Photos Suggest Shared Shadiness

Almost 2,500 years ago Greek fabulist Aesop sagely advised, “A man is known by the company he keeps”.  A modern analogy is seen in whom one chooses to break bread with.  This concept particularly applies to the slippery Clintons, and the now disgraced movie mogul they chose to dine with on December 13, 2016.  That Hollywood bigwig is today’s accused serial rapist Harvey Weinstein.  According to photographs—mysteriously only recently uncovered by Britain’s Daily Mail, not the mainstream media—Hillary is seated between two men accused of sexual assault; the other being her husband Bill.  Ah, the “hiddenness” of such open secrets—and the curious concealment of related pictures.

Historically, Hillary knew about Bill’s “bimbo eruptions” in the 1990s.  Another Clintonian open secret: long denied until the irrefutable DNA on Monica Lewinsky’s blue dress.  Likewise, in her decades-long friendship with Weinstein, is it possible that she didn’t know when everyone in Hollywood seemed to?  At the exclusive East Harlem eatery called Rao’s—mere weeks after her failed presidential campaign—Hillary is fraternizing with such a man?  Given her stinging political defeat one would reasonably infer she would surround herself with trusted intimates.  That means either she didn’t know or she didn't care.  Either way, what would Aesop say about her character, or theirs?

 

The suppression of questionable photos involving prominent Democrats is nothing new.  Another telling example is an obscure image taken at a weekly Congressional Black Caucus lunch back in 2005.  A single frame shot by Askia Muhammad and hidden by him for 13 years.  The main subjects were then freshman senator Barack Obama and the minister Louis Farrakhan: the highly controversial anti-Semitic, anti-white and anti-gay leader of the Nation of Islam.  (For context, per the New York Times, Mr. Farrakhan described Adolf Hitler as “a very great man” in 1984.)  If exposed then, what would the electorate have thought of photographic proof of connection between both men?

In any case, here’s what Mr. Muhammad told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, “I swore myself to secrecy. If the picture was exposed, it could still be a deal breaker for Obama [becoming president]. … I did not want to be the instrument of his downfall.”  His candid response likely explains why Hillary’s Weinstein photographs also took so long to surface.  Using Aesop's standard, these images depict associations with dubious characters.  Why hide these photos for years unless they symbolize a deeper reality of collective corruption?

Slut-Shaming A U.S. President

With the #MeToo movement in full flight, why hasn't anyone in the legacy media finally held former U.S. president Bill Clinton to account for his lifetime of boorish behavior? What of his string of adulterous affairs with numerous accusers—even within the Oval Office? What of Juanita Broaddrick's 40-year-old allegation of rape? Is it fair for Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen to slut-shame the sitting U.S. president: while giving worse behaved Bubba a complete pass? For one thing, Mr. Clinton's juvenile high jinks—among them, the Lewinsky affair: a national scandal that virtually brought the country to a standstill, and led to Bill's impeachment—happened while he was in office. How is that comparable to a porn star's allegation of a consensual affair with Donald Trump, then a private citizen, in 2006?

Where is this partisan's “honesty, dignity and rectitude”? In reality, Mr. Cohen engages in the yellowiest journalism by using language better suited to the gutter: “But Trump himself is a slut. He is a liar and a moral harlot who revels in irresponsibility and bad-boy behavior.” To paraphrase the Bible, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone” (John 8:7). That would be good advice for the Post's holier than thou columnist to heed: especially given his own sexism directed at a younger, female subordinate in the workplace. As reported in June of 1998 by the Washingtonian's Harry Jaffe in “Cohen Gets Kid-Gloves Treatment in Harassment Case”:

“Among the allegations reported to [deputy managing editor Milton] Coleman: Cohen asked [Devon] Spurgeon to come into his office and close the door, then queried her about her generation's view of oral sex. Also at issue: a conversation where Cohen said it's too bad Bill Clinton is the only one who can grope in his office and get away with it. He also is said to have intimidated her with references to his connections with top Post editors, such as Tom Wilkinson, who can hire and fire.”

