Voices from Trump Rallies, Uncensored

By dianeravitch

September 10, 2016 //

So Hillary spoke ill of half of Trump’s supporters.

Did she mean the delegates who chanted, “Lock her up!” at the GOP convention?

Or was she thinking of these gentlemen?

Categories Education Reform

37 Comments Post your own or leave a trackback: Trackback URL

Jon Awbrey says:

September 10, 2016 at 10:52 pm

If the basket fits …

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- Ellen Lubic says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 5:41 pm
  
  Just in…from The Hill
  
  Doctor: Clinton has pneumonia, was dehydrated and overheated Sunday
  
  Hillary Clinton has been ill with pneumonia, her doctor said Sunday evening in a statement.
  
  Dr. Lisa R. Bardack revealed the diagnosis on Sunday evening, hours after the Democratic presidential nominee was seen stumbling after exiting a 9/11 memorial event early.
  
  Bardack said Clinton had an examination at her home in Chappaqua after the incident Sunday, and was diagnosed with pneumonia on Friday.
  
  Read the full story here
  
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Vale Math says:

September 10, 2016 at 11:55 pm

That isn’t surprising or unexpected. Those people always exist and now they have a stage. Look at Maine’s governor. What is surprising is that so many decent conservatives and Republicans go along and even accept the behavior. Now is a good time for Republicans to look up a performance of Cecil P. Taylor’s play “Good”.

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- Joel Herman says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 8:25 am
  
  Vale, there is nothing surprising ask Kevin Philips, this has been Republican strategy since Nixon. My question to the Trump supporters I deal with, who are in a narrow niche because they benefit from a powerful Trade Union. Do you hate minorities and “the others “more than you value your and your children’s economic future?
  
  Where “New Democrats” are failing in this battle , they have blurred those economic lines that used to separate them from mainstream Business Republicans. Few people believe Hillary will actually represent their interests and not Wall Streets .
  
  No place is this more evident than in the “Education Wars “. The choice becomes a Hillary who may or may not be trusted to not support the interests of the privateers or a Trump who tells you he will destroy Public Schools.
  
  Good thing I don’t really do drugs or drink or it would be time to get drunk at 8:30 AM
  
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  - Vale Math says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 10:45 am
    
    Yes. Those that support private unions, but not public unions try hard to reconcile the cognitive dissonance. As they are finding out, the distinction is lost on most Republicans, particular the business class. Teamsters are seeing their pensions cut drastically. Even police unions thought they were immune and found themselves under attack by Republicans in Ohio.
    
    Hillary needs to give conflicted Trump supporters a reason to vote Democratic. She needs to take strong policy positions – strengthen laws to allow unions to form without intimidation, ensure companies that ship jobs overseas are held accountable and cannot benefit from the country they are undermining, disallow H1bs from stealing American jobs if there are Americans willing to work, ensure pensions and Social Security are solvent by making the rich pay their fair share, support teachers by eliminating test and punish and abolish flawed top down standards, work to make college affordable and accessible without indentured servitude to banks – just a start.
    
    I was attacked by a rabid Hillary supporter in an earlier post. The poster just doesn’t get it and neither do Democrats. This is not a normal election. Hillary is an elite, cold, uninspiring Establishment candidate in an election where both sides are fed up with the Establishment. So the Democrats silence the Sanders supporters – the passion and future of the Democratic party – and pick a bizarre VP candidate with little appeal. Democrats need to take strong, unambiguous positions supporting middle America and make that message very clear. Or they will lose. Even if Hillary wins now, Dems have to look strategically and realize these are movements underway, not just elections. Four years from now is just as important.
    
    Obama was Republican-lite. Hillary looks like Obama 2.0.
    
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  - Joel Herman says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 11:36 am
    
    Shame there is no like button
    
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  - NYC public school parent says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 7:37 pm
    
    Math Vale, I thought Tim Kaine seemed far more supportive of public schools than even Democrats like Elizabeth Warren. And Bernie Sanders.
    
    He doesn’t seem to have been fooled by the privatizers rhetoric that charters should be a “choice”.
    
    Elizabeth Warren hasn’t even taken a position in her own state. What is with that? And it seems as if Tim Kaine did a pretty good job of preventing charter school proliferation.
    
    I’m open to being corrected on this issue if I am mistaken or “fooled” by the media into thinking something that isn’t true.
    
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  - Ellen Lubic says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 5:13 pm
    
    Should have known you follow Kevin Phillips…me too.
    
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  - Joel Herman says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 6:48 pm
    
    By the way Ellen he thanked me for the letter but did not say he was acting on it . And again yesterday 10’s of thousands marched up fifth avenue yesterday to a media black out. Proud to say I started a small middle finger salute in front of Trump tower. Accomplished nothing but made me feel better.
    
    As for Philips “Bad Money” describes where we are at. The diversion of “rents” to Wall Street is sucking the life out of the economy. Trump may be entirely wrong for many reasons. But that does not mean the issues he raises are entirely wrong . On that note this from Jim Hightower
    
    http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/cleaning-after-pundits-dear-media-elites-no-trump-not-populist
    
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- NYC public school parent says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 11:25 am
  
  Vale Math,
  
  I am the person whom you refer to as a “rabid Hillary supporter” and I’m sorry if it seemed I was attacking you. I was frustrated that you were blaming Hillary and not the media. And I pointed out that if you – a smart, engaged voter — had been fooled into thinking that Hillary had not done exactly what you wanted her to do, then what hope does she have. You bought into the media characterization. She had said exactly what you asked her to say and spoke the absolutely truth. (I guess you can argue whether it’s half Trump voters, 30%, 40% or 60%, but it is a large number — I know because my relatives who vote for Trump spew exactly the same hatred for those groups and nothing is going to change their minds.)
  
