I was born in 1990. Therefore, for most of my life, I have had to live under the veil of Hillary Clinton as “every girl’s role model.” Clinton is undoubtedly very smart and talented. After all, you don’t get into Wellesley or Yale Law school on a fluke. In the wake of the Lewinsky scandal, I was taught that Hillary was a brave “rock” for keeping her marriage together. During her 2008 campaign, the voices of my youth echoed the same sentiment. (“Oh that Hillary, she was the brains in the Oval Office in the 1990s!” “A woman could resolve all our problems!”)
Naturally, I knew better than to think of Clinton as some champion of my gender. As Christopher Hitchens, who wrote my favorite book on the Clinton family (“No One Left to Lie To”), explained: “It’s often said, by people trying to show how grown-up and unshocked they are, that all Clinton did to get himself impeached was lie about sex. That’s not really true. What he actually lied about, in the perjury that also got him disbarred, was the women. And what this involved was a steady campaign of defamation, backed up by private dicks (you should excuse the expression) and salaried government employees, against women who I believe were telling the truth. In my opinion, Gennifer Flowers was telling the truth; so was Monica Lewinsky, and so was Kathleen Willey, and so, lest we forget, was Juanita Broaddrick, the woman who says she was raped by Bill Clinton. (For the full background on this, see the chapter “Is There a Rapist in the Oval Office?” in the paperback version of my book No One Left To Lie To. This essay, I may modestly say, has never been challenged by anybody in the fabled Clinton “rapid response” team.) Yet one constantly reads that both Clintons, including the female who helped intensify the slanders against her mistreated sisters, are excellent on women’s “issues.”
“During the Senate debate on the intervention in Iraq, Sen. Clinton made considerable use of her background and “experience” to argue that, yes, Saddam Hussein was indeed a threat. She did not argue so much from the position adopted by the Bush administration as she emphasized the stand taken, by both her husband and Al Gore, when they were in office, to the effect that another and final confrontation with the Baathist regime was more or less inevitable. Now, it does not especially matter whether you agree or agreed with her about this (as I, for once, do and did). What does matter is that she has since altered her position and attempted, with her husband’s help, to make people forget that she ever held it. And this, on a grave matter of national honor and security, merely to influence her short-term standing in the Iowa caucuses. Surely that on its own should be sufficient to disqualify her from consideration? Indifferent to truth, willing to use police-state tactics and vulgar libels against inconvenient witnesses, hopeless on health care, and flippant and fast and loose with national security.”
Anyway, I have had to come to accept that most people respect Clinton, despite the disgusting amount of evidence that paints her as a nefarious opportunist with lies spewing out of her every pore. I have been lulled into a state of submission in my tirade against her since it only brings me frustration in a generation of women indoctrinated to think that ol’ Hillary is a brilliant victim.
Oh, that’s right, the point of this post: I have reason to think that this era is coming to an end. “In Bahrain last Friday, a tired looking Secretary of State declared she would definitely not be running for president in 2012 (no real surprise there), but far more significantly stated that her current role would be “my last public position”. She signaled that she would “probably go back to advocacy work, particularly on women and children and probably around the world.” This was a big step back for a hugely ambitious politician with potentially another two decades of public life ahead.”
I hope that this is true. I don’t care if Hillary Clinton speaks at every graduation I attend, or writes reams of books about rationalizing her rapist husband – clearly I will never bring down her popularity. As long as she does not hold office, I will at least have a few years of peace without having to beat against a tide of Clinton teflon.
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Check out Jennifer Rubin on Hillary Clinton's record at State and how it is blemished in its own right:
The Honduras "coup" debacle, the strained relationship with Israel, the failure to sustain peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians (as the Bush administration did), the frosty relationship with European allies, the failure of "smart" diplomacy in Syria and Egypt and the Middle East more generally, a human rights policy that is roundly criticized from the right and the left, increased aggression from North Korea, the ongoing embarrassment of our participation in the Orwellian named U.N. Human Rights Commission, the botched pull-out of our anti-missile sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, the deficient response to the June 12 Iranian election, the failure to support robustly the Green Movement, and, most seriously, the failure to slow Iran's march toward membership in the nuclear power club. (The Senate, according to key aides, is contemplating measures to compensate for the lack of progress by the administration.)
(See the post for actual links)
This is a far cry from the Hillary Clinton from just 3 years ago.
You were born in *1990*?! Man, unless that's a typo, that makes you only *twenty*.
I'm twice your age with half your eloquence. So much for the wisdom of the years.
While not a fan of Maureen Dowd the one thing that made reading her columns at least palpable was her disdain for the Clintons and her utter lack of respect for Hillary.
As a woman, in a long time marriage, I have no respect for Hillary in keeping her marriage together with a nefarious husband. In fact it shows a weakness and a lack of self-respect that is suppose to have characterized women of earlier generations not those with that new found sense of self that so many of the feminist generation espouse. The truth of the matter is that Hillary sold her self-respect for the hopes of power and the Oval Office.
Hillary is an embarrassment who only got to her position in life due to a husband's success. So unlike the conservative women today who actually make a name for themselves (but are maligned and attacked by feminists) because of their own abilities and not on the coattails of a man, but with a man behind them. Very different and very much more worthwhile as role models for our daughters.
As someone who – as a lefty Dem – voted twice for Clinton, I have to just say ditto to what I.P. wrote above.
