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  • Hillary post-mortem

    http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign...d-by-bickering
    Clinton campaign plagued by bickering

    By Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes - 04/12/17 06:00 AM EDT


    The following is an excerpt adapted from “Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign,” which will be released on April 18. Copyright © 2017 by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes. Published by Crown, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC.


    ‘We Got An Ass-Chewing’

    Hillary was so mad she couldn’t think straight. She was supposed to be focused on the prep session for that night’s Univision debate in Miami, but a potent mix of exhaustion and exasperation bubbled up inside.

    She’d been humiliated in the Michigan primary the night before, a loss that not only robbed her of a prime opportunity to put Bernie Sanders down for good but also exposed several of her weaknesses. How could she have been left so vulnerable? She knew — or at least she thought she did. The blame belonged to her campaign team, she believed, for failing to hone her message, energize important constituencies and take care of business in getting voters to the polls. And now, Jake Sullivan, her de facto chief strategist, was giving her lip about the last answer she’d delivered in the prep session.

    “That’s not very good,” Sullivan corrected.

    “Really?” Hillary snapped back.

    The room fell silent.

    “Why don’t you do it?”

    The comment was pointed and sarcastic, but she meant it. So for the next 30 minutes, there he was, pretending to be Hillary while she critiqued his performance.

    Every time the Yale lawyer and former high school debate champ opened his mouth, Hillary cut him off. “That isn’t very good,” she’d say. “You can do better.” Then she’d hammer him with a Bernie line.

    It wasn’t just Sullivan in her crosshairs. She let everyone on her team have it that day. “We haven’t made our case,” she fumed. “We haven’t framed the choice. We haven’t done the politics.”

    “She was visibly, unflinchingly pissed off at us as a group,” said one aide who was in the room for the humiliating scene. “And she let us know she felt that way.”

    Hillary had been up into the wee hours the night before, agitating over her loss. This is because we made poor choices about where we traveled, she thought. She emailed Robby Mook to tell him she believed she’d spent too much time in the cities of Detroit and Flint and not enough in the working-class white suburbs around them. Sensing just how angry she was, Mook responded by putting together a morning conference call so that Hillary could vent. But that didn’t settle her; if anything, it left her more perplexed and angry, as her debate-prep team witnessed firsthand.

    Her aides took the browbeating — one of several she delivered in person and on the phone that day — in silence. They had a lot of their own thoughts on what went wrong, some of which echoed Hillary’s assessment: her message was off for Michigan, and she had refused to go hard against trade; Mook had pinched pennies and failed to put organizers on the ground; the polling and analytics were a touch too rosy, meaning the campaign didn’t know Bernie was ahead; she had set up an ambiguous decisionmaking structure on the campaign; and she’d focused too heavily on black and brown voters at the expense of competing for the whites who had formed her base in 2008. The list went on and on.

    The underlying truth — the one that many didn’t want to admit to themselves — was the person ultimately responsible for these decisions, the one whose name was on the ticket, hadn’t corrected these problems, all of which had been brought to her attention before primary day. She’d stuck with the plan, and it had cost her.

    While the campaign projected a *drama-free tenor, it was reminiscent of other moments of frustration.
    Months earlier, Hillary Clinton turned her fury on her consultants and campaign aides, blaming them for a failure to focus the media on her platform.

    In her ear the whole time, spurring her on to cast blame on others and never admit to anything, was her husband. Neither Clinton could accept the simple fact that Hillary had hamstrung her own campaign and dealt the most serious blow to her own presidential aspirations.

    That state of denial would become more obvious than ever to her top aides and consultants during one conference call in the thick of the public discussion of her server. Joel Benenson, Mandy Grunwald, Jim Margolis, John Anzalone, John Podesta, Mook, Huma Abedin and Dan Schwerin were among the small coterie who huddled in Abedin’s mostly bare corner office overlooking the East River at the campaign’s Brooklyn headquarters. Hillary and Bill, who rarely visited, joined them by phone.

    Hillary’s severe, controlled voice crackled through the line first. It carried the sound of a disappointed teacher or mother delivering a lecture before a whipping. That back end was left to Bill, who lashed out with abandon. Eyes cast downward, stomachs turning — both from the scare tactics and from their own revulsion at being chastised for Hillary’s failures — Hillary’s talented and accomplished team of professionals and loyalists simply took it. There was no arguing with Bill Clinton.

    You haven’t buried this thing, the ruddy-cheeked former president rasped. You haven’t figured out how to get Hillary’s core message to the voters. This has been dragging on for months, he thundered, and nothing you’ve done has made a damn bit of difference. Voters want to hear about Hillary’s plans for the economy, and you’re not making that happen. Now, do your damn jobs.