  You are angry because Hillary can’t control the media. It doesn’t matter what she says because it is impossible — when the media is out to get you in that way — to watch every single word. Impossible because there will always be some phrase that can be misused to “prove” it. Look at how an FBI investigation that cleared Hillary Clinton beyond a doubt and actually proved she was far more careful than Colin Powell to follow rules became a portray of a lying, corrupt sell-out person who had committed serious crimes but the FBI just decided not to throw her in jail to be nice. Look at how when she said exactly what she said, the media follow the right wing lead to make it “Hillary says every person who considers voting for Trump is deplorable”.
  
  If you don’t recognize the problem, and blame the candidate, the alt right wins. They may already have won. If you think Bernie’s message would have gotten though more when the alt-right and the mainstream media cowed into wanting Fox News to like them, then we shall have to disagree. This is about the media. And if we don’t stop it now and make it about the candidate, as we did with Dukakis, Gore, and every other supposedly “flawed” candidate who was excoriated by the media, then it will keep happening.
  
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  - dianeravitch says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 11:42 am
    
    I am embarrassed to say that one of my siblings is voting for Trump. She has conspiratorial and racist views. She is a Birther and a bigot. Nothing that I say changes her rabid views. She loves Trump. He is her dream come true.
    
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  - Joel Herman says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 12:23 pm
    
    Many are racist. But many would have voted their economic interests over their racial bias. That is where Clinton has failed to reach out. Nobody believes that she will standup for the working class. The fact that Trump policy will devastate most of his supporters is lost in the noise.
    
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  - Ellen Lubic says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 5:14 pm
    
    Don’t be embarrassed Diane..we all have some weird family members.
    
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  - Joel Herman says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 11:59 am
    
    As I just mailed this link to a friend I will re-post it. It explains how the influence of the Donor class works. Neither Vale or myself criticize Hillary for the scandals. It is the policy decisions that hurt. I expect Republicans to not have my interests at heart. I expect different from democrats. That has not been the history of the last two democratic administrations. I could care less about her protocol on the Emails. Benghazi is a pimple. Bill sex life is none of my concern … ….
    
    The Wall Street speeches are not being released for the same reason that Trump wont release his tax returns they reveal how flawed each is. What frauds they are.
    
    “It’s not just that the politician wants to act to curry the favor of the rich and powerful, more typically they identify with the interests of the rich and powerful so that they don’t even see themselves as compromising a principle.”
    
    http://billmoyers.com/story/bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton-and-the-money/
    
    But there are lessor of two evils and Hillary is that.
    
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  - flos56 says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 1:13 pm
    
    Joel, while I have concerns about some of Hillary’s so called friends and/or donors, I have been following her for years and she is a strong advocate for women and youth – 2 areas which are of deep concern to me. Both parties have made some wrong decisions and Obama has endorsed some questionable polices as well as some destructive ones (mainly his views towards education), however, we have a better chance of changing course with the democrats than the republicans. The Republican Party is the party of the “five old white men in a room” and they are totally out of step with the times, even pushing us back fifty years (fight against planned parenthood).
    
    So, yes, I’m unconditionally voting for Hillary. She is the best qualified with the most experience and the proper connections to get things done. Plus it’s about time this country have a woman president – and if not now, probably not in my lifetime.
    
    Trump, while fun to listen to (in a sadistic sort of way) is an inept baffoon who will cause undue harm and ultimately be controlled by the very people I despise. Love him or hate him, he does not have the intelligence or skill set to become our president – probably the most difficult job on the planet.
    
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  - Joel Herman says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 7:12 pm
    
    flos56
    
    I do not disagree with anything you say. I regret that we do not have a better choice. My position on the Clinton’s/ Obama is aligned with Thomas Franks or Michelle Alexanders position. But that is comparing her to a populist progressive not a demagogue buffoon. Jimmy Carter has said that Trump is harmless because he has no ideology . I am afraid he has adopted one.
    
    It is an ideology of the extreme right mixed with the most regressive aspects of the business wing of the Republican party.
    
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NYC public school parent says:

September 11, 2016 at 1:52 am

If the press wasn’t so biased against Hillary, they’d actually force Trump to denounce his most racist and hateful supporters. Instead of debating whether Hillary’s remark was a big mistake or a campaign ending disaster, as no doubt they will spend all day tomorrow discussing, they might ask Trump why he hasn’t denounced those kind of supporters at his rallies. They might actually discuss whether it is TRUE. And note that the continuation of Hillary’s comment specifically distanced those reprehensible supporters from the other Trump supporters who aren’t like that. Of course that will go unmentioned too as they debate and debate whether Hillary was disastrously stupid or disastrously corrupt when she said that. And somewhere Lee Atwater is laughing.

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- flos56 says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 7:41 am
  
  There are many of us who agree with her statement. We have eyes and ears and we’ve been watching – and some of us even use our own brains for thinking.
  
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  - ciedie aech says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 1:44 pm
    
    hear, hear.
    
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- Joel Herman says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 8:45 am
  
  Th Press is generating ratings, a close race that holds the interest of voters is in their economic interest. Real investigative journalism is dying. First they put on some ridiculous surrogates who they seldom challenge. They never turn off the surrogates mic, the waters get muddied. Example What color is the traffic light? Surrogates answer: That is a tall building.
  
  Then to cleanse their souls they make a statement that may reveal a slight pro Clinton stance. All the public hears is noise. Trump gets to rail against the biased press. If the press were treating him as it should he would be a marginal candidate. Which still leaves us with a terribly flawed Clinton. Flawed not by any inappropriate actions but by her policy positions.
  