How is it not beyond creepy for a then 57-year-old man to question a then 23-year-old editorial aide about sexual mores? At the time, the Post's response was simply to move his office to a different floor. As for curbing potential misdeeds, that's about as effective as moving an accused pedophile priest to a new perish. Indeed, all these years later, where's Richard Cohen's, or The Washington Post's, integrity and transparency regarding these events? As of now, this stone thrower is still employed there. In fact, sanctioned for decades to point fingers at others while ignoring his own less than chivalrous conduct. (As was typical in the Clinton era of “bimbo eruptions,” the wagons were circled and the young woman in question was blamed.) Unfortunately, his journalistic old boy's club is still stuck in Clintonian amber. Neither Clinton nor Cohen have yet received their deserved comeuppance in 2018.

Upon reflection, how was the lurid, sex scandal-plagued Clinton era not a shadowy reflection of recently exposed Hollywood sex scandals (read: Clinton friend and donor Harvey Weinstein), and the #MeToo movement? In both cases, didn't prominent Democrats misuse their lofty positions to exploit underlings for sexual favors? Specifically, when Bubba chased Monica around the resolute desk in the Oval Office, wasn't Bill's bad-boy behavior (with her and others) equivalent to the adulterous antics of a bathrobed Harvey? Rightly, today's press has excoriated the disgraced movie mogul Yet, Bill's extramarital affair with then 22-year-old White House intern Monica Lewinsky is still treated with kid gloves. Ironically, his still traumatized former paramour, now 44, couldn't bring herself to hold the Clintons responsible in her candid March 2018 Vanity Fair article: he for his arguably predatory behavior; she for calling Lewinsky a “narcissistic loony toon”. Shouldn't the Clintons be held to the same standard of conduct that the media is rabidly trying to hold The Donald to?

The hard left media continuing to protect the coddled Clintons conveys the message that questionable actions, or words, have no bearing on character or a president's ability to lead the nation. And despite the sea change regarding sexual harassment, Bill and Hillary have survived their various imbroglios, haven't they? So, it stands to reason that President Trump will also survive the supposed peccadilloes of his past. Before applying such blatant double standards to U.S. presidents, Democratic surrogates of the biased MSM need to take a long look in a mirror. Not to do so shows the truth of what they are: untrustworthy mudslingers of salacious leftist propaganda.

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Misbehaving Presidents' Mixed Messages

“We don't win anymore. When was the last time we won? Did we win a war? Do we win anything? Do we win anything? We're going to win. We're going to win big, folks. We're going to start winning again, believe me. We're going to win.” – President Trump at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on February 24, 2017

Isn't winning a great message to hear from a sitting U.S. president? Contrast that to the Obama years, plagued by gargantuan failures and losses. For example, most telling was the actual level of U.S. unemployment: 95 million able-bodied Americans absent from the workforce. (The U.S. Department of Labor repeatedly claimed the rate hovered around a measly 5 percent.) Such a diet of consistent falsehoods included Obama's famous, “If you like your health-care plan, you can keep it.” That whopper earned him left-leaning Politifact's Lie of the Year in 2013.

Interestingly, misrepresentation is the defining characteristic of modern-day Democratic presidents (and failed hopeful Hillary Clinton). All that's now required is a slick persona, a tenuous grasp on truthfulness and the gift of honeyed words earnest in their bewitching power to distract the public. With Hillary's hubby, his failings were of a personal nature, embarrassing peccadilloes highlighted by an affair with a then 22-year-old intern. Remember Bill's infamous claim, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss [Monica] Lewinsky.” (The scandal rocked his presidency, but didn't end it. Ultimately, he received a pass because adultery was successfully spun as a private matter. However, his public disgrace affected his ability to govern much more gravely then was acknowledged at the time.) Also detrimental to the nation, were Barack Obama's numerous untruths. Like Clinton, he was abetted by a fawning press—and a foolishly forgiving electorate.

That same latitude is never granted to their Republican counterparts. Remember, George H. W. Bush's broken pledge, “Read my lips: no new taxes”? That one flip-flop cost him his 1992 re-election bid. By contrast, Barack Obama, not Ronald Reagan, was the true “Teflon president” . His big government tenure was “transformative” in all the wrong ways: obtrusive, overregulated and overtaxed (read: the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the ObamaCare mandate because its legal basis is a tax!). Combine those systemic problems with a ballooning federal government, wasteful programs, deficit-spending and virtually doubling the nation's debt: a record-shattering 9.3 trillion! That's more in Barack Obama's eight years than all previous presidents combined (read: 212 years from Washington (1789) to Clinton (2001))!