Further, you cannot, cannot be a self-respecting woman respectful of women and support Hillary and her key role in the management of the non-stop "bimbo eruptions" in the 90s. Hillary and the feminist leadership had more to do with my eventual full 180* to conservatism as any readings, writings or talk show hosts. In 1998, the feminist movement officially jumped the shark when it covered for Slick Willy and joined in the attacks on the women Bill victimized and Hillary smeared and demonized. Hillary to me is no better than the female gangmember who holds down a female victim while her fellow male gangbangers rape her. It has discredited everything else she has ever done (which I also believe is frequently malevolent). In addition, she has displayed anti-Semitic tendencies (or what was that kissing Suha Arafat garbage about?).
Good riddance to her.
@ Daled Amos. Interesting piece, thanks!
@ Genesiscount, you're making me blush.
@ Independent Patriot. Let's also consider how she smeared of the victims of her husband's actions. How "pro-women" can someone like that be?!
Kathleen, well done. But you need to sign this post. I was thinking the same thing as genesiscount: "Surely the professor is older than 20?!"
Back to Hillary. I've always been vexed by her popularity, especially with the PUMAs who can't stand Obama, but worship her. I don't see much difference in their ideology…only their styles.
Also, I wouldn't take her statements about serving in public office as gospel. As I'm sure you know, she tends to tell fibs…
As demonstrated above, Hillary and Bill are accomplished liars. Why do you believe her when she says she won't run for elected office again?
Democrats have a very difficult time with the truth. I won't even get into the lies upon lies told by Pelosi, Reid, Obama, and other Democrats about the healthcare debate.
So let's look at a current one, the debate about taxes for next year and beyond. The Democrats and their their mainstream media lapdogs constantly say the position of the Republicans is that they want "tax cuts for the wealthy". But for those of us who live in reality, we know the Republicans are simply aruguing that they want the current tax rates to stay the same for everyone. They are neither arguing for a tax cut or a tax increase for anybody. They simply want to maintain the status quo regarding taxes. But the Democrats lie, using their lapdog media friends, the constantly refer to the Republican position as wanting "tax cuts for the wealthy". This lying propoganda is an insult to anybody with an IQ higher than my shoe size.
As Hitchens pointed out in the paragraph you excerpted, Hillary lied about her position on the Iraq War. To that I say, well, Hillary is a Democrat. Democrats lie. Square this brief video montage of clips of prominent Democrats dating as far back as 1998 to their position on Iraq leading up to the 2006 and 2008 elections:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5p-qIq32m8&feature;=related
1990?
I think that Hillary is finished if she doesn't run for President in 2012. She'll turn sixty-nine just before election day in 2016, she's already looking old, and it wouldn't surprise me if she had some substantial health problems between now and then.
@ Maggot, She looks busted and there seems to be a lot of blowback because of the WikiLeaks mess, aside from her other failures as Sec of State – the article posted on the first comment is pretty good.
@ Rose, March 16th to be exact (send presents!).
@ Ern, good point. If Hillary had a term I bet Chelsea would cite twelve years of executive experience when she ran for Pres…
Grand-Daughter of Barry, USMA '64?
@ David, Nope, nor am I related to Ed McCaffrey of the Denver Broncos. (Good guess, though!)
"The emerging agreement also includes tax breaks for businesses that the president said would contribute to the economy's recovery from the worst recession in eight decades."
Off-topic, but the MSM keeps trying to make this recession seem worse than the one in the early 80s in order to blind the public to the effectiveness of Reaganomics. Would you consider doing a post about this?
Hillary is like Obama. Both have a reputation for brilliance, and I am still waiting to see proof of it in their accomplishments. None is forthcoming; ergo, they are reputed to be brilliant because they are Democrats.
I was born in 1990. Therefore, for most of my life, I have had to live under the veil of Hillary Clinton as "every girl's role model."
Wow. Surely you realize this says more about the specifics of your upbringing than it does about the rest of your age cohort?
While I have no doubt there are others in your predicament, it is hardly universal. Keep up the efforts though, and you'll get beyond those handicaps sure enough.
But first you might want to ask yourself why you are trusting the assurances of someone you known to be a serial liar.
@ThomasD, I respectfully disagree. First of all, I was born to staunch Reagan Republicans, I never heard praise of any Clinton in my home. Maybe if I was born in an extremely red state I wouldn't have had that impression from other people; if everyone was in consent that the Clintons were goons. However, my teachers – public or private, women or men, liberal or ambiguous- as well as my friends parents, and most popular opinion in the states of NY & NJ, have always fawned over the Clintons for their espousal of "brilliance." My college-aged female Republican friends tend to be equally frustrated with this Hillary Clinton "girl power!" fervor, so I can only assume they had similar experiences.
I am not trusting her assurance, she has lost her political capital in her time as Secretary. Her claim corroborates my impression, perhaps I should have made that clearer.
Ummmm…. The Clintons have a famous grasp of the tiny nuances of meaning, ya know.
Precisely *WHAT* is her understanding of a "public position"? Is it one she has to run for and be elected to? Or would she consider an appointment to be a "public position"?
I don't really believe she wants to leave the limelight, so I'm betting on an ambassadorship, maybe to the UN? Or –is there such a thing yet?– US Ambassador to the EU. Something cushy, well-paying, and prestigious.
Great post! I have never understood why Hillary is considered a feminist icon. Sure, she holds all of the "right" feminist views on abortion, etc., but her role in demonizing all of Bill's bimbos is despicable.
And another thing that's always bothered me: while she certainly attended and graduated Wellesley and Yale law school on her own, her career is almost entirely based on her relationship with Bill. Her law career benefited from her being married to the governor, and her women's issue advocacy was amplified by her being the first lady, and her Senate election was influenced a lot by voter sympathy for her. At least she got her current position on her own, but really, would a junior Senator from NY with no foreign policy experience (outside of activities as first lady) have gotten that far without all of her previous wife-of-Bill Clinton advantages?