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Hillary Clinton Tag

Posted by William A. Jacobson on October 14, 2015 12 Comments
The challengers to Hillary Clinton in the debate last night made Republican undercard competitors seem downright impressive. Martin O'Malley has the vocal quality of elevator music. It reminds me of another voice, I just can't place it. But there's not much there there. Jim Webb seemed off-kilter, complaining endlessly about not getting enough time, and not really scoring any points with Democrats by invoking concepts like love of country and a strong military -- that will not fly in today's Democratic Party. What can we say about Linc Chafee? I thought he had the potential to be aggressive. Those of us who know him from Rhode Island know that while he comes across as a doofus, he can be quite nasty and acerbic. I thought we might get that from him when his opening statement emphasized that he's never had a scandal and is honest -- but he didn't take the shot directly at Hillary and seemed lost on stage. In short, none of the three lower-tiered Democrats scored any points and all seemed afraid to confront Hillary. Hillary was, as Mark Steyn puts it, The Alpha Female of a Beta-Male Debate:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on October 14, 2015 20 Comments
Hillary Clinton supporters understandably are happy after last night's debate. The motley crew of challengers on stage were incapable of stringing sentences together, much less taking on Clinton directly. Bernie Sanders' demand that the media leave Hillary alone on her server also was a boost to her narrative of "nothing to see here, move along." But that good night masked the fact that in the real world, the server is a serious problem legally and politically. When Obama was interviewed on 60 Minutes last Sunday, he seemed to be signaling there was nothing to Hillary's server problem, Obama pretty much signaled Justice to lay off Hillary:
Steve Kroft: Did you know about Hillary Clinton’s use of private email server– President Barack Obama: No. Steve Kroft: –while she was Secretary of State? President Barack Obama: No. Steve Kroft: Do you think it posed a national security problem? President Barack Obama: I don’t think it posed a national security problem....
That was a fairly outrageous statement to make considering the FBI is still investigating, and could be seen as an interference in DOJ evaluation of the case. Did Obama know something the rest of us don't know? Were the FBI and DOJ sharing information about the investigation with Obama? Now Obama is walking it back:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on October 11, 2015 40 Comments
That's my reading of this interview on 60 Minutes (emphasis added).
Steve Kroft: Did you know about Hillary Clinton's use of private email server-- President Barack Obama: No. Steve Kroft: --while she was Secretary of State? President Barack Obama: No. Steve Kroft: Do you think it posed a national security problem? President Barack Obama: I don't think it posed a national security problem. I think that it was a mistake that she has acknowledged and-- you know, as a general proposition, when we're in these offices, we have to be more sensitive and stay as far away from the line as possible when it comes to how we handle information, how we handle our own personal data. And, you know, she made a mistake. She has acknowledged it. I do think that the way it's been ginned-up is in part because of-- in part-- because of politics. And I think she'd be the first to acknowledge that maybe she could have handled the original decision better and the disclosures more quickly. But--

Posted by Amy Miller on October 11, 2015 15 Comments
Has anyone noticed that our candidates are a little...sassier...this time around? Maybe we have Donald Trump to thank for this; perhaps it's the advent of social media and the unfiltered nature of digital campaigns. Either way, it's something to be thankful for, if only for its entertainment value. Last week, Hillary Clinton sent copies of her book, Hard Choices, to all of the Republican candidates: Her campaign attempted to play this off as a big PR clown on the GOP---but it didn't work out as well as she thought it would. Ben Carson responded to Hillary's generosity in kind:
Thanks Hillary. Posted by Dr. Ben Carson on Friday, October 9, 2015
Coaster? Door stop? Step stool? Sounds about right. I can't think of a better use for it, at any rate.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on October 11, 2015 6 Comments
Hillary Clinton struggles to get her campaign on track, lurching to the left on a variety of issues near and dear to the hearts of the progressive base and facing the fallout from her decisions as Secretary of State as her poll numbers tank. Here's a chart via Hot Air that shows the trend of her and other Democrat candidates' polling (Real Clear Politics has an interactive version, if you're interested): rcp-dems According to Fox News' Special Report, the coming few weeks will be key to determining the success of these attempts.  Watch:

