We have previously discussed how Clinton has blamed self-hating women, the Russians, and a long list of reasons for her loss . . . except for herself. Despite losing the virtually unloseable election to Donald Trump, Clinton continues to be celebrated by Democratic insiders in speeches and continues to blame others for her historic loss. That campaign was in full view this week with Clinton’s appearance at the annual Code Conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. Clinton continues to evade tough questions about her own conduct while giving the false impression of taking responsibility. This week she crafted a truly Clintonesque line: “I take responsibility for every decision I made, but that’s not why I lost.” In other words, I take no responsibility. As many on this blog know, I have been very critical of Trump but I have no more patience with Clinton or the establishment figures who brought about this historic loss. All of these groups celebrating Clinton ignore the fact that Trump could not possibly have succeeded without her — and the effort of virtually every national Democratic leader to guarantee her nomination.
As we discussed earlier, Clinton’s magical mystery tour after the election is designed to avoid blame for herself and the Democratic establishment which largely engineered her selection. We are still waiting for a serious post-election interview of Clinton. Carefully selected interviewers never ask about any of the scandals that plagued Clinton or the fact that she was one of the least popular politicians in the country or that she magnified these problems by refusing to turn over her Wall Street speeches. They also do not ask why Clinton remained so close in the polls against someone so polarizing as Trump. Finally, when Clinton refers to her controversies as causing the loss, she is never asked about the fact that Trump faced endless such controversies at the same time but still prevailed against her. Trump faced unrelentingly bad press and, in comparison, Clinton had overwhelmingly positive (and at times openly supportive) coverage. Yet Trump prevailed against her. As David Axelrod said this week, “it took a lot of work to lose to Donald Trump.”
The show was in full display in the latest speech. The Clintons however have continued to evolve in their blaming of others. Within minutes of the loss on election night, Clinton aides began to spin the loss and entirely the fault of FBI Director James Comey — a spin picked up by Clinton herself the next day. Many of us have questioned that spin in light of Clinton’s long-standing low polls on truthfulness and her ranking as (with Trump) the most unpopular nominee of a major party for the presidency. Now however it is the Russians who stole the election from Clinton (who could not get serious distance from the most unpopular presidential candidate in history due to her own low polling). Accordingly, after claiming that she would take responsibility, Clinton immediately denied any responsibility: “The overriding issue that affected the election that I had any control over — because I had no control over the Russians — was the way the use of my email account was turned into the greatest scandal since Lord knows when. This was the biggest ‘nothing burger’ ever.”
There are a couple of obvious problems with this spin of course. First, Clinton’s use of a personal server did compromise security and was widely denounced. Despite her denials, classified emails were sent to her personal server. Second, Clinton and her supporters still struggle with the fact that the key emails cited in the election were true. They were not fake. So they are still trying to get voters upset that hackers revealed false statements by Clinton and high ranking officials. They are supposed to be disgusted that anyone allowed them to see emails that directly contradicted what they were being told.
I have previously said that the Russian hacking warrants comprehensive investigation, even though our county is notorious for such hacking and influencing of elections. It is a serious matter if the Russians selectively hacked Clinton’s emails to try to influence the election. However, I do not believe that the hacking was the reason that she lost. More importantly, the Clintons continue to avoid discussing the misrepresentations disclosed
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