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Hillary Clinton Tag

Posted by Jay Caruso on May 28, 2015 9 Comments
Fact: Bill and Hillary Clinton aren't going to give up information voluntarily. When the media did its job back in April, the Clinton Foundation was forced to refile multiple tax returns after it was discovered that the Foundation failed to disclose donations from foreign governments. Still, gathering new information about the Foundation remains a monumental undertaking, even for mainstream media outlets. The latest information to come out is the news that long time political confidant Sid Blumenthal was paid $10,000 per month by the Clinton Foundation while he was offering up unsolicited foreign policy advice to Hillary Clinton on Libya. From Politico:
Sidney Blumenthal, a longtime confidant of Bill and Hillary Clinton, earned about $10,000 a month as a full-time employee of the Clinton Foundation while he was providing unsolicited intelligence on Libya to then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, according to multiple sources familiar with the arrangement. Blumenthal was added to the payroll of the Clintons’ global philanthropy in 2009 — not long after advising Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign — at the behest of former president Bill Clinton, for whom he had worked in the White House, say the sources. While Blumenthal’s foundation job focused on highlighting the legacy of Clinton’s presidency, some officials at the charity questioned his value and grumbled that his hiring was a favor from the Clintons, according to people familiar with the foundation. They say that, during a 2013 reform push, Blumenthal was moved to a consulting contract that came with a similar pay rate but without benefits — an arrangement that endured until March.
If this was the only money Blumenthal was earning, it may not have been too eye-opening; but Blumenthal was also being paid by two organizations run by David Brock:

Posted by Leslie Eastman on May 28, 2015 18 Comments
Now that former Senator Rick Santorum has dived into the presidential pool, I thought I would check the status of a candidate who is already in -- Carly Fiorina. Early in her candidacy, Professor Jacobson noted she was "rocking it" by taking the fight to Hillary Clinton. She continues to show the rest of the field how to target the elusive Democratic candidate. For example, Clinton has been less than responsive when it comes to addressing the American press. In contrast, Fiorina held a press conference...directly outside a Clinton event.
First the former Hewlett Packard chief executive popped up outside the Marriott hotel where Clinton was just about to kick off a campaign event, offering to take questions from the press since Clinton so often won't. Forty-five minutes later and six blocks down the road, there Fiorina was again, bragging to the South Carolina House Republican caucus about what she'd just done as they chewed on grilled chicken at a Hilton hotel luncheon. "I've answered probably 420-plus questions on the record about everything, from, 'Is a hot dog a sandwich?' -- I flubbed that one, I will tell you -- to what I would do about ISIS and everything in between," Fiorina said. "And Hillary Clinton has answered maybe 15 questions."

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 27, 2015 12 Comments
An explosive new report from David Sirota and Andrew Perez of the International Business Times suggests that preferential treatment in weapon sales was given to Clinton Foundation donors while Hillary Clinton was serving in the state department:
Clinton Foundation Donors Got Weapons Deals From Hillary Clinton's State Department In the years before Hillary Clinton became secretary of state, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia contributed at least $10 million to the Clinton Foundation, the philanthropic enterprise she has overseen with her husband, former president Bill Clinton. Just two months before the deal was finalized, Boeing -- the defense contractor that manufactures one of the fighter jets the Saudis were especially keen to acquire, the F-15 -- contributed $900,000 to the Clinton Foundation, according to a company press release. The Saudi deal was one of dozens of arms sales approved by Hillary Clinton’s State Department that placed weapons in the hands of governments that had also donated money to the Clinton family philanthropic empire, an International Business Times investigation has found.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on May 26, 2015 19 Comments
Last week, Bloomberg News' Mark Halperin asked a panel of Iowa Democrats to name one accomplishment from Hillary Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State. Just one little accomplishment... One? Something? ANYTHING? A grand total of zero panel members could recall a single noteworthy accomplishment of Mrs. Clinton's. But we should cut them some slack because they're not wrong. To date, Hillary Clinton has done nothing notable aside from being married to a President, serving as a perfectly forgettable and ineffective Senator, and begrudgingly stepping aside in 2008 to make way for the Obama Presidency. She also pushed some button in Russia, and that seems to be going just swell. Do winning elections and screwing up major diplomatic relations constitute resume-worthy fodder? Carly Fiorina said it best shortly after Hillary made her official 2016 candidacy announcement, "Hillary Clinton’s a highly intelligent woman, hardworking, she’s dedicated her life to public service but unfortunately she does not have a track record of accomplishment or transparency." Expecting a Commander in Chief to have some kind of accomplishments that show their qualifications before getting hired for the job is reasonable, right? Maybe, just not if those accomplishments happened while serving has the head of the State Department, according to U.S. News and World Report's Susan Milligan. On Hardball with Chris Matthews' Milligan said the question posed to the Iowa Democratic panel was "unfair."