    “We got an ass-chewing,” one of the participants recalled months later.

    Hillary came back on the line to close the lecture. It was hard to tell what was worse — getting hollered at by Bill or getting scolded by the stern and self-righteous Hillary. Neither was pleasant. You heard him, she admonished. “Get it straight.”

    Hillary Clinton’s revenge tour and Nikki Haley’s ascent

    Democratic nominee blames her loss on misogyny, but strong women are undeterred

    By Tammy Bruce - - Wednesday, April 12, 2017


    ANALYSIS/OPINION:

    Hillary Clinton has emerged from the woods determining that her election loss is everyone’s fault but her own. But even more surprising was that Donald Trump colluding with the Russians was suddenly no longer the main culprit; no, now it was hatred of women that fueled her loss. But this was no ordinary misogyny, it was the fault of women in particular who apparently hate other women. Or something.

    In fact, if there’s a misogynist in this story, it’s Hillary Clinton.

    Mrs. Clinton spoke about her forthcoming book to The New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof at the Women in the World Summit in New York, in which she will explain it was misogyny, the FBI’s James B. Comey, WikiLeaks and Russia that did her in.


    In other words, a book of fiction blaming everyone except herself.

    Mr. Kristof dutifully asked her about the impact misogyny had on the election, handing her the plate she required to indirectly riff on how those who did not vote for her are bad, mean people.

    “I’m currently writing a book where I spend a lot of time wrestling with this,” she noted. “As you might guess, I’ve thought about it more than once. I don’t know that there is one answer. It is fair to say that certainly misogyny played a role. That just has to be admitted.”

    At one point Mr. Kristof directly asks Mrs. Clinton who she blames for her loss. Her simple answer confirms a mindset that has removed herself entirely from the equation, while placing everyone else at the fulcrum: “How much time do you have?”

    The fact of the matter is this: The people who didn’t vote for Hillary Clinton like women just fine, but they didn’t like one in particular — her. It was her patronizing sanctimony that repulsed people, yes, including women, during a campaign now returning as a charged-up revenge tour.

    Mrs. Clinton holds herself up as a lesson for girls and women in the damage misogyny can do. And she’s right, but the perpetrators are not the women who voted their conscience last year.

    The ultimate in misogyny is stripping women of their agency, of their self-worth. By excusing her self-inflicted failure on the deeds of others, Mrs. Clinton is telling women nothing they do matters; their choices are irrelevant; their own decisions are meaningless. In Hillary’s world, women are at the mercy of the environment, like a piece of driftwood in the sea.

    And yet this woman, victimized by so much, still insists she coulda, woulda, shoulda, been president.

    Are women impacted by the actions of others? Of course we are. Our lives are more complex and the issues we face at home and in the workplace must be continually challenged. Women who succeed recognize that it is our choices that make the difference on both what we offer and what we overcome.

    Instead, Mrs. Clinton relies on old feminist tropes, unable to face her own failures. She took for granted her base of support. She presumed she was owed the votes of a certain type of person and then felt comfortable ignoring them. She ran a campaign of vengeance and entitlement, while promoting an agenda that would further the economic destruction of the country and ignored our increasingly perilous national security.

    Hillary Clinton lost because she’s Hillary Clinton. She lost because she never set foot in Wisconsin. She lost because she lied. She lost because of her horrible judgment and a resentment of, well, everyone.

    She lost because she ran a campaign where she was the one who was to be elevated and lauded, when that is usually reserved for the American electorate.

    She made herself the point, when the point was the United States. She lost because, like most politicians, she viewed the American people as obstacles to overcome, not people to get to know.

    As Hillary was rolling out her revenge tour last week, there was another woman emerging as the breakout star of the Trump administration. Nimrata Randhawa (also known as Nikki Haley), our ambassador to the United Nations. Mrs. Haley was schooling the world body and U.N. Security Council specifically about the horrors of the Syrian chemical weapons attack on opponents of President Bashar Assad’s regime.

    Mrs. Haley, a former governor of South Carolina with no international diplomatic experience, was viewed suspiciously when first named to the post. Critics, including this columnist, were concerned about her lack of a resume on the serious issues besetting the world. How could someone, with no background at all in international politics and diplomacy, handle the pit that is the U.N.?

    Those concerns no longer exist after her virtuoso handling of an international crisis, replete with chemical weapons, mass murder, terrorist groups, Russia and Iran. Mrs. Haley was an iron fist in a velvet glove. She did not bend, she controlled the environment, and led.