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  - dianeravitch says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 9:14 am
    
    The press strains to show “balance.” They do not differentiate between a conventional candidate with experience and knowledge and a candidate who lacks experience, is woefully uninformed, and uses his speaking skills to appeal to the mob’s basest instincts. Joel, you and many others dislike Clinton’s policies, but she is not a menace and a threat to the future of the nation and the world. Trump is. He makes outrageous statements every day, which the press no longer finds novel. She dares to see that “half” his supporters are “Deplorables,” and the press blows it up into a media firestorm. But was she right? David Duke tweeted last night, “We are the Deplorables.” The NY Times has written several articles about the neo-Nazism, white nationalism, and race hatred that Trump’s rallies inspire.
    
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  - Joel Herman says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 11:27 am
    
    Diane agree. I saw that video on the Times web site last week. It is not the David Dukes we have to fear but the large number of Trump supporters who are buying into the demagoguery. Let us understand that many have arrived there due to economic frustration. They may have always harbored some degree of prejudice. But in the past many would have put their economic interests of above their prejudices. As Thomas Frank points out the (New) Democratic parties abandonment of working class issues in a neo liberal pursuit, in exchange for corporate cash exacerbates the problem .
```
  The press is not supposed to find balance they are supposed to try and present the facts or the truth as best they see it and then the public can decide which media outlets are more credible,there has always been some bias tied to ownership.   How does one find balance? . What is the balance? 
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    “They do not differentiate between a conventional candidate with experience and knowledge and a candidate who lacks experience, is woefully uninformed, and uses his speaking skills to appeal to the mob’s basest instincts.”
    
    I totally agree!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.
    
    I am sick of listening to surrogates for both sides in the medias effort to fill a 24hr news cycle. How about reporting what the candidates say,what their positions are. how feasible their plans are. Seek independent voices, where possible (who will disagree) and then let the public decide.
    I do not recall news in the day of Walter Cronkite looking like this.
    
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  - dianeravitch says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 11:37 am
    
    Absolutely correct, Joel.
    
    Walter Cronkite would never have stooped to the level of today’s gossip mill.
    
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Joe says:

September 11, 2016 at 9:15 am

Hillary has to be careful, she’s not allowed as many gaffes and faux pas as Le Roi of blundery is permitted. Even though she spoke the truth, it was a bit too much truth and it was immediately turned into something else that could really hurt her campaign. Hopefully this will just be a minor bump in the road.

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- NYC public school parent says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 11:26 am
  
  In other words, she isn’t allowed to speak. Because the press will turn anything she says into something negative.
  
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  - Gordon Wilder says:
    
    September 11, 2016 at 12:16 pm
    
    Confessions of a Clinton reporter: The media’s 5 unspoken rules for covering Hillary
    Updated by Jonathan Allen jon@vox.com Sep 8, 2016, 10:04a
    The reporter’s job is to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable” — a credo that, humorously, was originally written as a smear of the self-righteous nature of journalists. And so the justification for going after a public figure increases in proportion to his or her stature. The bigger the figure, the looser the restraints.
    After a quarter of a century on the national stage, there’s no more comfortable political figure to afflict than Hillary Clinton. And she’s in for a lot of affliction over the next year and half.
    That’s generally a good way for reporters to go about their business. After all, the more power a person wants in our republic, the more voters should know about her or him. But it’s also an essential frame for thinking about the long-toxic relationship between the Clintons and the media, why the coverage of Hillary Clinton differs from coverage of other candidates for the presidency, and whether that difference encourages distortions that will ultimately affect the presidential race.
    The Clinton rules are driven by reporters’ and editors’ desire to score the ultimate prize in contemporary journalism: the scoop that brings down Hillary Clinton and her family’s political empire. At least in that way, Republicans and the media have a common interest.
    
    RelatedWhy reporters won’t find anything damning in Hillary Clinton’s emails
    I understand these dynamics well, having co-written a book that demonstrated how Bill and Hillary Clinton used Hillary’s time at State to build the family political operation and set up for their fourth presidential campaign. That is to say, I’ve done a lot of research about the Clintons’ relationship with the media, and experienced it firsthand. As an author, I felt that I owed it to myself and the reader to report, investigate, and write with the same mix of curiosity, skepticism, rigor, and compassion that I would use with any other subject. I wanted to sell books, of course. But the easier way to do that — proven over time — is to write as though the Clintons are the purest form of evil. The same holds for daily reporting. Want to drive traffic to a website? Write something nasty about a Clinton, particularly Hillary.
    As a reporter, I get sucked into playing by the Clinton rules. This is what I’ve seen in my colleagues, and in myself.
    1) Everything, no matter how ludicrous-sounding, is worthy of a full investigation by federal agencies, Congress, the “vast right-wing conspiracy,” and mainstream media outlets
    One of my former colleagues, a hard-nosed reporter who has put countless political pelts on his wall, once told me that everyone in public life has something to hide. Who goes down in the flames of scandal? The politicians we decide to go after.
    
    That may not be 100 percent true, but it’s true enough. The act of choosing, time and again, to go after the same person has the effect of tainting that person, even when an investigation or reporting turns up nothing nefarious — and it’s time not spent digging into his or her adversaries. The original source of alleged malfeasance could come from the other party, within a politician’s party, or from the reporter’s own observations and industrious digging. But two things are crystal clear: If there’s no investigation, there’s no scandal. And if there’s no scandal, there’s no scalp.
