about anything except himself.
In Hillary, Bill found his perfect soulmate. She is as reckless as he is and as unconcerned about anyone besides herself. The whole e-mail debacle is only the most recent example of the Clintons’ modus operandi. In spite of their recklessness, they invariably survive, leaving a trail of casualties behind them. Someone should write a book about the number of lives that these two have destroyed in order to promote their own careers. Did either one of them care about Monica Lewinsky? Where was Hillary, the feminist, when Lewinsky was being dragged through the media? And what about Patricia Ireland, the then president of the National Organization for Women? She like Dershowitz turned herself inside out trying to defend Bill, and in the process she discredited not only herself, but also the entire organization. It was in 1998 that I realized the emptiness of the feminist movement – thanks to the Clintons!
In many ways, Hillary’s e-mail scandal is a replay of 1998 – the same arrogance, the same carelessness, the same disregard for others. In the statement issued July 5 by FBI Director James Comey, we read: “Although we did not find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information. For example, seven e-mail chains concern matters that were classified at the Top Secret/Special Access Program level when they were sent and received. These chains involved Secretary Clinton both sending e-mails about those matters and receiving e-mails from others about the same matters. There is evidence to support a conclusion that any reasonable person in Secretary Clinton’s position, or in the position of those government employees with whom she was corresponding about these matters, should have known that an unclassified system was no place for that conversation.” The reader can easily overlook the phrase “her colleagues” in Comey’s statement. Hillary will walk away from this scandal unscathed, but the careers of those who assisted her have been permanently damaged.
In effect, the FBI asserts that the woman who is likely to be elected President of the United States has a record of handling highly classified information very carelessly. In fact, her behavior was contrary to that which would be expected of any reasonable person. So here we have it; Hillary’s conduct was not criminal, it was reckless. Of course, the question remains as to why she used a private server at all. Well actually, it was private servers as the FBI report makes clear. Comey reports: “Secretary Clinton used several different servers and administrators of those servers during her four years at the State Department, and used numerous mobile devices to view and send e-mail on that personal domain. As new servers and equipment were employed, older servers were taken out of service, stored, and decommissioned in various ways.” The so-called “decommissioning” did not destroy the e-mails directly, but it scattered them into so many pieces that it was very difficult to reassemble the puzzle.
It is significant to note that it is not customary for the FBI to issue public recommendations about indictments; that is the responsibility of the Department of Justice. At this point in the story, Bill reenters the scene. Walking across the tarmac in Phoenix and engaging in a long conversation with Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Bill effectively eliminated her from the decision making process and at the same time destroyed her chances of ever being nominated to the Supreme Court–another casualty of the Clintons. Subsequently, he claimed that he regretted the conversation with her as though he were just a simple boy from Arkansas who didn’t think about the political and legal implications of his actions. Meanwhile, President Obama who is now obsessed about his dwindling legacy is defending the recklessness of the Clintons at every turn. After all, he appointed Hillary as Secretary of State.
Looking at the political career of Bill and Hillary Clinton, one is hard-pressed to find the right words to describe them. Perhaps Maureen Dowd hit the target dead center when she described them as the Tom and Daisy of politics, alluding to the destructive behavior of the incredibly wealthy couple in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. In her NYT article of July 9, Dowd writes: “If she (Hillary) were still at the State Department, she could be getting fired for being, as the FBI director told Congress, ‘extremely careless’ with top-secret information. Instead, she’s on a glide path to a big promotion. And that’s the corkscrew way things go with the Clintons, who are staying true to their reputation as the Tom and Daisy Buchanan of American politics. Their vast carelessness drags down everyone around them, but they persevere, and even thrive.”
In my opinion, the secret to the Clintons’ ability to persevere lies in their mastery of propaganda, particularly in their ability to project an image. The images of Hillary on the internet, for instance, are really quite astonishing. In one, she is presented as solid and trustworthy. In another, she appears compassionately concerned. In still another, she strikes the pose of Margaret Thatcher with slightly raised shoulders. But behind the image is always Daisy – the careless, reckless woman who considers herself above the rules and leaves a trail of casualties in her path. I think I’ll make posters for the Democratic Convention: Daisy for President!
Jack Brush is a Villager and frequent contributor to Villages-News.com. In his new book In Search of the Common Good: Guideposts for Concerned Citizens, he develops guidelines for balancing human rights with the urgent need to promote the common good in our society. For more information, see www.jackebrush.com.