Up until this point, I haven't made an at-length piece about Hillary Clinton. However, the fact that Bernie Sanders lost the primary and apparently is going to endorse her gives me room to excoriate the former...everything. This week saw FBI director James Comey give a speech that the FBI wouldn't indict her for the trouble regarding her private email setup and what that entailed,in spite of everything that was wrong with Clinton. Far too many people on both sides focused too heavily on the fact that she wasn't indicted.
However, two words that Comey uttered just kept banging around in my head: "extremely careless." Considering the events that happened on both sides of the Atlantic this week, the answer becomes clear: Comey accidentally provided the perfect way to describe Clinton, based not just on her emails, but on her decision making that stretches back years.
There has been much ink and type sprawled across pages of all sorts, so there may not be much to elaborate on in some cases. However, there are a few points I do want to indulge in. One of them was that Comey's decision to give his speech without indicting Clinton. However, given all the circumstances, Comey made the right choice. You don't have a scandal as enveloping as this one and just try and brush it off with a simple "yes or no" answer. The State Department didn't give a simple "yes or no" verdict when it released its report, so why should Comey be expected to do so? If the American public doesn't understand fully what happened, a great disservice will have happened.
Another point worth noting is that Comey cited the Espionage Act and its rare use of indicting someone through "gross negligence." From a precedent standpoint, it makes sense. The way that Comey describes the circumstances used for that one time were extreme and deliberate. That said, Comey's use of that for his defense is rich. The Obama administration has used the Espionage Act a record number of times to go after whistleblowers, but Clinton's emails aren't in the same realm? Even if Clinton didn't deliberately leak or perform similar actions regarding state secrets, there's still no denying at this point that Clinton willfully and deliberately set up a private email system, without permission or supervision. And for what?
Still, those words bang around: "extremely careless." After this week, it shouldn't be hard to understand why.
Regarding her emails, it isn't just her actions that have been extremely careless; it's her attitude and behavior. The way her statements about her email have been unraveled, the deletion of thousands of emails that may never see the light of day without the supervision of the State Department, the way she has acted regarding this issue since her first press conference about it...Republicans or not, if pretty much anyone else had tried the same shenanigans, the results would've been catastrophic. Perhaps most careless of all? If she didn't decide to do this in the first place, we wouldn't be here.
However, we can now draw lines to tie Clinton with the words "extremely careless" elsewhere, with some help from our neighbors across the pond.
The Chilcot Inquiry, which produced its report on the Iraq war after several years of examination, came out earlier this week to declare the verdict on the war. To put it mildly, it was devastating, as a brief outline can illustrate. While there are voices that felt that the report doesn't do enough, the findings were clear: Tony Blair and his government were profoundly at fault for their decisions leading up to the invasion of Iraq, the numerous missteps and willful decisions that built up to one of the most disastrous wars in recent history.
Of course, that should be no surprise to anyone here in the States. Bush, Cheney and so many others that trumpeted the way to the invasion, supported by others who didn't have the moral courage or conviction to stand up to them when the moment of truth came. Who am I missing? Oh, yes: Hillary Clinton. You can watch her speech on YouTube, and try to get through it (I decided against doing so). However, we know what happened next: She voted for it, the war happened and chaos ensued. While the vote had an overwhelming majority, she could've voted differently even from a moral standpoint. You could say her vote was...extremely careless.
Should she be spared further criticism in light of the Chilcot report? After all, she paid a dear price once already, stemming in part from her Iraq War vote, so maybe it's time to move on.
Just kidding. Of course not. In the years since that vote, Clinton has admitted that her vote was a mistake and provided context for that vote. But she never said the words "I'm sorry," which was important. Wars aren't mistakes. You can't patch things up by sending a box of chocolates. While there has been some effort to apologize for Vietnam, President Obama has not made a formal apology for that war (though the recent decision to lift the arms embargo on Vietnam could be seen as an unspoken, if dubious, apology). Apologies matter. They show that you're genuine about admitting that you were at fault for what happened.
Even if Clinton doesn't say those words, she could've made up for it with her actions, but even there, she has failed miserably. She has played a crucial part in events like the overthrow of the Honduran government; the staggering amount of money made off of arms deals to countries like Saudi Arabia, regardless if they had connections with the Clinton Foundation or not; and of course, the overthrow of Muammar Qadhafi and ensuing chaos that resulted, Benghazi or not. These poor decisions, which could even be called catastrophic, bolster the charge that Clinton is, what was it? That's right, extremely careless.
By this point (or if I'm honest, way before this point), many Hillary supporters are probably pounding away at their computers, foaming at the mouth and trying to defuse this argument by bringing out the old, tired arguments they used so far, none more so that the specter of Donald Trump being president. To which I say: Don't. Bringing Donald Trump into this reduces taking a long, hard look at Hillary Clinton's decision making to mere pettiness. Besides, Donald Trump didn't cause Clinton to vote for Iraq, or lead her to make those awful decisions as Secretary of State. For someone who's perceived as bending towards caution, as noted by other people, she strangely acts in a way that shows carelessness, either to herself or to other people.
So congratulations, Democrats: You built that!
Which means you have to reconcile with the idea of having Hillary Clinton in the White House, with all the scandals (fake or not), baggage and migraines that will surely come from that. Given the major party choices are Clinton and Trump, maybe Trevor Noah is right.
One more thing. If, come November, Hillary ends up winning, the Democrats need to answer one question for me: Do souls have a warranty? If not, I could always ring up Satan. I'm sure he gets asked that all the time.