In retrospect, the pre-election electorate was ravenous for a new voice, specifically an unapologetically pro-American one. (Hillary Clinton isn't that. Essentially, she promised a de facto Obama third term.) Enter the plain-speaking Washington outsider, a billionaire capitalist, who brashly articulated all things wrong with progressives in government. Central to that message was the concept of winning: obviously for himself and theoretically, one hopes, for the country. Today, how is that goal achieved by threatening the Tea Party's Freedom Caucus? Ironically, he attacks the very group he should champion:

“The Freedom Caucus will hurt the entire Republican agenda if they don't get on the team, & fast. We must fight them, & Dems, in 2018!” — President Trump's tweet at 9:07 AM on March 30, 2017

Under any circumstances, it's frankly nonsensical to ever conflate conservative Republicans with militantly obstructionist Democrats. Such groups are naturally philosophically opposed: political oil and water! For a campaign promise thwarted, he calls out the Freedom Caucus for rightfully scuttling Paul Ryan's disastrous “ObamaCare Lite” replacement? Thus, in the superficial name of “winning,” isn't that precisely like burning a village to the ground in order to “save” it?

The political landscape is, and remains, ripe for meaningful change. However, as of late, Mr. Trump's appealingly razor sharp campaign rhetoric is not living up to his muddled actions. To again reference the same CPAC speech:

“I'm here fighting for you and I will continue to fight for you. The victory and the win were something that really was dedicated to a country and people that believe in freedom, security and the rule of law. Our victory was a victory and the win for conservative values.”

A self-proclaimed guiding principle negated by his recent rant against House Republicans who stand for that precise thing! Immersed in the Washington swamp, allied with House Speaker Paul Ryan, is it possible he's lost sight of what conservatism means in concrete terms? After all, words are insubstantial compared to policy and practice. For his part, Mr. Ryan talks an equally good game. (Recall, he's been in Congress since 1998. That's 17 years before he assumed leadership of the lower chamber on October 29, 2015. For further context, for the last 7 years, the GOP has promised to repeal and replace ObamaCare.) With his reputation as a policy wonk, where has Mr. Ryan been all this time? His Johnny-come-lately response was a rushed bill—with the Republican brand simply slapped on—that fundamentally lacked bipartisan consensus: no Democratic support and not enough Republicans to pass the measure.

The American Health Care Act should have been a free market solution to health-care, but it wasn't. Hopeful for a “win,” President Trump mistakenly backed Ryan's loser: a bureaucratic 3-phased shell game that would have kept the government behemoth in place with superficial changes like substituting tax breaks for government subsides. So, it's wrong to scapegoat the Freedom Caucus for their lack of support. This debacle—this legislative “Rosemary's Baby”—is all Paul Ryan's mad creation. For this mess, he should be replaced forthwith. To that end, someone from the Freedom Caucus would be fitting.

Thus far, Mr. Trump's dealings with Congress have not lived up to his appealing CPAC rhetoric. The author of “The Art of The Deal” need not play things so fast and loose by vilifying other Republicans. While he owes the Republican establishment nothing, he would be wise to adopt the following Reaganesque Eleventh Commandment: Thou shalt not speak ill of any conservative. To do otherwise artificially divides the GOP against itself. And given their demonstrated lack of effective leadership, they need all the help they can get.

Polarizing allies won't achieve the right results for the American people. Still, Trump's willingness to work with everyone is exactly what President Reagan did. In that regard, “The Great Communicator” effectively went directly to the American people over the heads of his detractors (as The Donald does with his well-conceived tweets). Yet, Mr. Reagan never used the bully pulpit to literally bully anyone. Therefore, killing his Tea Party darlings in this way is something “The Gipper” would never do. That's not winning; it's reactionary, shortsighted and ultimately self-defeating. 

Lasting success for America equals a staunchly conservative agenda. To get there, Mr. Trump needs to appropriate the cohesive framework of principles embodied by the Freedom Caucus. Going forward, embracing them—rather than Paul Ryan's ilk—would greatly aid his cause. For instance, they would make an ideal legislative sounding board while he makes deals and takes constructive action. As modern history clearly demonstrates, only Democrats get away with misbehavior and mixed messages. Those types of mistakes are invariably fatal to the prospects, and success, of any Republican president.

