A downside of having a regular column that runs on Thursdays is that this consigns the commentator to a position of having to come up with both relevant and entertaining fare for Thanksgiving Day commentaries. Since this is a time when one would hope that most Americans are engaging in something more meaningful than reading political commentary, a certain internal conflict can arise.
I've never believed in crafting "throw away" pieces for times when readership might be down for whatever reason, but Thanksgiving Day topics still provide for some ambivalence on my part. Barring a dramatic news story breaking within hours of my deadline, the perennial question is generally: Should I address something light and thematic vis-Ã -vis the holiday at hand, or something reflecting a newsworthy item of particular interest to my readers?
This time around, I decided to do both. Sort of.
Just over a year after the 2016 general election, I would say that Americans most definitely have something to be thankful for in having dodged the bullet of a Hillary Clinton presidency. Perhaps it is having engaged in such in-depth coverage of the Obama administration over the preceding eight years that made the indelible impression on me with regard to Clinton's malevolence. Perhaps it was my having been in a position to become aware of each and every nefarious act involving Hillary Clinton during that period. In any case, this knowledge imparted the certainty that a second Clinton administration would probably have been even more lawless and amoral than the Obama administration.
Hillary Clinton served as the 67th U.S. secretary of state under Obama from 2009 to 2013, a position likely negotiated with the Obama camp in trade for Democratic delegates who intended to support Clinton during the 2008 race. This was a period during which U.S. foreign policy became the political equivalent of a sideshow exhibit. Our allies were betrayed and disrespected, and the Obama administration cozied up to some of our most dedicated enemies.
Under Obama and Clinton, the balance of power between NATO allies and Russia was sabotaged; in Ukraine, the Obama administration supported nationalist neo-Nazis against more Russia-friendly factions. With his 2009 "apology tour," Obama himself telegraphed his intention to essentially defang the U.S. with regard to broadcasting power abroad.
Israel, our strongest ally in the Middle East, became the beleaguered stepchild whom the evil stepmother ceaselessly abused. After catalyzing the 2010 Arab Spring, the Obama-Clinton State Department and intelligence agencies oversaw Egypt, Libya, Syria, Iraq and other predominantly Islamic nations in the Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa cast into a realm of chaos from which they have yet to emerge. Tens of thousands were gruesomely killed, maimed, raped, and pressed into slavery as a direct result of U.S. foreign policy under Obama and Clinton.
Weapons and training were clandestinely provided to "vetted Syrian rebels" who later turned out to be ISIS, and I have suggested on more than one occasion that the notorious "stand down" order that consigned U.S. intelligence personnel to death on Sept. 11, 2012, in Benghazi, Libya, may have originated with Clinton herself.
Last week, Attorney General Jeff Sessions directed senior federal prosecutors to investigate Clinton's oversight of the sale of 20 percent of America's uranium supply to Russia and other alleged unlawful dealings related to the Clinton Foundation. In a recent interview with the iconic communist publication Mother Jones, however, Clinton claimed that this issue had already been "debunked," which probably references past softball coverage by the establishment press. Clinton intimated that the Trump administration's deportment as regards this matter was that of "some dictatorship, some authoritarian regime where political opponents are going to be unfairly, fraudulently investigated. ..."
This appraisal, to anyone who has been paying attention, will far more resemble the administration in which Clinton formerly served than the current one.
The fact that even as a young political power couple, Bill and Hillary Clinton were always and only about the cultivation of power and money is old hat to many of us, but even in light of the grudging acceptance many voters have over politicians' tendency to act with marginal ethics in order to enrich themselves, the Clintons are monsters. Their decades-long affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood – sworn enemies of the West and a wellspring of Islamic terrorist groups – almost certainly contributed to their vast wealth, despite claims of being near-destitute when Bill left the White House in 2001.
It is the Clintons' almost reckless focus on amassing money that has occasionally tripped them up, however, even if no real consequences have been meted out as yet.
Considering the breadth and sheer number of the Obama administration's crimes and Clinton's crimes as secretary of state, many are stunned that the Trump Department of Justice did not more promptly pursue those issues. Despite the evidence at hand, we are now being subjected to preposterous denials on Hillary Clinton's part, as well as (for example) the victimized bleating of former Obama surrogates like Lois Lerner, the disgraced former IRS official who illegally targeted conservative nonprofits for investigation but who now wants a federal court to keep her testimony in those cases sealed in perpetuity. Lerner and a former IRS deputy recently made the exceedingly dubious assertion that this request is due to fear of death threats and potential harm to their families if related documents are made public.
Such attitudes serve to highlight the shameless elitism on the part of these foul creatures, as well as the cavalier view they hold as regards dismantling the rule of law – and of course, our liberties. Thus, it is quite reasonable to presume that having attained the presidency, the monumentally rapacious, megalomaniacal, malignant narcissist that is Hillary Clinton would have taken her election as a mandate to outdo her predecessor and former boss as the ultimate criminal in chief.