Hillary Clinton Clinches the Nomination [EvolutionBlog]


The inevitable has now occurred. Barring something earth-shattering, Hillary Clinton will be the Democratic nominee for President. She is the first woman to become the nominee of a major political party. In fact, she is the first woman even to be a serious candidate for President.

In her speech tonight, Hillary took time out to make a gracious mention of Bernie Sanders and all that he has accomplished in his campaign. Her audience cheered. Bernie, for his part, made only a brief, classless mention of Hillary (making hey of the fact that it was she who called him). His audience booed at the mention of her name. Charming folks.

Kevin Drum lays down some truth about Hillary:

For the record: Whitewater was a nothingburger. Travelgate was a nothingburger. Troopergate was a nothingburger. Filegate was a nothingburger. The Vince Foster murder conspiracy theories were a nothingburger. Monica Lewinsky was Bill’s problem, not Hillary’s. Benghazi was a tragedy, but entirely non-scandalous. The Goldman Sachs speeches were probably a bad idea, but otherwise a nothingburger. Emailgate revealed some poor judgment, but we’ve now seen all the emails and it’s pretty obviously a nothingburger. Humagate is a nothingburger. Foundationgate is a nothingburger.

Bottom line: Don’t let Donald Trump or the press or anyone else convince you that Hillary Clinton is “dogged by scandal” or “works under a constant cloud of controversy” or whatever the nonsense of the day is. That constant cloud is the very deliberate invention of lowlifes in Arkansas; well-heeled conservative cranks; the Republican Party; and far too often a gullible and compliant press. Like anybody who’s been in politics for 40 years, Hillary has some things she should have handled better, but that’s about it. The plain fact is that there’s no serious scandal on her record. There’s no evidence that she’s ever sold out to Wall Street. There’s no corruption, intrigue, or deceit. And if anything, she’s too honest on a policy level. She could stand to promise people a bit of free stuff now and then.

This is exactly right, and it’s one of the reasons I support her so strongly. Never has a politician been on the receiving end of such a sprawling, professional effort at personal destruction, and never have so many low-information types bought into it. That she has persevered, and even thrived, in the face of all this is all you need to know about her character.

All I keep hearing is that the independents loathe Hillary Clinton. That’s the word that gets used. Loathe. But once you clear away all of the fake scandals, what is there to loathe about her? She’s a typical, centrist Democrat who’s taken her various jobs a lot more seriously than most politicians. Is she too hawkish for you? Too close to Wall Street? Insufficiently left-wing? Fine. Then don’t support her. Be unenthusiastic about her. But loathe her? No. That’s so out of proportion to any sin she’s committed it places you outside the bounds of serious discussion.

And if you loathe her, then what emotion is left for the wall-to-wall scum of the modern Republican Party? Their nominee is a bigoted narcissist who lacks even the basic understanding of world affairs you would get from listening to a thirty-minute news broadcast every night. The Republicans are mostly falling in line behind him. They claim to be bothered by his relentless, overt racism, but one suspects they are only bothered that he never learned about dog-whistling.

In his own speech tonight, Donald Trump tossed off a deranged litany of charges related to Hillary’s e-mails, beyond even what the most ardent right-wingers had thought to allege. It was all invented from whole cloth, but who cares about that? He’s promising us a major speech where he’s going to detail his list of particulars against the Clintons. It will be lies from start to finish, and I’m sure the television pundits will harrumph about it. But all those mindless college-age Berniebros? The one’s who don’t remember the nineties, and whose champion has told them relentlessly that Clinton is the product of a rigged, corrupt system? They’ll believe it.

The country has gone mad. Half is supporting a malignant fraud, while a good portion of the other half thinks that malignant fraud might be preferable to Hillary Clinton. Folks, democracy doesn’t work.



from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1ZwVpCD

The inevitable has now occurred. Barring something earth-shattering, Hillary Clinton will be the Democratic nominee for President. She is the first woman to become the nominee of a major political party. In fact, she is the first woman even to be a serious candidate for President.

In her speech tonight, Hillary took time out to make a gracious mention of Bernie Sanders and all that he has accomplished in his campaign. Her audience cheered. Bernie, for his part, made only a brief, classless mention of Hillary (making hey of the fact that it was she who called him). His audience booed at the mention of her name. Charming folks.

Kevin Drum lays down some truth about Hillary:

For the record: Whitewater was a nothingburger. Travelgate was a nothingburger. Troopergate was a nothingburger. Filegate was a nothingburger. The Vince Foster murder conspiracy theories were a nothingburger. Monica Lewinsky was Bill’s problem, not Hillary’s. Benghazi was a tragedy, but entirely non-scandalous. The Goldman Sachs speeches were probably a bad idea, but otherwise a nothingburger. Emailgate revealed some poor judgment, but we’ve now seen all the emails and it’s pretty obviously a nothingburger. Humagate is a nothingburger. Foundationgate is a nothingburger.

Bottom line: Don’t let Donald Trump or the press or anyone else convince you that Hillary Clinton is “dogged by scandal” or “works under a constant cloud of controversy” or whatever the nonsense of the day is. That constant cloud is the very deliberate invention of lowlifes in Arkansas; well-heeled conservative cranks; the Republican Party; and far too often a gullible and compliant press. Like anybody who’s been in politics for 40 years, Hillary has some things she should have handled better, but that’s about it. The plain fact is that there’s no serious scandal on her record. There’s no evidence that she’s ever sold out to Wall Street. There’s no corruption, intrigue, or deceit. And if anything, she’s too honest on a policy level. She could stand to promise people a bit of free stuff now and then.

This is exactly right, and it’s one of the reasons I support her so strongly. Never has a politician been on the receiving end of such a sprawling, professional effort at personal destruction, and never have so many low-information types bought into it. That she has persevered, and even thrived, in the face of all this is all you need to know about her character.

All I keep hearing is that the independents loathe Hillary Clinton. That’s the word that gets used. Loathe. But once you clear away all of the fake scandals, what is there to loathe about her? She’s a typical, centrist Democrat who’s taken her various jobs a lot more seriously than most politicians. Is she too hawkish for you? Too close to Wall Street? Insufficiently left-wing? Fine. Then don’t support her. Be unenthusiastic about her. But loathe her? No. That’s so out of proportion to any sin she’s committed it places you outside the bounds of serious discussion.

And if you loathe her, then what emotion is left for the wall-to-wall scum of the modern Republican Party? Their nominee is a bigoted narcissist who lacks even the basic understanding of world affairs you would get from listening to a thirty-minute news broadcast every night. The Republicans are mostly falling in line behind him. They claim to be bothered by his relentless, overt racism, but one suspects they are only bothered that he never learned about dog-whistling.

In his own speech tonight, Donald Trump tossed off a deranged litany of charges related to Hillary’s e-mails, beyond even what the most ardent right-wingers had thought to allege. It was all invented from whole cloth, but who cares about that? He’s promising us a major speech where he’s going to detail his list of particulars against the Clintons. It will be lies from start to finish, and I’m sure the television pundits will harrumph about it. But all those mindless college-age Berniebros? The one’s who don’t remember the nineties, and whose champion has told them relentlessly that Clinton is the product of a rigged, corrupt system? They’ll believe it.

The country has gone mad. Half is supporting a malignant fraud, while a good portion of the other half thinks that malignant fraud might be preferable to Hillary Clinton. Folks, democracy doesn’t work.



from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1ZwVpCD

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