    We can all presume there is an overwhelming amount of misogyny at the U.N. Mrs. Haley is likely dealing with it every day, and yet everyone at the U.N. now knows who is in charge. And it’s not the boys from Syria, Russia or Iran.

    If we’re looking for role models for women, the best choice is to look to women who find their power inside, own their choices and forge onward, not to those who insult us all by insisting we’re all victims, at the perpetual mercy of others.

    • Tammy Bruce, author and Fox News contributor, is a radio talk show host.
    Last edited by TopHatter; 12 Apr 17,, 16:41.
    To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

  • #2
    My god, that was beautiful. I might actually have to buy that book, a complete first for me.
    “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

    Comment


    • #3
      That scene is right out of Veep.

      Comment


      • #4
        Sanders on Clinton's 'I'm with her' slogan: 'It's so phony'

        By Rebecca Savransky - 04/18/17 07:19 AM EDT 76comments

        Sanders on Clinton's 'I'm with her' slogan: 'It's so phony'

        © Getty Images

        http://www.news.com.au/world/north-a...b9a7c8a61cc757




        Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) called former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton's "I'm with her" slogan "phony," according to a new book.

        In "Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton's Doomed Campaign," The Hill's Amie Parnes and Sidewire's Jonathan Allen write that members of the Clinton campaign reached out to Sanders aides in late September to share a script of an ad they wanted the Vermont senator to record.

        In the ad, Sanders would tout the former Democratic nominee for her education, healthcare and minimum wage proposals.



        And he would talk about how her former rival, Donald Trump, was wrong about climate change and the economy.At the end of the script were the words: "I'm with her."

        “It’s so phony!” Sanders said. “I don’t want to say that.”



        Sanders did not use the slogan in the ad.



        The Clinton campaign eventually decided not to use the ad on television, after learning that voters had some doubts about whether the Vermont senator fully supported Clinton.




        “People felt that it was him delivering his message, not Hillary’s,” said one Clinton aide familiar with focus group responses.


        "People didn’t feel that it was an authentic pitch for her and what she wanted to do. It even had some backlash in folks saying that he’s not really supporting her.”



        The ad was not used on television, but some of the shorter takes of Sanders were used online.



        Sanders endorsed Clinton in July after running a long campaign against her.
        Presidential

        Hillary Clinton apologized to Obama on election night


        Published April 18, 2017
        · New York Post


        Study: Hillary ran one of the worst campaigns in history


        Hillary Clinton had to eat humble pie twice on election night.

        Clinton apologized to President Obama for her bruising loss — right after calling Trump to offer him “congratulations,” according to a new book chronicling her 2016 presidential bid called “Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign.”

        “Mr. President, I’m sorry,” she said, according to a Washington Post’s review of the book due out Tuesday.

        The White House urged Clinton to concede as Trump claimed battleground states — some by slim margins — because Obama wanted to avoid a messy recount.

        “You need to concede,” Obama told Clinton directly, later repeating the instruction to her campaign chairman John Podesta for good measure.

        The directive came after Clinton ignored previous messages from White House staff to throw in the towel.

        She conceded the loss publicly the next morning.

        http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017...ion-night.html
        Last edited by troung; 18 Apr 17,, 13:42.
        To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

        Comment


        • #5
          Mike Allen
          2 hrs ago

          Inside the Hillary Hindenburg

          A new book by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes, "Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton's Doomed Campaign," makes it clear that whatever you thought was happening in Brooklyn at Clinton's campaign headquarters, it was worse. One of the kickers:

          Hillary's top aides were as miserable as midlevel bureaucrats in an agency with no clear plans.

          15 highlights 348 words


          More highlights from the book:
          1.Jon Favreau, brought in to help with the announcement speech, "thought Clinton's campaign was reminiscent of John Kerry's, where he had gotten his start in 2004 — a bunch of operatives who were smart and accomplished ... but weren't united by any common purpose larger than pushing a less-than-thrilling candidate into the White House. ... Frustrated with the process and the product, Favreau dropped out."
          2."Some of Hillary's aides longed for her to find her own David Axelrod."
          3.Huma Abedin "couldn't be counted on to relay constructive criticism to Hillary without pointing a finger at the critic."
          4.Campaign manager Robby Mook "had the most reason to be nervous about his job. Longtime Clinton confidants outside the campaign had been agitating for months for Hillary to get rid of him."
          5.Bill Clinton's chief of staff, Tina Flournoy, "mentioned to him and a small group of his aides that she was going to see the Rolling Stones in Europe. 'Mick Jagger used to give my mother-in-law wet dreams,' Bill offered."
          6.Hillary to longtime confidant Minyon Moore, during the primaries: "I don't understand what's happening in the country."
          7."The one person with whom [Hillary] didn't seem particularly upset: herself."
          8."[T]he mercenaries ... feared — appropriately — that unflattering words about Hillary or the strategy would be repeated at their own expense by those who hoped to gain Hillary's favor."
          9."[S]he liked to set up rival power centers within and outside her operation."
          10.President Obama thought her handling of the server scandal "amounted to political malpractice."
          11."In hallmark fashion, Hillary had set up two separate and isolated teams to write her convention speech."
          12."Worried about leaving his supersecret [debate] prep materials in an Uber, [Philippe] Reines [who played Trump] bought a heavy-duty tether so that he could lock his briefcase to his waist. He actually acquired two different versions — one of which was originally designed for bondage enthusiasts."
          13.Hillary to an aide during the general: "I know I engender bad reactions from people."
          14.Bill Clinton on election night: "It's like Brexit ... I guess it's real."
          15.Hillary to Obama after calling Trump to concede: "Mr. President, I'm sorry."
          https://www.axios.com/inside-the-hil...366467487.html
          To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