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 23, 2015 13 Comments
According to a new report from Jeremy W. Peters of the New York Times, there's one Republican candidate that Democrats fear in a 2016 match-up with Hillary Clinton:
A Hillary Clinton Match-Up With Marco Rubio Is a Scary Thought for Democrats WASHINGTON — They use words like “historic” and “charismatic,” phrases like “great potential” and “million-dollar smile.” They notice audience members moved to tears by an American-dream-come-true success story. When they look at the cold, hard political math, they get uneasy. An incipient sense of anxiety is tugging at some Democrats — a feeling tersely captured in four words from a blog post written recently by a seasoned party strategist in Florida: “Marco Rubio scares me.” What is so unnerving to them at this early phase of the 2016 presidential campaign still seems, at worst, a distant danger: the prospect of a head-to-head general-election contest between Mr. Rubio, the Republican senator from Florida, and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The KOS kids don't seem as concerned:
I think it has some merit. I personally am not "scared" of Hillary facing Rubio in the general, but I do think that he would far and away be the Republicans strongest candidate. That does not mean that I find him impressive in any way - I do not. But I do believe that he could put a dent in the Hispanic advantage that the Democratic part has, and I also think that he could win Florida. Yes, I know, I know - his immigration stance will probably hurt him with both the Hispanic voting block and the RWNJ voting block - but I do believe that Democrats - and the Clinton campaign - should take Rubio very seriously.
Rubio represents the younger, new crop of Republicans who came up in the mid term elections of 2010 and 2014. Whether he represents a danger to Clinton in 2016 or not, he's certainly a reminder of a big problem Democrats currently face.

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 22, 2015 29 Comments
As Professor Jacobson pointed out yesterday, Hillary's email problems keep getting worse. But what would happen to Hillary if she wasn't a powerful and connected politician? What if she was an average citizen or more importantly, a member of our armed forces? An American soldier named Chad Longell recently made that point at IJ Review:
I Am A Soldier. Here’s What Would Happen If I Used Email Like Hillary Clinton Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s personal emails are in the news again, and members of the U.S. military and intelligence community sense that there’s a dangerous double standard developing regarding the handling of classified information. I know this because I currently serve. The New York Times revealed Monday that Clinton regularly discussed and circulated emails from close family associate Sidney Blumenthal as a source for Libyan intelligence prior to the Benghazi attacks on September 11, 2012.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 22, 2015 14 Comments
The Clinton Foundation is in the process preemptively coming clean on problems before it gets caught. Will even mainstream media reporters smelling scandals in the murky world of payments to the Clintons and influence peddling, Hillary's handlers are not waiting for the skeletons to be found. At least not the one buried near the surface. The latest Clinton Foundation scandal, as reported by The Washington Post, is that the Clinton Foundation reveals up to $26 million in additional payments:
The Clinton Foundation reported Thursday that it has received as much as $26.4 million in previously undisclosed payments from major corporations, universities, foreign sources and other groups. The disclosure came as the foundation faced questions over whether it fully complied with a 2008 ethics agreement to reveal its donors and whether any of its funding sources present conflicts of interest for Hillary Rodham Clinton as she begins her presidential campaign.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 21, 2015 21 Comments
The New York Times has extensive reporting on the first partial batch of Hillary emails released to the public regarding Libya. This is only the first batch, and of course, we don't know what was deleted from her private server. The bottom line is that the relationship with Sidney Blumenthal is as suspicious as suspected, Hillary knew the video story was a crock, and most of all, the entirety so far demonstrates why Hillary sought to hide her activities for so long. First Batch of Hillary Clinton Emails Captures Concerns Over Libya:
The Times obtained about a third of the 850 pages of emails. They appear to back up Mrs. Clinton’s previous assertions that she did not receive classified information at her private email address. But some of the emails contain what the government calls “sensitive” information or “SBU’’ — sensitive but unclassified. This includes details of the whereabouts of State Department officials in Libya when security there was deteriorating during the 2011 revolution. One email from a year and a half before the attacks that was marked sensitive but unclassified contained the whereabouts of Mr. Stevens as he considered leaving Benghazi during the uprising against the Qaddafi regime because of the deteriorating security.
That's of great interest, because foreign hacking of the home server has been a huge concern, and not just from foreign governments. How did al Quada affiliates know where Ambassador Chris Stevens would be? At least on the date of the above email they could have obtained the information from Hillary's emails. Gizmodo, part of the Gawker Media group, has a caustic take on Hillary's security lapses:

