Hillary Clinton Needs a Tutorial in Accountability

Donald Trump has been asked if he has the proper temperament to be a U.S. President.

However, it seems highly unlikely that Hillary Clinton will ever be asked the question.

Recently, as most people know, Hillary Clinton has been investigated for using her email server illegally, with respect to highly classified information she possessed while U.S. Secretary of State.

While it seems improbable (to me) that she’ll ever face any real legal accountability for her actions, given that her cohorts and friends in the federal government like and/or fear her, she appears more than a little outraged that her opponents in the presidential race even dare to question her about it.

In the past, when questions  were raised about her own law-breaking behavior in the Whitewater scandal, and later her husband’s perjury (leading to his impeachment, as president) in a sexual harassment case, she reverted to calling all opposition to herself (or her husband) the product of a “right wing conspiracy.”

In a campaign rally just the other day, Hillary Clinton is saying the exact same thing. She says that the current controversy is not due to evidence of anything, but to “right wing operatives” that were trying to block her agenda. Oddly, the FBI — once again, run by people most likely sympathetic to her candidacy — do not seem to agree. Yet she has no answer for that, and appears indignant and outraged she should be accountable for even providing one.

Hillary Clinton acts and speaks as if she’s not accountable for her behavior. She should not even have to respond, is her implicit attitude. If you question or criticize her behavior — in any way — then it can only be for a nefarious reason, even when you have solid evidence for questioning her.

I don’t know about you, but to me this does not seem to be the temperament you want to have for a person in a position of such authority and power as U.S. President.

In her most recent diatribe, Hillary Clinton also condemned the Supreme Court Citizens United case, which slightly loosened federal restrictions on the ability of corporations to spend money on political campaigns. [See breitbart.com 8-15-15, “Hillary Clinton Sneers at Republicans: ‘It’s Not About Benghazi… It’s Not About Emails’”] In Clinton’s mind, money — when spent by people who seek different policies from her own — represents a tyranny of conspiracy against her ideas, as well as against her personally.

Such paranoia is worrisome. The federal government already wields way more power than ever provided for in the Constitution. If, on top of that, we elect a president who feels that all or most disagreement with her policies is some kind of personal attack, how do you think she’ll use that newly acquired power? Remember Richard Nixon? She could make his real and alleged sins seem like nothing, particularly given the lack of spine or resolve typically displayed by her opponents, contrary to her portrayal of them.

I find it interesting that Hillary Clinton, in her hour of stress, would single out the Citizens United case as the biggest problem here. She seems to feel, like a lot of people in politics — especially in her party — that limits on free speech, disguised as limits on “campaign spending” — will be the final solution to the problem of dissenting opinion.

Yet in any free society where some people have a lot of money, everybody with strong ideas will seek out those with money to support them. There’s nothing wrong with this fact; and Hillary Clinton, indeed, fully agrees when she herself accepts donations from wealthy people who support her policies and candidacy.

I’m not defending Donald Trump, or anyone else running for president, because from what I can see, none of them stand for the kind of policies or philosophy about government I’d like to see adopted.

But I find it interesting that Hillary Clinton will never be questioned about her temperament suggestive of paranoia and intolerance, while Donald Trump most definitely will be. Once again, it’s a glaring double standard, and it’s not the kind that Hillary Clinton wants you to see.