    The Clintons have been under investigation for about 25 years now. There’s little doubt they’ve produced more information for investigators, lawyers, and journalists about their finances, their business and philanthropic dealings, and their decision-making processes in government than any officials in American history. They’ve watched countless friends frog-marched into congressional hearings and, in some cases, to jail. They know there’s a good chance that any expressed thought will become part of the public record and twisted for political gain.
    The most absurd allegations against Hillary Clinton have been bookends on her public career so far: that she had something to do with the suicide of Clinton White House aide Vince Foster, and that she bears responsibility for the terrorist attack that killed US Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.
    But in between, there was Travelgate, Filegate, and Whitewater. Some were less legitimate than others. When Clinton surprisingly claimed that she and her husband were “dead broke” when they left the White House, it was because they had spent all of their money to defend themselves against an eight-year barrage of investigations.
    It’s understandable, then, why the Clintons have a bunker mentality when it comes to transparency. But their paranoia leads them to be secretive, and their secrecy leads Republicans and the press to suspect wrongdoing. That spurs further investigation, which only makes the Clintons more secretive. The paranoia and persistent investigation feed each other in an endless cycle of probe and parry. Along the way, the political class and the public are forced to choose imperfect sides: the power couple that always seems to be hiding something, or a Washington investigation complex that is overly partisan and underwhelming in its ability to prove gross misconduct.
    This is, for Republicans, a reasonable strategy. They know that if they keep investigating her, it will do two things: keep the media writing about scandals that might knock her out, and turn off voters who don’t want a return to the bloodsport politics of the 1990s. They leak partial stories to reporters hungry for that one great scoop that will give them the biggest political scalp of them all. But they also err in jumping the gun in accusing her of wrongdoing, which allows Clinton to defend herself by pointing at the folly of her adversaries.
    2) Every allegation, no matter how ludicrous, is believable until it can be proven completely and utterly false. And even then, it keeps a life of its own in the conservative media world.
    In touring the country to promote our book in 2014, my co-author and I were repeatedly lobbied to assert that Clinton is a lesbian. One gentleman pushed the issue during a Q&A at a Barnes and Noble on the Upper West Side of Manhattan — one of the few places you might expect that kind of thing to get a rest.
    The National Enquirer published a story in April alleging that Clinton wiped her personal email server clean because it contained references to her lesbian lovers.
    Meanwhile, the conservative media are also convinced Clinton is preparing to wage a war on Christianity if she wins the presidency. But one thing revealed in her State Department emails is that Clinton shared daily religious reflections with her friends.
    
    It’s not just the out-of-the-box allegations that keep the media machine spun up. A year before Chelsea Clinton got married, Clinton staffers were kept busy by mainstream journalists who were absolutely sure she had already gone through with secret nuptials.
    And, on a more serious note, remember Benghazi flu? Many political opponents and members of the media were unable to accept the idea that Clinton was forced to cancel planned Senate testimony on Benghazi because she’d suffered a concussion. Now, three years later, it seems ridiculous to think that Clinton was making an excuse — she’s since testified on both sides of the Hill — or that she suffered, as Karl Rove suggested, brain damage. And if she was making up the concussion to avoid testifying, how did she suffer brain damage from a fake fall?
    The conservative media echo chamber, which bounces innuendo from Rush Limbaugh to Fox News and back again, ensures that the most damning story lines — true or not — stay alive. The Benghazi attacks are a perfect example. Terrorists killed four Americans. The conservative echo chamber seems convinced Hillary Clinton is at fault. The reasonable argument to make is that we shouldn’t have been in Libya in the first place and the murders were a down-the-chain result of bad policy. But the right wing wants to prove that they happened because of Clinton’s actions — or inaction — on security matters.
    They’ve talked about security requests denied for Libya (never mind that the stronger contingent would have been in Tripoli, not Benghazi, and that there’s no evidence Clinton herself was aware of the requests), a stand-down order that prevented reinforcements from arriving in Benghazi (never mind that they wouldn’t have gotten there until after the fighting was done, and that even a House Republican committee found that there was no such order) and, most of absurd of all, that Clinton knew the attack was coming. This is how Limbaugh put it in May.
    The fact is they knew about the Benghazi attack 10 days before it was to happen. They knew who did it.
    The freedom of the conservative media to make wild allegations often acts as a bulldozer forcing reporters to check into the charges and, in doing so, repeat them. By the time they’ve been debunked, they’re part of the American public’s collective consciousness. Or, as it’s been said, a lie gets around the world before the truth gets out of bed.
    3) The media assumes that Clinton is acting in bad faith until there’s hard evidence otherwise.
    One outgrowth of Clinton’s terrible relationship with reporters is that journalists often assume she is acting in bad faith. There’s good reason for that. Though she’s added some new pros to her press staff for this campaign, her operation’s stance toward the media was always a reflection of the way Bill Clinton’s White House handled journalists.
    Back in the mid-1990s, Bill Clinton relied on a series of Machiavellian spin doctors to keep the press at bay. With the Clinton White House, the modus operandi was to stonewall as long as possible, lie if necessary — or just out of habit — and turn questions around on the questioners. After all, Bill Clinton once wagged his finger at a press conference and told reporters, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman … Ms. Lewinsky.” He’d lied in a deposition, too.