Posted by Mike LaChance on October 10, 2015 14 Comments
CNN's Ashleigh Banfield spoke to Democratic strategist Robert Zimmerman about the upcoming Democratic primary debate yesterday. They considered the unthinkable possibility that Bernie Sanders will bring up Hillary's email scandal, which Banfield quickly suggested isn't really a scandal. Matthew Balan of NewsBusters reports (emphasis is his):
CNN's Banfield: Hillary E-Mail Scandal 'Not Even A Scandal' On Friday's Legal View, CNN's Ashleigh Banfield did her best to downplay Hillary Clinton's ongoing e-mail scandal. Banfield asked Democratic strategist Robert Zimmerman if Bernie Sanders would bring up the issue at the upcoming Democratic presidential debate.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on October 09, 2015 13 Comments
Hillary Clinton's campaign is encouraging those digitally inclined to join their digital grassroots army. The process is pretty simple. The first step to joining the astroturf grassroots gang, entering your email address and zip code: Tweet for hillary clinton campaign grassroots digital media sign up scandal email benghazi 2016 democrat Almost instantly, you'll receive an email promising you all kinds of "goodies." We're not entirely sure what "goodies" we might get and we're afraid to ask.

Posted by New Neo on October 09, 2015 7 Comments
Hillary Clinton's opponents in the race for the 2016 Democratic nomination are against the TPP deal, unions are against the deal, and now she's against it too although previously she was one of its strongest supporters. It's hard to imagine that a single thinking human being would be convinced that her change of heart on this issue is on the merits rather than merely politically expedient. For example, even Ezra Klein finds himself a mite perturbed by her reversal on this and other matters:
Of late, Clinton is again looking like the kind of candidate who puts polls in front of policy. First, she came out against Obamacare's Cadillac tax — a policy that enjoys wide support among health economists... ...What I have trouble believing is that Clinton and her policy advisers really think the Cadillac tax is a bad idea. Her past policies embrace its theory, her past advisers helped pass it into law... On Wednesday, Clinton came out against the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, saying that she's concerned with the provisions around pharmaceuticals and the absence of provisions around currency manipulation. But as Tim Lee notes, Clinton strongly supported early versions of the deal — she called the TPP "the gold standard in trade agreements" — that were worse on pharmaceuticals and identical on currency manipulation...

Posted by Amy Miller on October 08, 2015 28 Comments
Back in July, we reported that Hillary's emails revealed a disturbing (but not altogether startling) connection between the former Secretary of State and Sidney Blumenthal. We already knew that Blumenthal was sending Clinton "off the books" intel reports on the situation in Libya, but new emails suggested that he was also offering advice on how to handle the politics of dealing with Iran, China, and Northern Ireland. Now, new reports show that the advisor and Clinton Foundation payee engaged in communications with the Secretary that both raise ethical questions about business practices, and could have endangered national security. In a 13-page letter to ranking Democrat Elijah Cummings, Benghazi Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy previewed new and troubling details about just what sort of information Secretary Clinton was sharing with Blumenthal via her home-brew server. From the Weekly Standard:

Posted by Amy Miller on October 08, 2015 18 Comments
When CNN hosted the Republican primary candidates, the candidates got 3 hours in which to make (or sink) their case for the White House. It was a long affair, but some good came from it---Marco Rubio distinguished himself on foreign policy (whether you agree with his approach is a different story entirely,) Carly Fiorina shifted from "dark horse" to budding household name, and Ted Cruz was afforded more of an opportunity to get in on the conversation. The Democrats won't be afforded that same luxury. Next week's CNN debate---this time, hosting the Democratic primary contenders---will afford the Dems' 5* candidates just two hours to make their initial splash in the primetime media pond. *Will Joe Biden debate? We're still not sure:

Posted by Amy Miller on October 07, 2015 11 Comments
On Monday, American officials announced that they had finally reached an accord on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), an east-meets-west free trade deal that has been in the works for nearly a decade. TPP languished under "classified" status, irking both Republicans and Democrats who publicly lashed out against the Obama Administration for keeping the details of the trade deal secret, and that frustration has now boiled over as legislators and other officials get their first look at the 1000+ pages of negotiated regulations. What have we learned so far? Not much, but the Trans-Pacific Partnership was and will remain controversial. High-powered Democrats are pitted against each other---and the president---over concerns that an emphasis on free trade could alienate powerful workers' unions and other interest groups. Today, Hillary Clinton formally came out against TPP, citing concerns about job creation, wage levels, and national security, saying, "I don't believe it's going to meet the high bar that I have set." Watch:

Posted by Amy Miller on October 05, 2015 23 Comments
Since news first broke about Hillary Clinton's "home-brew" email server, conservatives and transparency advocates have run a full-court press against Clinton's efforts to keep prying hands off of her official and personal communications. What should have been a simple (if massive) request for transparency has ballooned into a legal and political nightmare, leaving investigators open to a barrage of accusations claiming that, when it comes to Clinton, former Secretaries of State should remain virtually untouchable. The idea is nonsense, not only because it ignores the law, but because it ignores the question anyone with a brain and common sense has been asking since day one, but no one with a big enough megaphone has asked. Finally, someone asked it. During a town hall-style interview for the Today Show, Savannah Guthrie went there, asking Clinton, "do you know how bad it looks?" Watch:

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on October 04, 2015 22 Comments
As the Hillary campaign tries to rally in the face of favorability numbers that must be causing more than a few sleepless nights at Camp Hillary and new financial boosts to Bernie Sanders' campaign, the news for Democrats is not all discouraging.  Apparently, there is a way that whomever the Democratic nominee, a Democrat can win the White House . . . with the help of illegal immigrants and a "glitch" in the Electoral College system. Paul Goldman and Mark Rozell, writing at Politico, have put forth an interesting premise:  "noncitizens decrease Republican chances of winning the White House next year."  In their article, entitled "Illegal Immigrants Could Elect Hillary," Goldman and Rozell explain:
The right to vote is intended to be a singular privilege of citizenship. But the 1787 Constitutional Convention rejected allowing the people to directly elect their President. The delegates chose instead our Electoral College system, under which 538 electoral votes distributed amongst the states determine the presidential victor. The Electoral College awards one elector for each U.S. Senator, thus 100 of the total, and D.C. gets three electors pursuant to the 23rd Amendment. Those electoral numbers are unaffected by the size of the noncitizen population. The same cannot be said for the remaining 435, more than 80 percent of the total, which represent the members elected to the House.

Posted by Mike LaChance on October 02, 2015 4 Comments
The progressive base of the Democratic Party is voting with their wallets and has pushed fundraising for Bernie Sanders up to the level of the Clinton machine. Over the last three months, Sanders has come within $2 million of Hillary's grand total. James Hohmann and Elise Viebeck of the Washington Post:
So much for the Clinton juggernaut Clinton raised $28 million from July 1 to Sept. 30. Bernie Sanders raised $26 million. Hillary personally headlined 58 fundraisers during that time period, the same number as she did during the previous quarter. Sanders only appeared at seven finance events! Almost all of his money came from online. The disclosures come with fresh evidence that the base of the Democratic Party is not ready for Hillary. Yesterday alone, the Sanders campaign raised more than $2 million online. About $500,000 of that came in from 10:30 p.m. until midnight, according to my colleagues Matea Gold and John Wagner. Sanders has received 1.3 million donations from about 650,000 different donors. That puts him across the threshold of 1 million contributions earlier than Barack Obama in both his presidential campaigns.

Posted by Amy Miller on October 01, 2015 8 Comments
A new USA Today/Suffolk University poll shows that Hillary Clinton's numbers have taken a dive since July, when she commanded 59% support for her nomination. This summer Bernie Sanders drew just 14% of the support of those polled, with an undeclared Joe Biden still raking in 8% support. Now, polling shows that Clinton's support has dropped almost 20 points to just 41% of likely Democratic primary voters. Sanders and Biden, meanwhile, have gained ground, earning 23% and 20%, respectively. She's still in the lead, but the field is spreading out---which could mean bad news for the left's presumptive nominee. More from The Hill:
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