The big "but."
It's the big "but" that keeps collective rationality in a constant state of anxiety.
Hillary Clinton leads in the polls by 8 or 9 points depending on which one you read because of her obvious superiority in knowledge and the ever more important, temperament. But, she's behind Donald Trump - a candidate, it had been calculated, tells a lie approximately every five minutes in his public speeches - in polls focused on "trustworthiness and straightforwardness."
To reinforce this notion, Sec. Clinton, herself, gave an inexplicable answer to Fox News's Chris Wallace when she said, " My answers were truthful, and what I've said is consistent with what I have told the American people..." Simply, not true. Sec. Clinton was not truthful with the American people, and it became a situation that required the FBI to come in and get the truth. So was Mrs. Clinton truthful with them. Director Comey has said as much.
Essentially, Mrs. Clinton wasn't truthful with the public not because of something technically illegal or unprecedented but because she fully well knew that it would be politically damaging and also play into a well established negative narrative about her and her family.
It begs the valid question of if something like this will happen when she's in office, and for all Republicans it's not a matter of if but when - a valid concern.
However, there's another "but [a huge one]," and that is Donald Trump who in our estimation is no better than Sec. Clinton on this front. And all things being equal on this, heading into the presidency, we have more faith in the fact that if a President Clinton was found to do something illegal, was impeached, and hence driven from office that she would leave the scene. We have no faith in Donald Trump accepting the penalty of an impeachable offense. How twisted is that?
Admittedly, that's a bit of hyperbole, but there is some truth in it. What is really happening - slowly and frustratingly - is that the American electorate is still wrapping its collective head around the fact that this is how our politicians are, right now [this election]. As difficult as it is to look beyond it, you see the other factors of knowledge and temperament acting as the deciding ones, in which again Sec. Clinton handily leads.
A telling reflection of this is that Republicans are clearly in an "every man/woman for him/herself" mode when it comes to dealing with Donald Trump's presidential candidacy, especially if you're up for reelection in the fall. Late week, Donald Trump formally endorsed House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH), but the problem is that it was completely unconvincing given Mr. Trump's initial vindictive refusal of withholding these very endorsements at the beginning of the week. And what a disastrous week it was for Trump.
Even in the hard-hitting politics game, The Trump campaign has consistently been blowing it. Sec. Clinton in response to a poor answer to Chris Wallace followed it by using phrases like "I short-circuited" and "I need to clarify better," in response to her email troubles, which is inexcusable a year after all this scrutiny began as noted by Yamiche Alcindor of The New York Times. To know all of Donald Trump's idiotic self-inflicted wounding statements of this without having to list them is clearly a blown opportunity to turn the press's attention squarely toward your opponent. At best, Mr. Trump could possible concede a draw, but in reality he lost the week, one in which he should have won but instead turned it into a week that probably lost him the election. We tend to agree more with Joy Reid that over the 'Olympic break' these awful, but accurate, perceptions of Mr. Trump will further become 'baked in.' Conversely, Hugh Hewlitt's nicely amusing assessment that Mr. Trump has to begin 'season two' of his campaign after Labor Day; however, the certainty of that happening is highly doubtful.
With all of Mr. Trump's bi-polarity in what he says - saying one thing now and another later - it's enough to fear putting the nuclear launch codes in his hands, and issue that should never be when discussing presidential candidates, but here we are.
It's not surprising to hear Republicans yell, "Runaway, runaway!"
Panel: Joy-Ann Reid, NBC News, Yamiche Alcindor, The New York Times; Hugh Hewlitt, conservative radio show host; Mark Halperin, Bloomberg Politics
A Couple More Things...
We really didn't touch on the interviews of the day and we'd be remiss and negligent if we didn't make a few comments.
With regard to Senator Tim Kaine, the entire point that he's on the ticket is to fill the trustworthy void for Sec. Clinton. In the colloquial sense, he's a "true boy scout." He gave a cogent answer on his TPP stance, one that the Clinton campaign should stick to which was that he was for it, only if the labor and environmental protections could be and would be enforced. They were fixed so he no longer supports it - delivered reasonably.
Counter that with Retired Lt. General Michael Flynn who if you listened carefully argued for something very dangerous, which was the none disclosure of what America is doing militarily - numbers of troop deployments, target cities, etc. However, with troop numbers, in particular the American public has the right to know because it's being done in our name. Lt. Gen. Flynn supported Mr. Trump's argument that NATO members have to pay their bills, but only a more tepid stance in affirming that the United States would stand by its collective commitments to the treaty [i.e. having another country's back if it's attacked]. It was not reassuring given Mr. Trump's insinuations that the United States wouldn't honor those commitments.
And as for Governor Rick Scott (R) of Florida - inadequately handling the Zika crisis and running a pro-Donald SuperPAC - what else is new?
Rick Scott in charge on the front lines of this nation's collective health protection against a virus we haven't stopped - scary to say the least.
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