    So the press has plenty of precedent for believing that when the Clintons aren’t forthcoming — and sometimes, even when they are — they’re covering something up. And the Clintons, given the history of some-smoke-no-fire investigations launched against them, have plenty of precedent for being mistrustful of the press. The result is a brutally dysfunctional relationship on both sides. The Clintons believe the press acts in bad faith, and the press believes the Clintons’ attitudes toward the press are evidence that the Clintons are hiding something.
    That attitude carried over to Hillary Clinton’s 2008 campaign, and to some degree her tenure as Secretary of State. The standard response to a reporter’s question is not an answer. It is to ignore the question or to engage in a Socratic debate by asking a question in return. It’s clear Clinton doesn’t like the media one bit, as Glenn Thrush and Maggie Haberman reported last year.
    When asked why Clinton hasn’t done more to reach out to reporters over the years, one Clinton campaign veteran began to spin several theories. She was too busy, she was too prone to speaking her mind and the like—then abruptly cut to the chase:
    “Look, she hates you. Period. That’s never going to change.”
    At a July Fourth parade this past weekend, Clinton aides used rope to create an impromptu moving barrier for reporters, keeping them away from the candidate and voters. She treated them like cattle, and they responded by putting the video on television for the last three days.
    The mistrust among journalists is a problem for Clinton. And as the media is an amplifier for the public, it’s also little wonder that so many voters are inclined to believe she’s often acting in bad faith. Most Americans say she’s not honest and trustworthy.
    This view, shared by many reporters and most of the public, makes it much easier to treat Clinton’s actions as though they are uniquely sinister. Case in point: She made a ton of money giving paid speeches to people with business before the government. So did Jeb Bush, of course. But until Bush recently released an accounting of some of those speeches, the media had little interest in his dealings. Kudos to Ken Vogel of Politico, who did some digging on that for a story published Thursday.
    The imbalance in assumptions about Clinton’s motivations is another way in which the Clinton code has a distorting effect on the public perception of her. And it, too, is self-perpetuating: It leads Clinton to assume the press is biased against her, which leads her to treat the press poorly, which leads more reporters to assume she’s trying to hide something from them.
    4) Everything is newsworthy because the Clintons are the equivalent of America’s royal family
    When Clinton keynoted an annual fundraiser for David Axelrod’s epilepsy charity in June 2013, several major news outlets sent reporters to cover the speech. That was more than three years before the 2016 election. Every word, every gesture, every facial expression is scrutinized.
    Video of Clinton ordering a burrito bowl at a Chipotle became the first viral image of her campaign. Reporters gave fodder to late-night comedians earlier this year when they made amad dash to catch up as her campaign van rolled by.
    This coverage of every last detail, of course, isn’t a one-way street. It wasn’t until a reporter was tipped off to the Chipotle visit that anyone knew about it. She craves the attention even more than she detests it.
    But that, too, has a distorting effect. As with the royal family in London, normally private moments become part of a public narrative: her husband’s affair, her daughter’s wedding, the birth of her granddaughter.
    All the attention has the effect of making Clinton seem, to the casual observer, hungrier for press than even the average politician. And there’s no doubt that part of the love/hate relationship is an intense desire to attract and manipulate coverage. But Clinton understands that sometimes it’s better not to be in the spotlight.
    The best example of that was when she declined requests to appear on Sunday political talk shows right after the Benghazi attacks. Susan Rice, then the ambassador to the UN and now Obama’s national security adviser, leaped at the chance to stand in for Clinton. Those appearances ended up costing Rice the nomination to succeed Clinton as secretary of state when many senators concluded she had lied about the origin and nature of the attacks.
    The press has such fascination with the Clintons that the coverage would be there whether Hillary Clinton wanted it or not.
    5) Everything she does is fake and calculated for maximum political benefit
    For someone who lost a big lead in the 2008 presidential primary and is ceding ground to Bernie Sanders right now, Clinton is given a lot of credit for her political acumen. Her detractors see in every move, including the birth of her granddaughter, a grandly conceived and executed political calculation.
    Clinton’s flaunting of her grandchild is one of the most transparently cynical and sentimental acts of a major American politician that I can recall. We have had presidents who have been parents, and we have had presidents who have been grandparents. But a campaign based on grandparental solidarity? A novelty.
    And Clinton plays into that by using the positives in her life for political gain.
    That doesn’t make her different from other candidates for the presidency — it makes her just like them. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie talked about his grandmothers, his mom, his wife, and his kids when he launched his bid for the presidency last week. Was that calculated to send messages about Christie to the public? Of course!
    The best example, though, was the tear — the one that rolled down Clinton’s cheek as she campaigned in New Hampshire after having come in third in the Iowa caucuses in 2008.
    The New York Times’s Maureen Dowd pilloried her for what Dowd saw as a window into the dark part of Clinton’s soul.
    There was a poignancy about the moment, seeing Hillary crack with exhaustion from decades of yearning to be the principal rather than the plus-one. But there was a whiff of Nixonian self-pity about her choking up. What was moving her so deeply was her recognition that the country was failing to grasp how much it needs her. In a weirdly narcissistic way, she was crying for us. But it was grimly typical of her that what finally made her break down was the prospect of losing.
    As Spencer Tracy said to Katharine Hepburn in “Adam’s Rib,” “Here we go again, the old juice. Guaranteed heart melter. A few female tears, stronger than any acid.”
    How far political journalism has come from castigating Ed Muskie for crying to accusing Clinton of calculating that tears would help her win. She’s not that good at politics.
    What the Clinton rules mean for the election