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Clinton 'Son' Seeks Blue Dress DNA

Danney Williams, 31, finally wants to prove who his big daddy is. Mr. Williams's lifelong quest for his famous father's acknowledgment has leapt right out of the supermarket tabloids—and Joe Klein's novel Primary Colors. With the emergence of yet another Clinton scandal one week before Election Day—this one Bill's now adult love child—the former president should hide all throwable objects from Hillary's legendary rages. Beyond seeing stars (with the tactile, painful memory of a broken White House lamp), the only primary colors Bill anticipates are the bruising kind: black and blue ones from the missus.

Recall, Primary Colors is the tale of a Clinton style southern governor (“Jack Stanton”) who successful run to the presidency is almost derailed by a sexual scandal—specifically an illegitimate multiracial offspring. In real-life are those two characters Bill Clinton and (the remarkably resembling) Danny Williams?

Yet, unfolding events are far more fascinating than Mr. Klein's fiction. Known to Mr. Williams is his mother, Bobbie Ann Williams, an Arkansas prostitute. Tuesday, at a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington DC, Mr. Williams publicly requested some of the presidential goo (yuck!) from Monica Lewinsky via her infamous '90s blue dress. (Providing said genetic material would preclude a long and expensive paternity suit.)

So, once again, Bill and Hill have his and hers scandals to dodge. His is the embarrassment of two unearthed sexual indiscretions strangely merging: the Lewinsky affair (which led to Bill's impeachment) and Mr. Williams's bloodline (more ballast to crooked Hillary's fading presidential prospects). Hers is the reinvigorated Comey FBI probe involving top aide Huma Abedin's 650,000 emails (coupled with her estranged hubby Anthony Weiner's Zipper-gate). It's a wonder any of them have the gall to show their faces in public (let alone seek high elective office).

After Donald Trump's victory on November 8^th, the Clintons could appropriately do the lurid talk show circuit. On Jerry Springer Hillary and Monica could wrestle and pull each other's hair. Then for good measure the Clintons could be featured on Maury ('You are the father'). Lastly, Danney Williams could make a Barbara Streisand “Papa Can You Hear Me?” heartfelt plea for acceptance into the Clinton clan while Dr. Phil arranges an army of therapists to untangle the family dysfunction. 

This endless Clinton soap opera is indeed an epic farce. The tragedy for the American people is that one of them is currently a hair's breadth from the Oval Office. For all their lies and corruption both richly deserve the big house. From behind bars fate would bring everything full circle: the Clintons would get their comeuppance—and authorities could finally collect Bill Clinton's sought after DNA for his long denied 'Danney boy.'

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Weiner's Zipper-gate Is Clinton Karma

What is it with the toxic intersection of Bill and Hillary Clinton scandals, sex and interns?

Back in the '90s, the most famous instance was Bill's adulterous affair with then 22-year-old intern Monica Lewinsky. His lies led to charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. That scandal resulted in impeachment, but an abetting Democrat-controlled Senate saved Slick Willie.

Today, it's murky characters in crooked Hillary's orbit: her Girl Friday Huma Abedin (originally Hillary's intern, now a top aide) and Huma's estranged hubby, disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-NY). Apparently, a tangential child pornography FBI investigation into super-freak (sexting; selfie sending) Mr. Weiner has uncovered Abedin's 650,000 previously unknown emails on a shared computer. Are Hillary Clinton's 48,000 deleted emails and/or more classified information (read: Server-gate) among them? That's anyone's guess (including Abedin's who reportedly told intimates she has no idea how they got there) and the results, if any, won't be known until well after Election Day.

At least Bill Clinton got caught in flagrante delicto when he was already in office. While his wife desperately claws at the Oval Office door, Hillary Clinton's corruption precedes her—and would doggedly follow her into the presidency. Imagine what greater influence she could peddle—to political sycophants and foreign powers alike—and what impressionable interns he could covet! The mind boggles at such nightmarish scenarios.

If elected, Hillary's scandals and lawbreaking are the perfect storm to sink our currently badly floundering country. In addition to these ever-present clouds of suspicion, this habitual liar will deliver the economic morass and racial polarization of an Obama third term. America needs neither the domestic malaise nor the international humiliation of another weak progressive Democrat.

