Over the weekend, Vox published an article headlined “Hillary Clinton personally took money from companies that sought to influence her.” Given Vox’s overwhelmingly liberal audience and the astounding lengths the publication’s top editors will go to defend liberal politicians, the fact they’re being so blunt tells you something about just how damning the scandals circling Hillary are. Vox isn’t even trying to spin it. And the George Stephanopoulos brouhaha notwithstanding, for the most part, the major media have dutifully reported the accusations without pulling too many punches.
But I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that the media are banking a good deal of credibility reporting on Hillary now, because they intend to spend it later. For one thing, nearly all of the reporting is piggybacking on Peter Schweizer’s investigative work, who the media never fail to remind us worked for Sarah Palin briefly, without disclosing their own conflict of interest. For another, the media are letting Hillary Clinton stonewall even as various Clintonistas make laughable excuses. Lanny Davis must have carpal tunnel syndrome from furiously banging out disingenuous op-eds, and it almost goes without saying that David Brock and the rest of the flying monkeys at Media Matters are bad at what they do and should feel bad about themselves for doing it. Even those elements of the overtly liberal press that don’t have direct ties to the Clintons (that we know of, anyway) are already falling back on whatever flavor of “vast right-wing conspiracy” they think sounds discrediting.
Further, while the media are expressing some mild frustration that Hillary Clinton is refusing to answer any questions, they are for the most part letting her get away with it. If a Republican candidate were dogged by this much scandal and trying to avoid the press, their silence would lead every nightly newscast for weeks until the candidate agreed to be locked in a room with Andrea Mitchell and a cattle prod for a three hour network special called “50 Shades of Jeb.”
We’re still 17 months out from an election so the media have some freedom to decide exactly how much pressure they want to apply to Hillary Clinton. If you think the media have been surprisingly tough on Hillary so far, do bear in mind that in about 12 months as the election starts to close in and polls narrow, the whole liberal clerisy is going to write “Why I’m Still Voting For Hillary” pieces, along the lines of “Sure, the Clinton Foundation appears to be a billion dollar money laundering operation masquerading as a charity with the willing cooperation of thousands of corporate and media elites. And maybe we have to face the fact that the Clintons have been rooking people with variations of this scam for 35 years. However, the Supreme Court and Obamacare are just too darn important to trust to a Republican with the White House. While Hillary and Bill may have lined their pockets with money from brutal Central Asian oligarchs under the rubric that they were helping kids with AIDS, at least they’re not the kind of monsters who think that gay people may have to go to more than one bakery to find a wedding cake.”
If Hillary secures the nomination as expected, and the scandals continue to metastisize as expected, before this election is over, the tortured “…but I’m voting for her anyway” declaration will become a genre unto itself. There will be a torrent of rationalizations in the pages of the same publications that are grilling her now. Count on it.