    I take a dim view of the idea that journalists successfully anoint political winners. The media might have been in the bag for Barack Obama, but he didn’t win because he got positive coverage. He won because he had better strategy, a better message, and better skills at delivering that message — in the 2008 primary and in the two general elections he won.
    That said, the media can definitely weigh down — and even destroy — a candidate. The emphasis on a candidate’s flaws — real or perceived — comes at the cost of the candidate’s ability to focus his or her message and at the cost of negative attention to the other candidates. This is a problem for Clinton, and it seems unlikely to go away.
    Hillary Clinton is comfortable enough to be a target for a lot of journalistic affliction and powerful enough that no one needs to comfort her from that affliction. But these double standards are an important factor to keep in mind when judging her against her rivals for the presidency. Whether they’re fair or not, the Clinton rules distort the public’s perception of Hillary Clinton.
    Correction: This story has been corrected to remove an erroneous reference to the source of the original report on the Monica Lewinsky scandal. The Drudge Report first broke news that Newsweek had decided to hold a story about the affair.
    
    Watch: Understanding how Hillary Clinton would govern
    
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JB2 says:

September 11, 2016 at 12:15 pm

David Brooks, “something ‘Nixonian’ about Hilliary” this morning…

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Ellen Lubic says:

September 11, 2016 at 4:01 pm

I appreciate the continued level headedness of Joel, Vale Math, and Gordon, in stating facts and current information about HIllary Clinton. Agree with all of you plus some others who always are measured and informed.

I find the continued rant however of NY Parent, regarding the “HORRID media” v. Hillary, (that seems to defeat our quest for at least the lesser of the evils) exhausting.

This intelligent and knowledgeable commentator cannot seem to recognize that he/she loses much credibility by pointing to his/her exaggerated view of Hillary as the savior of children without ever acknowledging the other 30 years of her political decisions which many here find questionable.

Also, NY Parent insults the intelligence of all others here who have agreed to vote for Hillary while holding noses, because Trump is an uniformed proven liar and self aggrandizing ignoramus who will cavort with Putin, and probably other dictatorial world leaders, who Donnie Boy patterns himself after. He would be a disaster as president, so many of us who had worked for Bernie see that Hillary is our only viable choice.

To keep pushing the same platform re ‘the wonderful Hillary’ is not winning any minds…but indeed, Hillary could learn much from some of our writers in terms of focusing on real issues, and presenting how she sees herself presiding over American interests, and not engaging in a mud slinging match with the T-Rump contingent. She should be ‘presidential’ at all times. Her surrogates, like her mediocre choice for VP, and Biden, and Schumer, and others, can do the dirty work of pointing out the turd that is Donald Trump and his dangerous followers.

It would be far more enlightening if Hillary’s true believers like NY Parent would post her many votes in the Senate, and her achievements as Sect. of State, that have made America a better nation for citizens and for the world, BUT not keep harking back 40 years to Marion Edelman.

I can, but won’t list her negatives like her corporate and Wall Street allegiances to Monsanto and Goldman Sachs, etc. and her coziness with the oligarchs like Eli Broad and Michael Bloomberg.

I challenge you to MAKE ME want want to vote for her with current facts, without holding my nose, but not by being insulting.

Yes, the media is generally in it for their own paychecks and ratings, and their stock in trade is to manufacture 24 hours of news every single day even if it is pure crap. However, not every news source does this. I hope everyone watched Fareed Zakaria today…his forum was an eye opener and certainly gave me new things to consider. Even Thomas Friedman made much sense.

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- NYC public school parent says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 6:52 pm
  
  Ellen Lubic,
  
  I don’t recall you attacking me when I was defending Rafe Esquith just as vehemently against what I saw as people making broad sweeping judgements without facts. In fact, you thanked me for it. I believe in evidence and when someone makes broad claims while ignoring the evidence, I respond. I did it with Rafe Esquith and you thanked me. When I do it with Hillary Clinton you get incredibly defensive. Maybe it’s my style and if so, I am sorry. Or maybe you aren’t considering what I am saying and jumping to conclusions.
  
  If you want to attack me for pointing out how terrible the media coverage of Hillary Clinton is, have at it. Guilty as charged. I will keep stating it over and over again and point to articles in so-called “liberal” media newspapers like the NY Times that have convinced the vast majority of Americans that Hillary is corrupt, greedy, and sold out US interests for money.
  
  Please find me where I claimed you aren’t allowed to criticize Hillary on the issues. For the record, I myself often criticize Hillary on the issues, which is why I happily voted for Bernie Sanders in the primary and Barack Obama when he ran against her.
  
  Despite your insulting characterization of me as some knee jerk Hillary Clinton supporter unwilling to countenance any criticism of her, I don’t think she is perfect. I have stated that often but you are so very angry at me that you refuse to listen.
  
  I objected to Vale Math because he fell for the right wing media portrayal and attacked Hillary Clinton. Was I upset? Of course — if Vale Math, who I respect, got fooled and didn’t bother to read, what hope does Hillary have of ever convincing Americans who aren’t nearly as interested in reading as Vale Math?
  
  I have NEVER attacked you for criticizing Hillary Clinton on the issues. But if you repeat the right wing talking points saying she is corrupt I will call both of you out on it because you don’t have a shred of evidence that Hillary is blowing off the concerns of working people who are attracted to Trump as Vale Math keeps claiming.
  
  The irony is that I agree with many of your criticisms of Hillary on the issues. But I base my opinions on real facts which is why I also defended Rafe Esquith when I saw people attacking him based on facts not in evidence and trumped up characterizations that, like Hillary Clinton, were used to smear someone when the evidence wasn’t there.
  