It's reasonable to infer that Huma Weiner (a.k.a. Abedin) is at the nexus of corrupt (Hillary) Clinton everything. For more than three years of Mrs. Clinton's term as Secretary of State Abedin was her deputy chief of staff. Then Huma resigned from that formal role becoming a “special government employee” (and how!) taking simultaneous paying gigs for the “charitable” Clinton Foundation, and international consulting firm Teneo Holdings (founded by a Bill Clinton long-time personal aide). At present, Abedin's currently vice chairman of Clinton's presidential campaign. Thus, there's no doubt Hillary's criminality is back under FBI scrutiny—and Huma's in the know.

Director James Comey's unexpected announcement is a ray of light surfacing in the final days of the presidential contest. All ironically facilitated via two shady personas, a matching set of wieners named Weiner: her emails, his perversion. (What a poetic mirror for their scandal-embroiled Clinton counterparts!) For Comey's eleventh hour disclosure, a stirring, scandal fatigued nation will be grateful for a fresh start: a Donald Trump victory on November 8th.

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Forgetting Clintons' Scandals with Trump's Words

“And all the kids [Democrats; biased MSM] cheered! But I didn’t cheer. I stood right up and started shouting. This isn’t what happened last week! Have you all got amnesia? They just cheated us! This isn’t fair!” – Kathy Bates as Annie Wilkes in “Misery” (1990)

Who among us would not agree that the contentious exchanges between insider Hillary Clinton and outsider Donald Trump have not been a “misery” (for the rest of us)? In different ways, the two candidates are a warped fun house mirror into the American political character—or lack thereof. Unfairly demonized in the press, Donald Trump's boorish playboy ways can easily be excused as red blooded carnal excess. Certainly, the bullish erector of phallic skyscrapers is no boy scout. So what? In presidential politics—as in real estate—neither arena is for the faint of heart.

Unless you're as newly delicate as Michelle Obama now claims to be. Suddenly she's a retiring flower, recoiling from the horror (the horror!) of Donald Trump's taped jocular language! One imagines many put-upon butlers rolling their eyes from coddling madame in her rarefied White House bubble. Which of her serfs fetched the industrial-sized smelling salts from 5-star chefs in the White House's kitchens to revive her?

Ah, designer duds Michelle. Apparently, her sensibilities are so much finer than ours; her troubles so much more severe! How she must have steeled her nerves to absorb Mr. Trump's locker room banter. Of course, it's just decade old words from a private conversation. But Michelle wants the Thought Police dispatched forthwith! How dare The Donald make such coarse noises! Michelle's rocked: 'shaken to her core.' Why is it that Mr. Trump's language staggers her, but not Bill's immoral sexual escapades, or Hillary's amoral lies or Server-gate criminality?

Consider the Obama daughters, Malia is 18 and Sasha is 15. Most mothers of daughters—especially gullible teenagers—wouldn't want a man of Bill Clinton's predatory history skulking around the White House. After all, Mr. Clinton did much more than simply talk: he acted out. For example, during his presidency he turned the Oval Office into a boudoir for adulterous trysts with Monica Lewinsky; then an impressionable intern just a few years older than the Obama girls.

How vigorously the MSM defended Bill Clinton's numerous affairs, his “bimbo eruptions” in the '90s as “just sex.” (Specifically, Hillary demonized Ms. Lewinsky as “a narcissistic loony tune” until irrefutable DNA evidence emerged from her blue dress.) Furthermore, during Mr. Clinton's impeachment proceedings how stridently the press argued that his private life had absolutely nothing to do with his ability to govern. And foolishly the public bought that real whopper of a fish story. Yet, in “Crisis of Character,” former Secret Service agent Gary Byrne directly observed:

“I witnessed firsthand the Clintons' personal and professional dysfunction: So consumed were they by scandal, so intent on destroying their real or imagined enemies, that governing became an afterthought.”

In retrospect of those scandal-plagued years Mr. Byrne's statement rings true. In the final analysis, has any politician been more directed by the orientation of his zipper than Bill Clinton?

So it is with crooked Hillary's lawbreaking, her greed and titanic lies. Once again, same as before, the legacy media is promoting Clintonian corruption as “no big deal.” This time instead of Bill's hanky-panky, it's Hillary's “damned emails.” Or is it lying repeatedly to Congress, the FBI and the American people? Or perhaps it's the pay for play influence peddling scandal via the charitable sham that is the Clinton Family Foundation? Is it really a good idea to put the most powerful country in the world in the hands of a person with no discernible moral code? What does Hillary Clinton really stand for besides her own lawlessness, recklessness and relentless self-promotion?

