WAPost: the latest Clinton email story just is NOT a scandal

[pnwmom]

My personal opinion is that the press blows up stories like this to be "fair." Since they have so many negative stories of Trump that deserve front page placement, they take nothingburger stories of Hillary's and make them front page news.

But that isn't fair.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/08/23/the-latest-clinton-email-story-just-isnt-a-scandal/?utm_term=.745d0c0e374f

There’s a new round of “revelations” concerning Hillary Clinton’s time at the State Department today, and since it involves some people sending emails to other people, it gets wrapped up with that other story about Clinton. Are you ready for the shocking news, the scandalous details, the mind-blowing malfeasance? Well hold on to your hat, because here it is:

When Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State, many people wanted to speak with her.

Astonishing, I know.

Here’s the truth: every development in any story having to do with anything involving email and Hillary Clinton is going to get trumpeted on the front page as though it were scandalous, no matter what the substance of it actually is. I’ll discuss some reasons why in a moment, but we could have no better evidence than the treatment of this particular story.


SNIP

The second story is that Judicial Watch, an organization that has been pursuing Clinton for many years, has released a trove of emails it obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, emails that supposedly show how donors to the Clinton Foundation got special access, and presumably special favors, from Clinton while she was at State.

The only problem is that the emails in question reveal nothing of the sort. What they actually reveal is that a few foundation donors wanted access, but didn’t actually get it.

SNIP

But that doesn’t mean that any story touching on her emails deserves screaming headlines and dark insinuations, and this one certainly doesn’t. So why isn’t it on page A14 where it belongs? The most important reason is the oldest one: the “Clinton Rules,” which state that any allegation about Bill and/or Hillary Clinton, no matter how outlandish and no matter how thin the evidence for it, should be treated as serious and worthy of extended attention and unrestrained speculation. In 2016, that’s even more true for anything involving anybody’s emails.

[Thinkingabout]

1. Funny when the details are released the whole story blows up in the face of the

republicans who have attempted to disparage Hillary Clinton. Evidence goes against the scandals, when will they ever learn.

[Hortensis]

2. "a few foundation donors wanted access, BUT DIDN'T ACTUALLY GET IT."

Just wanted that repeated.

Thanks, PNWMom

[Tarheel_Dem]

3. But that won't stop the broadcast media from trying to help Trump make it a scandal. n/t

[JoePhilly]

4. TRump is supported by actual racists ... and that gets a pass.

People send Hillary emails ... and ... "How dare she get emails from those people!!!!!" :

There is one upside ... my millennial son ... huge Bernie supporter ... who also watches CNN and MSNBC ... is PISSED beyond belief.

I'm actually having to talk him down.

He's now a louder Hillary supporter than I am ... that's how pissed he is at the media's BS framing of these events.

[pnwmom]

5. That's wonderful to hear about! I hope there are millions of other young people

who are seeing what Hillary has been up against for the last few decades.

[JoePhilly]

6. YUP ... he and I talked a great deal in the primaries ...

... but I never tried to push him in any direction.

He voted for Obama in 2012, but that was easy. This is his first "real" election.

The only things he knew about Hillary were the media driven lies. But he watched the convention. And he learned more about Hillary. And he felt "better" about voting for her.

And now as he's learned more ... and as he listens to the media spin every non-event into a "scandal", he;s getting pissed.

So I explained to him that THAT nonsense has been going on since before he was born (93). He sees it now.

[pnwmom]

7. My Bernie-loving sons have come around, but not to the point where they're getting

mad at the stories on TV. But I'm not sure they're paying a lot of attention now that Bernie's out of the race -- and that's a shame.

Still, Hillary will have their votes, and that's something.

[JoePhilly]

9. agree ... get the votes no matter what ...

... my son has always been interested in politics, so he tries to follow it. He already knew that "everyone hates Hillary" long before the primaries. So she started behind. Bernie was unknown, sounded good, and had zero negatives from what my son knew.

But as we go forward ... he's seeing things he had not seen before. He's seeing the "new" attacks on Hillary. And he sees they are BS. Which caused him to have the "ah-ha" moment.

He'd never seen the actual attacks before ... he only knew the media's condensed bumper sticker versions of those attacks.

Now as he watches the latest nonsense attacks ... he is seeing the way those bumper stickers are "manufactured". Take a non-event, call it a "scandal" and then reduce the entire discussion such that the "BLANK scandal" becomes a totally new and separate thing from reality. A way to claim a bad thing happened without having to state what the bad thing actually was.

I also think he's pissed that he had been falling for it initially.

[pnwmom]

11. Did he watch the back to back conventions?

I thought Hillary's was so effective, and I appreciated that Bernie did his best to help pull people together.

[LiberalFighter]

15. Good to hear.

[Ghost Dog]

8. But, this doesn't involve emails, just the SoS's agenda

and Foundation accounts. Isn't this the heart of it:

Many donors to Clinton Foundation met with her at State

... At least 85 of 154 people from private interests who met or had phone conversations scheduled with Clinton while she led the State Department donated to her family charity or pledged commitments to its international programs, according to a review of State Department calendars released so far to The Associated Press. Combined, the 85 donors contributed as much as $156 million. At least 40 donated more than $100,000 each, and 20 gave more than $1 million...

... (T)he frequency of the overlaps shows the intermingling of access and donations, and fuels perceptions that giving the foundation money was a price of admission for face time with Clinton...

... The 154 did not include U.S. federal employees or foreign government representatives. Clinton met with representatives of at least 16 foreign governments that donated as much as $170 million to the Clinton charity, but they were not included in AP's calculations because such meetings would presumably have been part of her diplomatic duties...

http://bigstory.ap.org/82df550e1ec646098b434f7d5771f625

I suppose the defensive argument should be that 1). All top level US politicians, rightly or wrongly, but that's the way it is, expect to receive favors in return for access, and more, and 2). The Foundation spends money efficiently to do good work.

[pnwmom]

13. It wasn't just her job to work with representatives of foreign governments.

It was also her job to work with US citizens who had overseas involvements. That would explain her contacts with Americans dealing with issues overseas.

Also, there is nothing in this article that is evidence that she gave any improper assistance to anyone, or that she gave special access in exchange for donations to the Foundation.

This is just about "perception." Just more smoke from the smoke-making machine.

[oasis]

10. Media must appear "fair and balanced" so expect more bogus stuff

to pop up about Hillary. After three decades, nothing has changed.

[Iliyah]

12. Yahoo headline was "FBI "found" 15,000 new e-mails"

[forest444]

14. Yahoo News is run by neocons and RW shills.

Like a watered-down Whore Street Journal.