  Now maybe you have changed your mind and now believe Rafe Esquith is as much of a child abusing money grubbing teacher as Hillary is a corrupt and money grubbing politician. Maybe there is now evidence that convinced you of Rafe’s sexual abuse of children and maybe someday there will be evidence that convinces me of Hillary’s pure evil and corruption. But until that day, I will continue to defend both of them. That does NOT mean I think they are perfect. I didn’t vote for Hillary in the primary and I know her flaws just like Rafe is obviously flawed. There is a difference between flawed and evil and I’m sorry you hate when I point it out.
  
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Ellen Lubic says:

September 11, 2016 at 4:58 pm

Below, to support my comments re how insulting and redundant NY Parent is…in the part about our respected Vale Math…she again repeats that he is “fooled into thinking”…and…”Hillary has not done exactly what you (he) wanted her to do”…so Vale Math is what? a traitor by “believing the media”?

I have always found Math Vale/Vale Math to be a careful and erudite thinker whose comments I learn from. I am incensed at this person in NY who keeps battering those of us who disagree with her by saying “we are fooled”…what trite garbage. The people who read and post on this blog are generally the most informed, and are not “fooled” by media…IMO.

This is the same hyperbole that NY Parent used to excoriate me, and others, who have carefully followed the Clintons over the past 40 years of their being in the public arena. We are all intelligent and highly educated people, and we are not fooled by media, particularly current reports…but rather many of us are educators and teach government. It has become a real waste of time to read this, NY Parent. You are the one who needs to broaden your perspective by learning more about the Clintons and more about how our government works vis a vis how it was designed to work.

Have you done a study of Hillary as attorney for Monsanto? As attorney for Eli Broad? Of Obama appointing the VP of Monsanto at head of the FDA? Of Obama appointing the devout Evangelist at head of the health of all Americans, even the women, and he a true believer in NEVER abortions. Hillary keeps attaching herself to the Obama era decisions. Many of us find that appalling. Instead of toadying she should disavow some of this most egregious stuff…like Obama/Arne/King and charters. Like Common Core. Like really promising to negotiate with Big Pharma to benefit consumers, not Wall Street. I could fill this page with suggestions, as could many of us who harkened to Bernie.

Posted minutes ago above…..you write the same insults to our intelligence. Who made you the only person here who knows all things at all times? What arrogance….

“Vale Math,

I am the person whom you refer to as a “rabid Hillary supporter” and I’m sorry if it seemed I was attacking you. I was frustrated that you were blaming Hillary and not the media. And I pointed out that if you – a smart, engaged voter — had been fooled into thinking that Hillary had not done exactly what you wanted her to do, then what hope does she have. You bought into the media characterization. She had said exactly what you asked her to say and spoke the absolutely truth. (I guess you can argue whether it’s half Trump voters, 30%, 40% or 60%, but it is a large number — I know because my relatives who vote for Trump spew exactly the same hatred for those groups and nothing is going to change their minds.)”

*****Wake up in NY…the media is not responsible for the decisions that Hillary actually made over the past 40 years. Neither Vale Math, Joel, Gordon, Catherine, nor I, are “fooled” by the media. I am voting for Hillary despite her some of her record that I find terrible, and I do not need to reconstruct history to make her into a heroine to make this vote.

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- NYC public school parent says:
  
  September 11, 2016 at 7:24 pm
  
  Ellen Lubic,
  
  Vale Math was fooled by the media account of what Hillary Clinton said. He admitted it. Hillary actually made a speech doing exactly what he criticized her for not doing. But the media took the quote out of context to make it seem as if she wasn’t.
  
  I only say you are fooled when you post things that are not true or are mischaracterized and exaggerated.
  
  That’s why I did in the case of Rafe Esquith, too. I felt that posters on here were fooled by mischaracterizations in the media and not paying attention to the facts. I did NOT claim he was perfect, just like I do not claim Hillary Clinton is perfect. I am saying, criticize her for real issues. I probably agree with you about many of those criticisms.
  
  Unlike you, I don’t look at the totality of Hillary Clinton’s life and see a woman who will happily throw over the most vulnerable Americans to serve those with power. I don’t. I could see flaws with Bernie and flaws with Hillary, and I still voted for Bernie Sanders.
  
  I will continue to call you out when you use right wing talking points with no evidence to attack Hillary. And I will continue to agree with you when you make legitimate criticisms of her.
  
  And I have a thick skin, so feel free to keep attacking and attacking me. I will STILL support your views when I agree (as with Rafe Esquith and some of your legitimate criticisms of Hillary) and I will continue to point out the flaws in what you say when I feel you are making claims based on right wing talking points. And when I say you are “fooled” when you repeat something in the media that isn’t true, it is because I think highly enough to assume you would not intentionally lie about something that you knew to be false.
  
  I don’t want to “convince” you to vote for Hillary Clinton. You need to decide for yourself and if you truly are convinced of even half the constant characterizations of her you keep insisting are true, why would you vote for her? I never claimed Hillary was different than Obama (although I hold out hope she will be at least little better). So I don’t blame her for Obama’s decisions yet, but if you want to argue she will be the same as Obama, I would never say you were wrong. To me, that isn’t enough to say she is too scary to vote for.
  
  We are on the same side – as we probably are regarding Rafe Esquith. I don’t like people making dishonest judgements not based on facts, which is why I don’t like when the media presents a situation in a way to fool all but the most careful readers into thinking there is something there. It happened in the NY Times reporting by Judith Miller in the run up to the Iraq War. It happened with how the media portrayed Al Gore. And it happened with Hillary Clinton.
  
  By the way, I feel very confident Bernie Sanders himself would find the reporting of Hillary’s so called denunciation of all Trump reporters to be terrible. He has continued to say over and over again that Hillary Clinton is not the evil person the media portrays, even though he disagrees with her on the issues.
  