Any U.S. president to the electorate is very much like a de facto marriage. As an analogy, why would any sane person elect (or marry) “a partner” who cannot be trusted to act in the U.S.'s best interests? That's the existential question that has led to failed Obama's reelection—and threatens to derail the country entirely if Hillary Clinton replaces him. Facts are often not pretty things. From this two-faced Democratic triumvirate—if any of their lips were moving—when didn't they lie about something? That overarching dynamic has defined both Bill Clinton's and Barack Obama's presidencies. Why would Hillary's be any different? The scandals change—but the lying doesn't. That's what's truly inexcusable here. Beyond that, why is the public so conditioned to accept the big lie (after the dastardly deed)? More to the point: what insanity compels them to keep pulling the polling levers for these wrongdoers anyway? Is this the real-life mass amnesia Annie Wilkes complains about?

Why are Democrats forgiven everything while Republicans are given no latitude whatsoever? Still, no matter what the propagandist media reports, there remains a vast difference between Trump's words and Bill and Hillary's misdeeds. Annie's right: fair is fair. Only the deluded or the dishonest believe that either scandal embroiled Clinton is fit for office. And why should triviality automatically disqualify Mr. Trump? Certainly not his vocalizations: as unsubstantial as the hot air coming from his mindless detractors.

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Hillary's House of Lies

“It is not fair to blame Clinton for this particular high-handedness—she was not involved in this discussion [related to the use of her own private server]... [or] in creating this climate of [State Department] acquiescence.” - The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus

Right out of the gate, Hillary fallaciously claimed the server was Bill's. Let's recall reality, the facts Ms. Marcus is completely oblivious to. In September 2015, Mrs. Clinton then told NBC's Chuck Todd on “Meet the Press”: “[The server] was already there. It had been there for years. It is the system that my husband’s personal office used when he got out of the White House.” Unfortunately for her, Mr. Clinton's habit of not using email had already been disclosed to the WSJ that previous March: “The former president, who does regularly use Twitter, has sent a grand total of two emails during his entire life, both as president, says Matt McKenna, his spokesman.” (It doesn't take a rocket scientist to logically infer that Bill Clinton probably doesn't like keeping physical records of his activities. Perhaps a understandable bias developed from his intern-chasing Monica Lewinsky blue dress days?) In any case, in this latest version of the big lie, Ms. Marcus contents herself not with blaming Bill, but faceless flunkies at the State Department.

Of all the confederacy of dunces at The Post, this columnist should read her own newspaper, specifically the Taking Exception editorial “What secrets are hidden in Ms. Clinton's emails?” by Michael Canes of McLean. He writes:

“The Post should probe the email issue much more deeply. And it needs to question whether Ms. Clinton, having abandoned her responsibilities with respect to email communication while secretary of state, is still a qualified presidential candidate. It may conclude that the alternatives are worse, but it shouldn’t turn a blind eye toward how badly Ms. Clinton has betrayed the public trust and how much more dangerous the email issue [stolen state secrets] may yet turn out to be.”

However, Ms. Marcus is doing the opposite—her darnedest to spin Hillary's leaden political prospects into fool's gold—that the electorate ain't buying. And that, certainly, is an errand of a colossal dupe. For the law in this matter is crystal clear: under Title 18, Section 1924, of federal law, it is a misdemeanor punishable by fines and imprisonment for any federal employee to knowingly remove classified information “without authority and with the intent to retain such documents or materials at an unauthorized location.” Contrast that unambiguous statute to the schizophrenic tone of Ms. Marcus's latest column. A missive so tortured, nonsensical and bereft of reason it would give the Queen of Hearts in “Alice in Wonderland” pause. Specifically, her “journalism” is so yellow she is nothing more than a propagandist talking head for the Clinton campaign, reiterating the same bold-faced, threadbare lie that Mrs. Clinton's email server was set up to keep her personal emails private. This is the same tall tale Hillary's been spouting for over a year. Pick your Clintonian poison pill as explanation: her actions were approved by the State Department, other Secretaries of State had “done the same thing,” that she wanted the convenience of accessing all data on one device. Make no mistake, she's Frank Underwood (played by Kevin Spacey in “House of Cards”): a real-life F.U. in a skirt.

