The specter of an indicted president sitting in the Oval Office is not only frightening; it’s surreal–like one of Salvador Dali’s paintings. And this image becomes even more surreal when one considers the real facts of the current situation. In his statements of July 5, 2016, FBI Director James Comey laid out a case for indicting the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for her unauthorized use of a private e-mail server.
“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…None of these e-mails should have been on any kind of unclassified system, but their presence is especially concerning because all of these e-mails were housed on unclassified personal servers not even supported by full-time security staff…” Then to the surprise of everyone, Comey closed the case without an indictment, concluding that Clinton and her colleagues were “extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information” (italics added). This statement alone should have disqualified Hillary Clinton from serving as President of the United States. If she does not reach the standard of any reasonable person in her position as Secretary of State and if she was extremely careless in the handling of highly classified information, why should we entrust to her the highest office in our country? I cannot imagine any company promoting a manager to a higher position based on the type of report that Comey delivered. Nevertheless, facts never seem to make much difference when the Clintons are involved. So Hillary forged ahead, touting her experience and competence in government! Apparently, her supporters were supposed to delete from memory the fact that the FBI considers her incompetent.
Then came the October Surprise on the 28th, when James Comey announced that the FBI is reopening the case of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server. Just days before the final voting on November 8th, Comey presents us with the possibility that we could elect a President who will soon be indicted on criminal charges. True to form, the pro-Clinton media has attempted to downplay the entire matter by assuring us that “October Surprises” are a traditional part of American politics and thus no cause for alarm. Even foreign newspapers like Le Monde are trying to help Hillary out of this mess. On the 29th, the Paris paper published an article entitled “La surprise d’octobre, tradition politique américaine“ in which the editors dutifully recounted all of the pre-election surprises from 1968 to the present. In the 2000 presidential election, for instance, it was discovered that George W. Bush had been arrested by the Maine police in 1976 for driving under the influence of alcohol, and in 2012, Mitt Romney made those disparaging remarks about lower income Americans. As it appears, the media would like for us to believe that George’s DUI 40 years ago is on the same plane with Hillary’s possible criminal activity being currently investigated by the FBI!
The surrealism of the situation does not cease, however, with the response of the media. Hillary herself is now on the attack. It is not she who is at fault, she charges, but rather Comey and the entire FBI. Observing how Hillary demands answers from the FBI as though she were the one conducting the investigation, it is really difficult to distinguish between unbridled arrogance and pathological behavior. Of course, one must bear in mind that the Clintons never consider themselves to be subject to the law in the same sense that the rest of us are. If she had ever had any regard for law and regulations, she never would have used the private e-mail server in the first place. In any case, Hillary and her troops are on the march, and I am sure that Joe Biden is now looking for a chance to “punch” the FBI Director.
Finally, the radical feminists who support Hillary at all costs have added their own bizarre twist to the scene. In a Time magazine article (Oct. 31), Professor Robin Lakoff of the University of California, Berkley describes the reopening of the investigation as–in her words–“a bitch hunt”. What an impressive formulation for a professor of linguistics! Lakoff sees the investigation as an attack not just on Hillary Clinton, but on all women. As she states: “The only reason the whole email flap has legs is because the candidate is female. Can you imagine this happening to a man?” To Ms. Lakoff, I respond: “Yes, I can imagine quite well this happening to a man if he had done what Hillary has done! Do you seriously believe that the FBI only investigates the suspected criminal activities of women?” As an aside, let me say that I lament the state of academia in America today. Being a professor myself, I know that there was a time when university professors in America took facts seriously and applied critical reasoning to the situations that they analyzed. Fortunately, the radical feminists do not represent the majority of American women who as a rule have much better judgment.
So here we stand. Hillary is under criminal investigation by the FBI, and despite all logic and reason, she may well be elected President. What a contrast to everyday life! My wife Susan and I are volunteers in the “Take Stock in Children” program in the Marion County High School System where we serve as mentors to disadvantaged students. As a part of our application for this work, we were required to request and submit a complete police report. Had we been under investigation by the FBI, I rather doubt that the school would have accepted us as mentors. In fact, I doubt that you could get a job at McDonald’s if you were under criminal investigation by the FBI. So yes, I think that we find ourselves in a most surreal situation, and the prospect of an indicted Hillary Clinton as President certainly fits the Spaniard’s art quite well.
But perhaps I am being too pessimistic. In reacting to the news of the investigation, Hillary said that she was “confident whatever (the emails) are will not change the conclusion reached in July.” In this best case scenario, a future President Clinton would not be indicted on criminal charges, but rather simply declared incompetent, once again!
Villager Jack Brush is a frequent contributor to Villages-News.com