  Unless you think Bernie is a liar, maybe you will think about that. I will repeat for what seems like the 100th time: I am not a “rabid” Hillary supporter. I don’t agree with all her positions and I wish she would be more forceful in her support for the liberal ideals that Barack Obama threw under the bus. And I believe the media’s characterization of her as a lying, corrupt, money-hungry traitor is not just wrong, but could very easily cause our country to be led by someone who does not believe in democracy and thanks to an outrageously terrible media, may have the “popular support” to get rid of it altogether.
  
  And I am near tears thinking that people as smart as Vale Math are so easily fooled by right wing talking points turned into front page NY Times articles.
  
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  - Ellen Lubic says:
    
    September 12, 2016 at 2:18 am
    
    You see yourself as the only one who understands all issues. And you twist others comments to suit your own end. You put words in my mouth like “corrupt” that I have not used, and say I use the Right Wing agenda when I list facts like who Hillary has worked for…all provable…all online. Again, you do this to suit your own purpose. I find you intelligent but rather unhinged, so will no longer engage with you.
    
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  - NYC public school parent says:
    
    September 12, 2016 at 12:47 pm
    
    Ellen Lubic,
    
    I don’t object to you posting facts like who Hillary worked for and I never attacked you for doing so. I am glad you are bringing those out.
    
    I only objected when you repeated right wing talking points. I objected when Vale Math used those talking points to attack Hillary.
    
    You are twisting my comments to suit your own end. I don’t know why. You keep characterizing me as a knee-jerk Hillary supporter when I am very sympathetic to some of your reasons for not liking her.
    
    If you can find me one time that I attacked you when you used facts about who Hillary worked for, I will be surprised. That’s not what I would do but maybe I made that mistake. If so, I would apologize.
    
    I don’t claim to “understand all issues”! You keep insulting me when I have done you the courtesy of complimenting you.
    
    The only thing I understand is that if people who keep repeating the right wing talking points that Hillary is the most dishonest candidate in history, Trump will win.
    
    If you have any respect for Bernie Sanders anymore you will understand that you can tell people to stop criticizing Hillary for non-issues while still encouraging them to criticize her for real issues.
    
    You are looking for enemies where there is none. I will STILL support you when you post something I agree with. I’m sorry you believe my desire for an honest discussion is “unhinged”. That’s what you were called when you supported Rafe Esquith. You were unhinged for supporting someone who abused children. Did you like being called that? Did you find it as nasty as I did?
    
    I will continue to support the good work you do and disagree with you at times. And no doubt you will continue to attack me and call me unhinged. Thank you for being such a kind person.
    
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  - dianeravitch says:
    
    September 12, 2016 at 2:16 pm
    
    I am unashamed to say that I like Hillary. I don’t think she is guilty of 99% of the charges leveled by right vast rightwing conspiracy.
    I probably won’t like what she does in education, although I feel sure she will not support vouchers, like Trump.
    She will probably pick people I don’t agree with.
    But they will be intelligent and reasonable people.
    We will be able to dissent.
    We won’t hear the jackboots in the background or worry about the white nationalists shutting us down.
    
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  - NYC public school parent says:
    
    September 12, 2016 at 3:59 pm
    
    Diane, when I read comments here — even the ones by people who grudgingly agree they will vote for the dishonest, lying crook Hillary because she isn’t Trump — I see how Trump will win this election.
    
    The left’s repetition of the alt-right’s characterization of Hillary is playing right into their hands. She lies more than any politician in history, including Nixon. She only cares about money. Same as Donald Trump. As as long as most people have a choice to vote for a liar or a liar, they might as well vote for the liar that’s going to “stick it to the man.”
    
    If the left had followed the lead of the man they claim to admire — Bernie Sanders — they would have understood how to strongly criticize Hillary’s policy choices without turning her into the alt-right’s symbol of the most lying, corrupt, greedy politician in history who will sell your kid if someone pays her enough.
    
    Instead every single endorsement of Hillary comes with the caveat that “of course she’s a lying crook” and the alt right is laughing all the way to the white house. They know those endorsements are helping Donald, not Hillary. If you are going to get a lying crook, might as well get one who isn’t part of the system. Hillary is just like Donald.
    
    When I hear some people saying “well Hillary has to tell them what she is going to do for them”, I believe they missed the bigger picture.
    
    It doesn’t matter what Hillary says or does. It doesn’t matter what she promises. She is a liar and corrupt so why should anyone believe a word she says. That’s where Karl Rove and Roger Ailes played the left beautifully and yes, made them fools. Bernie didn’t make his supporters into fools, but Roger Ailes and company sure did succeed in making some of them — and media — play right into their hands. And if people don’t start waking up and understand how dangerous this is, we will have President Trump. Maybe he won’t be as bad as I fear he would be, but given his success in manipulating the media for the last year, I won’t be surprised if he is even worse. Goebbels could not have done a better job shaping this election for Trump.
    
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  - dianeravitch says:
    
    September 12, 2016 at 9:35 pm
    
    NYC Public School Parent, agreed.
    
    Trump’s strategy is to brand his opponent. If he says “Lying Ted” or “Crooked Hillary” often enough, the mud sticks. The alt-right is shaping the narrative. The difference between Hillary and Trump is night and day. She’s experienced and knowledgable. He is crude, vulgar, and ignorant.
    
    A friend who is a historian wrote today and said, “Trump is the worst candidate for president in American history.” I agree.
    
    The thought occurred to me today, “Which candidate would I rather have dinner with?” I knew at once. Hillary would be interesting, fun, human. She would listen. Donald would declaim, boast about how rich he is, would never listen. It’s all about him.
    
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  - flos56 says:
    
    September 12, 2016 at 9:46 pm
    
    Remember the vote in Great Britain? And how did that work out for them?
    
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