So the State Department's own inspector general's report of Mrs. Clinton's clearly forbidden and blatantly law-breaking activities isn't a smoking gun? If that's not unequivocal evidence of wrongdoing to the shockingly thick Ms. Marcus, what, if anything, is? She can't recognize truth or relevancy here with a GPS and a divining rod. Ms. Marcus quotes a trivial Hillary email, her “I don't want any risk of the personal being accessible,” as a spurious distraction from the patently indefensible. For Ruth Marcus, the Democratic front-runner has suddenly become Greta “I want to be [left] alone” Garbo. Speaking of “smoking guns,” did anyone put one to Hillary in her relentlessly single-minded pursuit of ever higher government posts? Like Mrs. Clinton's loony imitation of a small yelping dog, the political spotlight has been her personal chew toy for the last 25 years. Therefore, she knows very well that privacy is the cost of public life. (Let's all cry a river for Mrs. Clinton's “sacrifice.”) More common sense that utterly escapes Ms. Marcus's baseless scribbles.

Hillary, this rules-don't-apply-to-me queen bee, is imploding under the weight of her own Server-gate scandal. In this regard, Mrs. Clinton's actions—whether intentional or not—are beside the point. A now more and more likely national security breach by criminal hackers and/or foreign powers is deadly serious. Therefore, it's far more than simple “bad” judgment or a violation of protocol, it's treasonous.

Mrs. Clinton doesn't belong in the White House, she belongs in the big house. Thus is humpty dumpty tumbling from her most lofty perch: the Democrats' nomination for president. And just like the fairy tale, all the king's horses (read: Mr. Obama) and all the king's men (read: the sycophantic MSM's Marcuses of the world) can't put ol' cracked, crooked Hillary back together again.

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2016: “nice” losers, nasty winners

The presidential candidate of Midwestern nostalgia, Ohio governor John Kasich, is a nice man. Unfortunately, the 2016 election cycle is a meat-grinder: equal parts unpredictability and contentiousness, not decency. Therefore, “nice guy” candidates like the highly likable and eminent Dr. Ben Carson, in the same Kasich mold, trail badly in the polls. In any case, the electorate is disillusioned by the establishments of both political parties, as well as the propagandist, one-sided MSM that carries the Democrat's swill of half-truths, misleading statements by omission, and outright cover for lies (like Joe Biden's 1992 "misunderstood" objection to an end-term Republican president making a Supreme Court nomination.) All under Mr.Obama's golf-playing watch: 10 trillion in additional debt; almost 8 more years of economic downturn; 93 million able-bodied Americans unable to find employment; Democrat's pandering to Radical Islam, illegal aliens and Black Lives Matter; Europe awash in 60 million migrants and the Middle East on fire with terrorism. And lest I forget our pro-Islamic president's crowning legacy: the high probability proliferation of nuclear weapons in the Middle East under the control of Iranian ayatollahs.

To any clear thinking person, is it any surprise that everything is “throw the bums out?” (This means you too, House Speaker Paul Ryan, with your “fresh start” 2 trillion dollar budgetary capitulation to Democrats.) In 2016, it takes no genius to realize that voters are fed up to their eyeballs. Consequently, Kasich's fond Americana of homemade apple pies or “I Love Lucy” reruns is out-of-step with the timbre of the country. The long-suffering silent majority is awake, and the political landscape rightfully trembles: a mobilized army is at the Republican ballot box. This unique phenomenon (with obvious causes and contrarily unforeseeable results) is the real life manifestation of “Network” fictional newscaster-prophet Howard Beale's justified rage at the system. Simply put, like him, we're 'mad as hell and we're not going to take it anymore.'

Make no mistake: this is a year of unprecedented, hardscrabble political blood-sport. Therefore, genteel non-brawlers for the presidency like Mitt Romney (who had his chance 4 years ago) not only need not apply, they should keep silent by invoking Ronald Reagan's 11^th commandment of not speaking ill of fellow Republicans, even primary-leading Donald Trump. After all, we don't need 3 million uninspired conservatives staying home as they did for the “elder statesman of 2012” who gifted Mr. Obama his disastrous second term.

