What has been Hillary Clinton’s greatest weakness? What has been the one thing that has allowed Donald Trump to hang around like a bad case of MRSA? Perceptions that she is hiding a bunch of rotten corpses in her closet. Sure, the media blow things out of proportion and they are scandal hungry, but it’s not just the media. They tried to find scandals on Obama, but they just weren’t there. The Clintons, however, give the media plenty of ammo. And when you have a history of concealing and stonewalling the public, it makes some of the wildest conspiracy theories seem actually believable. We can now expect conspiracy theories about her health to remain throughout the election. We can also expect the public to take the other conspiracy theories a lot more seriously.
I know that’s not what the progressive diehards want to believe, and believe you me, I don’t like writing it, but as I said: you will see.
piffle, I think you have not hanged around very long in this site, I do remember that many progressives and liberals here already know what the republicans will attempt to do with any Democratic president.
This only becomes a problem for her if she is not telling the truth about the pneumonia. As of now, I don’t see any reason to suspect she is hiding something. Woe unto her, though, if she is. I suspect there’s going to be a whole lot of sleuthing going on over the next few weeks trying to uncover something. But once we have the first debate under our belts, everyone will have something else to kvetch about.
It’s fun watching all you Trumpistas trying to make yourselves feel better about the fact that your orangutan is going to go down in one of the biggest electoral defeats in US history. Rave on, delusionals! Sane people will get the last laugh in November.
As opposed to that bastion of Truth, birther-in-chief Donald Trump? Yes, I consider her campaign far more trustworthy than his, even as much as they have lied and dissembled.
Trump was there, a few tens of feet from Clinton as I read. But I don’t think leaving a service or ceremony if you feel ill enough to basically collapse on your way out would be seen as disrespectful by anyone reasonable. That’s not the issue here.
OTOH the idea ‘who GAS what the dead of 911 think?’ would not be a good one for someone running a national political campaign, as opposed to random snarky internet posters. But I might assume you’re not really serious on that one and just saying the ‘disrespect’ angle is phony in this case which I agree with.
This is like a lot of things. There’s no way it’s going to change the opinion of people who are absolutely opposed to Trump. Such people are going to rationalize Clinton’s collapse (it really wasn’t a ‘stumble’) and belatedly revealed pneumonia diagnosis as nothing. And it’s a matter of opinion and impression, so they aren’t ‘wrong’ per se. But there’s enough undecided (either to vote or who to vote for) to still swing the election. And if you’re undecided, a show of physical weakness is not good, that’s political reality. And it will continue to be a problem if either she has to become significantly less visible resting or ends up coughing a lot in the debates. I don’t see how anyone’s crystal ball is clear enough to be sure that won’t be the case and won’t have a serious negative impact on her chances (same for the opposite, no way to say ‘she lost the election today’).
Nate Silver produces interesting stuff, reasonable to argue the best of such stuff. But those models ‘probabilities’ are just outputs of volatility/correlation matrices based on historical outcomes relative to poll results in different states, and historical trends and factors (how is the economy, etc) with a basically normal distribution type assumption. They tell you zero about the actual probability Clinton’s health problem seriously affecting this election. And having pneumonia at 68 is a fairly serious health issue, not in terms of likely death, but in terms of carrying on a grueling campaign and appearing completely well and strong as swing voters are going to tend to expect/demand.
IMO, that’s not the real damage that was done today. The real damage done here is that she basically confirmed a conspiracy theory.
Does anybody not actually fucking see the danger here?
This is on the heels of basically having been called out by the FBI director and having to basically say “Well yeah I lied about that too - but so what?”
I mean, Hillary is not just unlikable anymore, she’s got zero credibility. And the conspiracy theorists, the Alex Jones’ of the world actually became somewhat credible…which is a terrifying thought.
She basically proved that the conspiracy theorists were right.
Do I think that it’s a fatal mistake? No, it’s not. Trump could still do something off-the-charts stupid, like insult a child with Down’s syndrome. He could have a disastrous debate performance (preferably two or three). But this is serious damage she’s inflicted upon herself. Make no mistake about it.
and her doctor cleared her to go out on the campaign trail, and they’ve known and tried to hide it, and they went to Chelsea’s apartment (with a small child there) instead of the hospital.
This all smells like more Clinton crime family BS.
Now she has to take several days off the campaign trail in order to stick with this cover story. They will probably ask that she be allowed to sit for the debates too.
I think you’re wrong about what’s happening here. I’m not seeing anyone here who wants Trump to win. The fact is, many of us are quite upset that this situation will probably take center stage in all Trumps campaign ads between now and November. Stephen Bannon is going to make sure of that. If someone tell a big enough lie, enough times, even sane people will start believing it.
Hehe. Punditry. Nice one. Who am I punditing for again? But i do see a bunch of people who already can’t grasp the fact that some people will actually vote for Trump, that a significant number of people not decided and that the election is far from over who can’t see how bad this looks. Being seen as weak can be fatal. Trump was trying to make her health a campaign issue. Now it’s front and center.
Beyond the polling issues lets just talk about the physical reality. I’m sure she has pneumonia as she is saying. When I last had pneumonia it knocked me on my ass for a week and I was in good shape and a hell of a lot younger. At this point of the campaign she can’t afford to take a week off. She can’t afford to appear weak. And she needs to take it easy and make sure she takes care of herself. Even though it is treatable she’s getting to the age where there can be serious complications if she doesn’t slow down and rest.
But I might assume you’re not really serious on that one and just saying the ‘disrespect’ angle is phony in this case which I agree with.