          Comment


          • #6
            It is tempting to buy, kind of a "lessons learned" for next time, but the overarching message is probably obvious: "don't pick a complete narcissist as a candidate unless they have charisma by the bucketload"
            In the realm of spirit, seek clarity; in the material world, seek utility.

            Leibniz

            Comment


            • #7
              she can't help herself.
              Hillary Blames America First

              by Jonah Goldberg June 2, 2017 12:00 AM @JonahNRO

              She acts like a sprinkler system of excuses for her 2016 loss, spraying them all around. In one of the great scenes in American cinema, Jake Blues (John Belushi) of the Blues Brothers explains — at gunpoint — to his ex-fiancée (Carrie Fischer) why he left her at the altar. “I ran out of gas! I had a flat tire! I didn’t have enough money for cab fare! My tux didn’t come back from the cleaners! An old friend came in from out of town! Someone stole my car! There was an earthquake! A terrible flood! Locusts! It wasn’t my fault! I swear to God.” I kept thinking of that scene as I watched Hillary Clinton on Wednesday run through all of the reasons why she lost the 2016 presidential race. At a conference hosted by Recode, Mrs. Clinton said, “I take responsibility for every decision I make — but that’s not why I lost.”


              The real reasons for her defeat include, but are not limited to: FBI director James Comey’s handling of the investigation into her e-mail server, the institutional ineptitude of the DNC, Facebook, Macedonian “fake news” websites, real news (in the form of unfair coverage from the New York Times and other mainstream outlets), voter suppression in Wisconsin, low-information voters, the billionaire Mercer family, and the deep-seated sexism of the American people. (Now, from one perspective — i.e., hers — she’s right. When you lose a very close presidential race almost any factor can be isolated and credited with the reason for your defeat. It’s like a football game that ends in a squeaker. Every fumble and interception can be highlighted in isolation as the reason one team lost or another team won. But it’s rare to hear losing coaches explain away their losses by singling out the individual mistakes of the players. That’s because they understand that you have to look at the game in its totality. Hillary Clinton got more votes than Donald Trump.

              But Trump won the Electoral College by squeezing a 10,000-vote margin of victory in Michigan, a 22,000-vote margin in Wisconsin, and a 46,000-vote margin in Pennsylvania. According to Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio, were it not for five counties — four in Florida and one in Michigan — Hillary Clinton would be president now. Rather than vent about “misogyny” or Macedonian masterminds, she would be on firmer ground by simply saying, “We lost because we didn’t put enough resources into Macomb County, Mich., and South Florida.” Rather than vent about ‘misogyny,’ Clinton would be on firmer ground by simply saying, ‘We lost because we didn’t put enough resources into Macomb County, Mich., and South Florida.’ But that doesn’t support Clinton’s martyr complex.

              Which is why she acts like a sprinkler system of excuses, spraying them all around. It doesn’t matter that she is to blame for many of her excuses. If she hadn’t ignored rules for handling classified information, Comey would never have needed to investigate her and the media wouldn’t have had that story to cover. If she discovered that the DNC’s data collection was so terrible — a claim the Democratic party’s own data guru describes as untrue, in profane and scatological terms — she should have compensated. And as for her whining about negative media coverage, it’s not like her opponent was lavished with praise from the Times. Perhaps the most ridiculous claim is that she lost because she’s a woman. Hillary Clinton has convinced herself she is an avatar for all womankind.