Beyond that, it is a mistake to assume the “mad as hell” ire is just a “guy” thing. Historically anti-suffrage Democrats' bray today about unfairness to women such as the gender pay-gap, but in Hillary Clinton's State Department (that mysteriously “lost” 6 billion) as in Mr. Obama's White House, the hypocrisy of paying women less for the same work is still firmly entrenched. Yet, outrageously, it is not Democrat's being demonized for their real life records of actual economic discrimination. It's the aforementioned nice guy, John Kasich, whose innocuous statement (“of many women who left their kitchens to go out and to go door to door to put up yard signs for me,”) relates to his memory of first running for political office in 1978.

His words are not descriptive of his current view of the role of women in 2016. This rabid MSM distortion is exactly what I mean by the press's “misleading statements.” Rather than faithful and objective reporting decades long gone, the fourth estate intentionally omits context—and actively misconstrues what is said—to mean something never intended. It is also no coincidence that all of these yellow journalistic “dirty tricks” benefit Democrats. How else could a scandal-laden, habitual liar (under as many as three federal investigations for corruption and influence-peddling) be a lock for her party's presidential nomination?

In psychological terms this disgraceful political dynamic is classic projection. Blaming “others,” specifically Republicans, for the precise mind-set, behavior and policies that they themselves are guilty of. In any case, if it is acceptable to take Kasich to task for his off-the-cuff statement regarding a woman's political role in 1978, it is fair game to also mention a highly relevant front-running Democrat's example. Of course, I coyly refer to 1998's “Zipper-gate” scandal: Hillary's spouse Bill and his paramour, the then blue dress-wearing 22-year-old intern, Monica Lewinsky. My point: seduced by a powerful older man (a U.S. president no less) was that impressionable young woman championed by Hillary—today's “women's rights icon”—or mercilessly criticized by her as a “narcissistic loony toon?”

The subsequent DNA evidence of Bill's extra-marital dalliance proved Hillary's assessment untrue (as with her future, similar misstatements on Benghazi, Server-gate and “Clinton Cash”). Yet, propped up by the media (same as Obama), her false narrative as the “wronged wife” persists to this day. Indeed, Hillary's history of withering attacks on the cadre of women of Bill's '90s “bimbo eruption” demonstrate the pair are no respecters of anything related to women. Further, politicians with the Clinton surname are much more deserving of a prison stint rather than a “rosy” reward of taxpayer-funded habitation in the White House.

All of the above demonstrates that American politics is a dirty, ego-driven business. Unfortunately, the kind and well intentioned get crushed underfoot. The unfair treatment of Kasich (and Carson) is a case and point. There is no room in the current political climate for these men of authenticity. However, as a voice of reason, the role of vice president remains a real possibility to temper the Machiavellian passions of the next U.S. president.

Twitter: @DavidHunterblog

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President as celebrity-in-chief

TV's “The Apprentice” P.T. Barnum-style pitchman Donald Trump is riding the high tide of politician as celebrity. It may lead to an exclusive Pennsylvania Avenue address, but if so, he's not the first to get there. Politics as pop culture entertainment was first harnessed by blue dress intern-chasing “Slick Willie” himself, Bill Clinton. In 1993, a youthfully rakish, shade-wearing future president played the saxophone on the Arsenio Hall Show. He also brazenly told the MTV generation whether he wore boxers or briefs (so Monica Lewinsky need not be consulted on the matter).

Likewise in 2007, Joe Biden's storybook 'first mainstream African-American who is articulate, bright, clean and nice-looking' had the same shiny newness as Bill—and a cool aloofness that appealed to superficial millennials, twice. In all three cases, Clinton, Obama and potentially Trump, all appeal to the lowest common denominator of the American electorate. Bill ran as a baby-boomer, regular guy centrist and won. Likewise, Obama successfully hid his ultra-liberal mind-set, ran on the nebulous slogan “hope and change,” and also won. Now we have Mr. Trump following suit, except his is a red-hot firebrand style of making dubious, wild promises (Mexican-paid border wall-building; expelling 11 million illegal squatters) absent specific plans.

To a man, theirs is the power of image and personality. Indeed, none of the above should be taken seriously or have the opportunity to hold the most important office in the world.

America does not need another unpredictable, “celebrity” egotist as president in 2017. 

Twitter: @DavidHunterblog
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