"It strains all logic ... to ignore the warning signs about Hillary Clinton"

Is the Democratic Party establishment just rolling the dice with Clinton? Do they know it's what they're doing (source)?

by Gaius Publius

The quote in the headline is from a recent piece by Shaun King, who looks at the mounting "impossible for the Party to ignore" list of incredulities about the Clinton candidacy. In particular, King looks at three pieces, bulleted below.

• The inconsistency of her position on her speeches vs. her position on Trump's tax returns. King (my emphasis): "Yesterday, she openly mocked Donald Trump for not releasing his tax returns and stated emphatically that his unwillingness to release them suggests that he is hiding something."

Note that it's not the apples-to-oranges difference between speeches and tax returns that's the problem. It's her "artful smear" — the suggestion that if he's not showing something, he must be hiding something. That looks pretty apples-to-apples to me, and damning. (Transcript of that artful smear here.)

• Her poll after poll collapse in head-to-head matchups against Trump (while at the same time, head-to-head matchups between Sanders and Trump show Sanders' numbers improving, a point King doesn't make). King: "That's four polls released in 48 hours which all show Hillary struggling against Trump and Bernie performing significantly better." See King's piece for the detail.

• Mounting problems and inconsistencies involving James Comey's FBI investigation of her private email server and its contents. 

The last point above contains at least three separate problems.

First, her use of an unsecured server itself, which wasn't even encrypted for the first two months of her time in office, raises questions of gross and criminal negligence with both classified and (as I read it) unclassified government documents, both types of which she had a legal obligation to protect. You could ask, for example, do the Russians have some of the contents of her server, or the Chinese? If Clinton were a mid-level officer in the CIA, what would be done to her regarding just that possibility alone?

It's apparent, by the way, that her use of a private server for all email, government and personal — and a single email account for all communication whatsoever — was not known or approved by anyone with the ability to "sign off" on it. See Jake Tapper here for more on that. And as you do, notice that CNN is asking these questions, not Fox.

Second, an examination of the server's contents, including more than 30,000 deleted and probably recovered emails (about half the total number), may also prove damning, especially if there was an inappropriate or corrupt mixing of government business with personal business.

Finally, the deletion of 30,000 emails, if content was being hidden for the purpose of concealing evidence of a crime, is a cover-up, itself a crime, and suggests a conspiracy on the part of her top staff to help her, another crime. In case you've lost count, that's potentially multiple crimes arising from this one investigation. 

That's just breath-taking when you consider the problems this issue raises for the party. All of it causes King to ask the question I quoted in the title:

At what point will the Democratic Party acknowledge that she is simply not the best candidate to defeat Donald Trump?

Note — This isn't about Clinton. It's about beating Donald Trump. Clinton is perfectly capable of worrying about Clinton, and that's her concern more than it is ours. Our concern is ... not electing Donald Trump. Presumably, but not certainly, it's the Party's chief concern as well. At least they say it is. But are they just rolling the dice because they like her best?

There will indeed be a crossroad in Philadelphia for us all. (And keep the name "Biden" in mind. We've been warned already.)

"The word 'investigation,' it's in our name"

King elaborates a bit on the email investigation in a section I'd like to quote:

Yesterday, FBI Director James Comey was forced to clarify that the Clinton campaign's characterization of their investigation into her email scandal as a "security inquiry," instead of a full fledged investigation, was simply wrong. Embarrassingly, Comey was then forced to say that he didn't even know what a "security inquiry" was — basically stating that the Clinton campaign made it all up.

"I don't know what that means," Comey told the media yesterday. "We're conducting an investigation. That's the bureau's business. That's what we do. The word 'investigation' — it's in our name," Comey declared. "And I'm not familiar with the term 'security inquiry."

That's not all. The State Department announced on Monday that the[y] "cannot find" years of emails from Hillary's information technology director, Bryan Pagliano. He's a central figure in the FBI investigation.

What are we supposed to think about this?

Even if the Justice Department does not issue indictments, this hangs like a sword over the Philadelphia Convention, the election, and her whole time in the White House, if she gets there. Wow. I do not envy her, but I worry much more about us. As I said, this is much more about the country than about Clinton.

It's Not Too Late to Stop This

It's still not too late to stop this, to help Bernie Sanders go to the convention with a majority of pledged delegates. He's still speaking to overflow crowds, and he's still winning states. It's an uphill climb, but not an impossible one. It's always been an uphill climb, and he's still in the race.

Care to help? Now is when he needs it. If so, click here. And thanks!

GP