              Talking about her allegedly unfair treatment, she said, “And at some point it sort of bleeds into misogyny.” Male politicians get treated unfairly from time to time as well (you can look it up). Is that proof of anti-male sexism? Was her husband a victim of misandry? If Hillary Clinton earned one thing in her long and less than fruitful political career, it is this: the right to be criticized or praised on her own merits — or lack thereof. The East German poet Bertolt Brecht once wrote sardonically that when the government lost the faith of the people, “Would it not be easier in that case for the government to dissolve the people and elect another?” Hillary Clinton has been running for president for much of her adult life. She lost twice because, like Jake Blues, the electorate left her at the altar. If she had merely won among the voters who cast ballots for Donald Trump and Barack Obama, she’d have won. She didn’t, preferring to call many of them “deplorable.” Now she claims that many of them were sexist and ill-informed. I’d call her the Brecht Girl, but that would be cited as more proof of the misogyny that did her in. — Jonah Goldberg is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a senior editor of National Review. You can write to him by e-mail at [email protected]. Copyright © 2017 Tribune Content Agency, LLC

              Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/articl...bertolt-brecht
              DNC data guru denies Hillary Clinton's claim she "inherited nothing" from DNC
              http://www.cbsnews.com/news/dnc-data...hing-from-dnc/

              / REUTERSREUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

              Andrew Therriault, the former director of data science for the Democratic National Committee, said Hillary Clinton's claim that she "inherited nothing" from the DNC is totally off base.

              Earlier this week at a media and technology conference in California, Clinton claimed the Democratic Party didn't give her the data-related resources she needed, sparking a brutal response from Therriault on Twitter.

              "DNC data folks: today's accusations are f***ing bull****, and I hope you understand the good you did despite that nonsense," Therriault tweeted Wednesday in a series of tweets that have since been deleted but were captured by other news outlets.

              "Private mode be damned, this is too important," Therriault said in another tweet. "I'm not willing to let my people be thrown under the bus without a fight."

              Clinton's comments Wednesday resurfaced responses from her critics that Clinton still isn't owning her loss to now-President Donald Trump. Clinton she wasn't a "perfect" candidate, but that isn't why she lost, blaming everything from the Democrats' data operations to the media covering her email scandal like "Pearl Harbor."

              "I get the nomination, so I'm now the nominee of the Democratic Party," Clinton said at the coding event. "I inherit nothing from the Democratic Party. I mean, it was bankrupt. It was on the verge of insolvency. Its data was mediocre to poor, non-existent, wrong. I had to inject money into it."


              In her speech, Clinton also praised the Republican National Committee's operations and former RNC chairman -- now White House chief of staff -- Reince Priebus.

              The Republicans, Clinton said, "raised, best estimates are close to $100 million. They brought in their main vendors."

              Back in February, Therriault authored a Medium post titled, "We shouldn't blame data for bad campaign messaging," saying data is a campaign tool, not a campaign strategy.
              Last edited by troung; 02 Jun 17,, 19:28.
              To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

              Comment


              • #8
                Hillary Clinton is running again: Doug Schoen


                By Julia Limitone Published June 01, 2017 Election


                Hillary is back in the game, fmr. Clinton pollster Doug Schoen says
                Former Clinton pollster Doug Schoen on Hillary Clinton blaming everyone but herself for her election loss.


                Hillary Clinton is blaming everyone else but herself for her election loss to President Trump, but former Clinton pollster Doug Schoen says this is her way of gearing up for another run.

                “Even if it’s in only in her own mind… she is running,” Schoen told the FOX Business Network’s Stuart Varney.

                The longtime Democrat who worked for President Bill Clinton between 1994 and 2000 said Hillary “made it very clear’ at an event last week that “she’s back in the game,” but pointed out how her lack of self-responsibility for campaign mistakes is alarming.

                “This speech at Wellesley where she said she’s joining up with the resistance… she’s blaming everybody—it startles me she doesn’t blame herself. She’s not an introspective at all,” he said.

                In his opinion, a key to being a successful leader is understanding and admitting your failures. Schoen pointed out how Clinton was distraught over her loss, at first, but painted a different picture when they met.

                More from FOXBusiness.com
                • Hillary Clinton's entitlement doomed her campaign, 'Shattered' co-author says
                • Clinton email scandal damages U.S. ability to get intel: CIA’s Woolsey
                • Clinton, Obama are still in charge: Varney

                “What I saw last week when I was up close and personal with her was a woman who has come to blame everybody else—the Russians, Comey – everybody else except herself. So that allows her to go forward, it’s a narrative that works for her,” he said.