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 21, 2015 12 Comments
MSNBC's Morning Joe recently asked a panel of Iowa Democrats to cite something, anything, that Hillary Clinton accomplished in her role as secretary of state. The silence was deafening. Daniel Halper of the Weekly Standard:
Iowa Dems Can’t Name an Accomplishment Secretary of State Hillary Clinton In a video played this morning on MSNBC, Iowa Democrats were not able to name an accomplishment of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential frontrunner... "I really can't name anything off the top of my head," one voter says after letting out a long sigh. Another asks the interviewer, "Want to give me a minute? Give me two minutes."
Watch the video below:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 20, 2015 20 Comments
In 2011, ABC News launched a major rebranding effort focused on the slogan "See the Whole Picture," featuring key news personalities including George Stephanopoulos:
Today ABC News launched a major re-branding initiative. The last time that ABC News spoke directly with its audience about what defines ABC News was over a decade ago with "More Americans Get Their News from ABC News than Any Other Source" - a statement that is still true today. ABC News President Ben Sherwood laid out the foundation of the new campaign to ABC News staff in an email on Monday morning: Starting today and over the course of 2012, you're going to see new on-air promos that feature images of an unprecedented gathering of ABC News anchors and correspondents and a call to action: When viewers turn to ABC News, they will "See the Whole Picture." Believe it or not, it's been more than a decade since ABC News consistently put forward a message or slogan. This new promise - "See the Whole Picture" - will help unify ABC News and differentiate our efforts from the competition.

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 20, 2015 9 Comments
The American people are learning that Hillary Clinton doesn't like to answer questions and a new ad from American Crossroads focuses like a laser on the issue:
New American Crossroads Ad Calls Out Hillary Clinton for Dodging Tough Questions WASHINGTON – Today, American Crossroads released a new web ad calling out Hillary Clinton for continuing to dodge tough questions and provide non-answers to the few inquiries to which she has been forced to respond. “Despite being a candidate for president, Hillary Clinton is determined to dodge important questions about her positions and provide non-answers to inquiries about her ethical troubles,” said Ian Prior, Communications Director for American Crossroads. “Whether the issue is trade, the Keystone Pipeline, or the influence of foreign donors, Americans deserve better than transparent spin and crickets from Hillary Clinton.”
Watch the ad: As long as we're on Hillary ads, there's another one I'd like to share with you.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on May 19, 2015 21 Comments
Forget the primary debates, Snoop Dogg has already decided for whom he'll cast his ballot next November -- Hillary Clinton. During an interview with Bravo this past Sunday, a caller dropped a political question into the mix. Noting that Snoop was a Ron Paul supporter in 2012, this particular caller was curious to learn Snoops views on the coming 2016 election. "I like to be politically correct, but sometimes I'm politically incorrect," a shaded Snoop responded. "I would love to see a woman in office because I feel like we're at that stage in life to where we need a perspective other than the male's train of thought, and just to have a woman speaking from a global perspective as far representing America -- I would love to see that. So I'll be voting for Mrs. Clinton." There's a sexist case to be made here -- choosing a political candidate based on sex rather than merit is certainly not congruent with progressive thinking.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 19, 2015 23 Comments
I knew that Hillary was going to have a Blumenthal problem for her 2016 campaign. But I expected that the problem would be Max Blumenthal, son of close Clinton advisor Sidney Blumenthal. Max, the virulently anti-Israel activist, has been the subject of much controversy because of his penchant for vituperative and outlandish attacks on Israel, not the least of which was his call for Israeli Jews to be indigenized after the end of the Jewish state. See our Max Blumenthal Tag for some background. The issue with Max was whether Hillary could have Sidney as an advisor given Sidney's seeming support for Max's antics, if not his anti-Israel agenda. Buzzfeed reported on the problem back in November 2013, Clinton Adviser Sid Blumenthal’s New Cause: His Son’s Anti-Israel Book:
A veteran confidant of Hillary Clinton has waded into a bitter argument over the explosive topic of Israel, defending his son’s intensely anti-Israel book from a liberal critic. Sidney Blumenthal, a former New Yorker writer turned Clinton adviser from the White House to the 2008 campaign, has been waging an online campaign against Nation columnist Eric Alterman for negatively reviewing his son Max Blumenthal’s book, Goliath. The book was described by Alterman, himself a frequent critic of Israel, as “awful” and something that “could have been published by the Hamas Book-of-the-Month Club (if it existed).”