                Despite his views Schoen quipped Bill greeted him with a hug while Hillary was “chilly.”
                http://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/...ug-schoen.html
                To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

                Comment


                • #9
                  SUNDAY, JUN 4, 2017 06:00 AM EDT
                  Why can’t Hillary let it go? Donald Trump’s not the only one still obsessing over the election
                  DANIELLE RYAN


                  Why can't Hillary let it go? Donald Trump’s not the only one still obsessing over the election

                  Hillary Clinton may have finally lost the plot.

                  Last year’s defeated Democratic presidential candidate spoke to journalists Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg at the Code 2017 conference in California on Wednesday about the reasons for her election loss — and there is a whole lot to unpack.

                  I’ve never run for president, but I imagine political losses of the magnitude suffered by Clinton are very hard to get over — and not just for the candidate. I personally know many people who voted for her who are still wandering around in a state of disbelief. For diehard supporters, the loss hurts in a visceral way that lingers.

                  But there comes a point when you just have to accept reality — and Clinton herself seems to be having a tough time with that. The Code interview offers pretty broad insight into Clinton’s psyche, nearly seven months on from the election.

                  The conversation starts with Mossberg asking Clinton to name one major misjudgment — discounting any outside forces — that her campaign made and that she wishes she had done differently. It took Clinton 17 seconds to mention the word “Russians” — and a further 10 seconds to bring up the way her private email server was used against her. Keep in mind, this was after Mossberg asked her to name just one legitimate mistake she and her campaign made. She couldn’t do it.

                  Clinton has always believed she is the victim of vast conspiracies — and so the conversation continues pretty much in the same vein for another 75 minutes, with Clinton providing probably her most extensive list yet of reasons why she lost, which, naturally, had absolutely nothing to do with her.

                  Clinton really threw these guys under the bus. The data the Democratic National Committee provided to her campaign was “mediocre to poor, nonexistent, wrong,” she said.

                  But according to some of those data gurus who spoke to the Daily Beast, Clinton is plain wrong about that. John Hagner, who worked as national field director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, told the website: “The DNC is farming and what the campaign does is cooking. It’s hard to blame the farmer if the soufflé folds.”

                  A less eloquent version of the same sentiment came from Andrew Therriault, who had worked as the DNC’s director of data science. He called Clinton’s claim “fucking bullshit” on Twitter, adding that the data he had seen showed that crucial Rust Belt states like Michigan and Wisconsin were not looking “even close to safe,” but that Clinton’s team “thought they knew better.”

                  Fake news (and the Russians)

                  According to Clinton, the “vast majority” of news posted about her on Facebook was fake, because “1,000 Russian agents” were paid to make up stories about her. Obviously, it’s beyond dispute that there were plenty of crazy, fake news stories about Clinton during the campaign, but that it was the “vast majority” is hardly clear — and the claim of “1,000 Russian agents” was an unconfirmed report.

                  Clinton is also sure that the Russians “could not have known” how best to manipulate and weaponize information against her without being “guided” by the Trump campaign.

                  Twitter, too, Clinton said, has been “victimized” by “deliberate efforts to shape the conversation” — as if efforts to shape political narratives were some strange phenomenon that popped up in 2016 just to spite her.

                  WikiLeaks (and the Russians)

                  WikiLeaks dumped the John Podesta emails immediately after Donald Trump’s infamous “grab ’em by the pussy” tape leaked to the media. According to Clinton, this means that Julian Assange’s outfit and the Russian government are “the same thing.”

                  This accusation is linked to the suggestion that the Trump campaign was “guiding” the Russians by telling them when to release certain information. But would communication at that level really be necessary?

                  Let’s give the Russians some credit. If you’re intensely following an election and committed to engineering its outcome, it’s hardly rocket science to know when to drop a damaging piece of information. If Russia was really behind the hack-and-dump operation, Putin’s operatives probably didn’t need Trump to jump in and say “Hey, I’m in a tough spot, so now would be a great time to drop those Podesta emails!”

                  Aside from the matter of who leaked what, Clinton spends no time rehashing the actual content of the various leaks and is in complete denial that any of her emails could have hurt her. In fact, she says that everything in those communications was “run of the mill” campaign stuff.

                  Nor does she address the fact that former DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz was forced to resign over revelations that the party appeared to be working with Clinton to deny Bernie Sanders a fair shot at the nomination. Or the fact that CNN contributor (and later interim DNC head) Donna Brazile fed a debate question to Clinton’s campaign ahead of time.

                  These are all things Clinton could have raised when Mossberg asked her what misjudgments and mistakes she made along the way to her agonizing defeat. But, hey, maybe the Russians made them do it.

                  Sexism

                  Barack Obama was able to break the racial barrier because he is “an attractive man,” Clinton said. This peculiar comment seemed to imply that Clinton believes she could not break the gender barrier partly due to her appearance.

                  People, she said, have “a set of expectations about who should be president and what a president looks like.” Obama “broke that racial barrier — but you know, he’s a very attractive, good-looking man.”

                  Clinton also thinks it was sexist to use the fact that she was paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for Wall Street speeches against her. Men also got paid for speeches they made, so that was “unfairly used” to hurt her.

                  OK, fair enough: Clinton does get criticized more harshly for some of the same behavior as men, and no doubt there is plenty of sexism surrounding the physical appearance of women in politics. But let’s not feel too sorry for her when she’s pocketing hundreds of thousands of dollars to reassure Wall Street bankers that she holds both a “public and private position” on certain issues.

                  Netflix

                  Because Netflix has too many anti-Clinton documentaries.

                  “Go to Netflix and say you want to see a political documentary, eight of the top 10 — last time I checked a few weeks ago — were screeds against President Obama or me, or both of us.”

                  The strangest thing about this might be that Hillary Clinton is actually checking Netflix to see how many unflattering documentaries there are about her.

                  James Comey (and the mainstream media)

                  When then-FBI Director James Comey announced that the investigation into Clinton’s emails would be reopened, less than two weeks before the election, the media covered it “like it was Pearl Harbor” — “front pages everywhere, huge type, etc.”

                  Maybe they should have buried it somewhere in the back and used smaller font?

                  Assumptions

                  This one might be my favorite because it’s so lacking in self-awareness. Clinton complains that she was “the victim of a broad assumption” that she was going to win.

                  This is amazing, because no one was more certain of Clinton’s victory than Clinton and her staffers. They barely bothered to campaign in some states, convinced beyond doubt that they would go blue. The campaign organized an election-night fireworks display over the Hudson River, which it only canceled a day before voters went to the polls, when things were starting to look a bit dicey.

                  But even on Election Day, her aides were so sure of victory that, according to the New York Times, they popped Champagne on the campaign plane before the polls had even closed.

                  Hillary Clinton has officially jumped the shark with this interview. It’s time for an intervention in Chappaqua, because the longer she continues on like this, the more damage she’s going to do to her party.

                  Much as it may be therapeutic for Clinton herself, talking about Russia and Comey and sexism and WikiLeaks for the next God knows how long won’t help Democrats win back seats in Congress.

                  People rightly lampoon Trump for obsessing over the election like the child he is. Well, it’s been nearly seven months and Clinton is still going around acting as though she’s history’s greatest political martyr, regaling us with new reasons why none of the blame for anything that went wrong lies with her.

                  Democrats need to get their act together. They need to talk about policy and get serious about how to fight Trump on issues of far greater importance than how many bots are following him on Twitter. Hillary Clinton now claims to be part of the “resistance” to Trump, but she’s still fixated on herself.
                  ....
                  Last edited by TopHatter; 06 Jun 17,, 13:00.
                  To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Reality Winner and Russian election hacking

                    NSA contractor Reality Winner accused of leaking file on Russia election hacking

                    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...-hack-nsa-leak

                    Three days before Americans voted last November, Reality Winner joked with her sister online that Moscow’s efforts to influence the US presidential election could have an upside for her as a keen weightlifter.

                    “When we become the United States of the Russian Federation,” she said on Facebook, “Olympic lifting will be the national sport. Seven months later, Winner, 25, called home to Texas on Saturday to let her family know that the Russian hacking saga had ended up landing her in a far more serious situation.

                    “She said that she had been arrested by the FBI and that she couldn’t really talk about it,” her mother, Billie Winner-Davis, told the Guardian in a telephone interview. “I am still in shock.”

                    Prosecutors allege that last month, Winner, who was working for the defense contractor Pluribus International Corporation, printed an NSA document detailing how Russia had hacked a voting equipment vendor in Florida and was trying to breach local election systems right up until the days before November’s vote.

                    The Intercept reported on Monday that Russian military intelligence carried out a cyber-attack on at least one US voting software supplier and sent spear-phishing emails to more than a hundred local election officials days before the poll.

                    The hacking of senior Democrats’ email accounts during the campaign has been well chronicled, but vote-counting was thought to have been unaffected, despite concerted Russian efforts to penetrate it.

                    Her family rushed to Georgia for Winner’s first court appearance on Monday but remains confused. Winner-Davis said she was unaware that her daughter had allegedly already admitted, when questioned, to taking the top-secret document. Nor had she heard of the Intercept and she really did not know why Reality would have done it. “I never thought this would be something she would do,” Winner-Davis said. “I mean, she has expressed to me that she is not a fan of Trump – but she’s not someone who would go and riot or picket.”