Posted by Mike LaChance on May 19, 2015 9 Comments
You may have noticed that our unbiased media is asking Republicans lots of questions about the Iraq War. Hillary Clinton is the only 2016 candidate who voted for the Iraq War as a senator; she was also directly involved with the war in her role at the State Department. Perhaps she deserves a few similar questions---when she finally decides to take one. Last night, Bill O'Reilly opened his show by discussing new initiatives America is taking to deal with ISIS, but as Charles Krauthammer pointed out, there are many questions Hillary Clinton still has to answer on this subject. As a senator, she opposed the surge in Iraq and implied that David Petraeus was lying during his congressional testimony. Does she still agree? Clinton was the secretary of state when we pulled out of Iraq in 2011. Was that a mistake?

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on May 18, 2015 54 Comments
I'm struggling to concoct a scenario more damning than this. After filing a FOIA suit, thanks to a court order Judicial Watch obtained documents from the Department of Defense and Department of State which indicate the Obama administration knew al Qaeda was planning the attack in Benghazi ten days before it happened. TEN DAYS. hillary gif benghazi FOI dept state scandal judicial watch Immediately following the 9/11 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi in 2012, the DOD had identified the culprits and indicated the attack had been planned "ten days or more" prior.
A Defense Department document from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), dated September 12, 2012, the day after the Benghazi attack, details that the attack on the compound had been carefully planned by the BOCAR terrorist group “to kill as many Americans as possible.” The document was sent to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Obama White House National Security Council. The heavily redacted Defense Department “information report” says that the attack on the Benghazi facility “was planned and executed by The Brigades of the Captive Omar Abdul Rahman (BCOAR).” The group subscribes to “AQ ideologies:”
The attack was planned ten or more days prior on approximately 01 September 2012. The intention was to attack the consulate and to kill as many Americans as possible to seek revenge for U.S. killing of Aboyahiye ((ALALIBY)) in Pakistan and in memorial of the 11 September 2001 atacks on the World Trade Center buildings.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on May 16, 2015 24 Comments
The Clinton Foundation is having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad couple of months.  There were the pay to play accusations from Haiti, the numerous other pay to play "coincidences," the rather cozy relationship with "journalist" donor (and former employee) George Stephanopoulos, reports of $30 million from books and speeches in 16 months, and even the email controversy is being linked to the Foundation as part of "one big, hairy deal." It doesn't end there.  Jonathan Allen at Vox reports that in a Friday afternoon Clinton financial disclosure "news dump" is evidence that Hillary "personally took money from companies that sought to influence her":
During Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State, Corning lobbied the department on a variety of trade issues, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The company has donated between $100,000 and $250,000 to her family's foundation. And, last July, when it was clear that Clinton would again seek the presidency in 2016, Corning coughed up a $225,500 honorarium for Clinton to speak.
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