                    Winner’s posts on social media over recent months suggest, however, that she, like many other Americans, had become increasingly agitated over some extraordinary developments in national politics. She posted disparagingly on Facebook about Donald Trump’s pledge to build a wall along the Mexican border, about his draconian criminal justice plans, and about his assault on the Environmental Protection Agency. In February, she referred to the president as “piece of shit”.


                    Winner was born in Texas in December 1991. She was raised in Kingsville, a small city in the south of the state, about 40 miles from Corpus Christi. She has a sister, Brittany, who is studying for a PhD in Pharmacology and Toxicology at Michigan State University and did not respond to an email.

                    Reality began working for Pluribus in Augusta, Georgia, in February this year, according to court filings. She previously served in the US air force since January 2013 and held a top-secret security clearance. Her mother said Reality had been a linguist for the air force. “She speaks the middle eastern languages – Farsi, Dari and Pashto,” said Winner-Davis, who laughed when asked if she had taught them to her daughter. “No, she did it all on her own,” she said.

                    Winner-Davis said that her daughter had joined the military soon after graduating from H M King high school. As well as being bright academically, she excelled in tennis and athletics. “But she had gotten a little tired of school,” said her mother, and decided against continuing with college. Winner appeared to be enjoying Augusta, posting photographs to Instagram of good meals she had eaten and videos of herself happily working out. She recently took a trip to Belize. Then her spell in Georgia was abruptly cut short over the weekend.

                    On Monday evening, her mother struggled to say whether her daughter’s alleged leak would constitute an act of bravery or a painful mistake. “I don’t know, I don’t know,” Winner-Davis said. “I don’t know what the hacking thing all means. Has it made a difference in the election? Who knows.” Her family knows little except that they are bewildered and concerned about the possible 10-year prison sentence that Winner could receive if convicted. “She’s a beautiful girl,” said her mother. “Everyone who meets her loves her, and she’s kind.”

                    = = = = =

                    Reality Leigh Winner Criminal Complaint

                    Reality Leigh Winner, an intelligence contractor, was charged with sending a classified report about Russia’s interference in the 2016 election to the news media, the Justice Department announced Monday, the first criminal leak case under President Trump. The announcement came about an hour after the national-security news outlet The Intercept published the apparent document, a May 5 intelligence report from the National Security Agency.
                    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...aint-Form.html

                    = = = = =

                    The original report, from The Intercept:

                    http://boingboing.net/2017/06/05/nyet.html
                    Trust me?
                    I'm an economist!

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Originally posted by troung View Post
                      Hillary Clinton now claims to be part of the “resistance” to Trump, but she’s still fixated on herself.
                      Narcissists usually are
                      “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        i'd say, "politicians usually are".

                        HRC was pretty much in the usual range of the politician-class narcissism (her real weakness is hubris). Obama was on the higher end. Romney was on the lower end.

                        our current POTUS narcissism level, on the other hand, the metaphor that comes to mind is like the Empire State Building next to some withered rabbits' pricks by comparison.

                        i understand why Hillary "can't let it go"; she's trying to salvage what remains of her legacy, seeing as how she not only lost twice, but lost to -Donald Trump-. it's a pretty sh*tty way to end a life's career.
                        Last edited by astralis; 06 Jun 17,, 13:53.
                        There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Originally posted by astralis View Post
                          i'd say, "politicians usually are".

                          HRC was pretty much in the usual range of the politician-class narcissism (her real weakness is hubris). Obama was on the higher end. Romney was on the lower end.

                          our current POTUS narcissism level, on the other hand, the metaphor that comes to mind is like the Empire State Building next to some withered rabbits' pricks by comparison.
                          No argument here.

                          Originally posted by astralis View Post
                          i understand why Hillary "can't let it go"; she's trying to salvage what remains of her legacy, seeing as how she not only lost twice, but lost to -Donald Trump-. it's a pretty sh*tty way to end a life's career.
                          Yeah, you're right. But it's almost worth having Cheeto Benito in the Oval Office just to see her and her supporters taken down a few notches. Almost.
                          “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            joe,

                            But it's almost worth having Cheeto Benito in the Oval Office just to see her and her supporters taken down a few notches
                            man, if you think HRC supporters are annoying, i gotta wonder if you've had the distinct...pleasure of meeting Sanders supporters, lol.
                            There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by astralis View Post
                              joe,
                              man, if you think HRC supporters are annoying, i gotta wonder if you've had the distinct...pleasure of meeting Sanders supporters, lol.
                              Oh I have indeed. I'm actually rather shocked at their relative non-reaction to the DNC conspiracy to keep Bernie off the ticket in favor of the latest Chosen One.
                              “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                              Comment

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