‘What happened?’ is the title of Hillary Clinton’s new 464-page book.
The answer, it transpires, is the most whiny, self-pitying, deluded load of literary claptrap written since Kim Kardashian’s ‘I was empowering women’ defense for posting naked bird-flipping selfies.
By the time I’d finished wading through Hillary’s absurdly self-indulgent tome, I felt like I’d been lowered into a large vat of violently indignant, furiously self-justifying, boiling mad spittle.
This is the tormented, tragic work of a spurned woman who never thought she could possibly lose to Donald Trump, a man she considered her inferior opponent in every possible way imaginable from intellect and political experience to credibility and popularity.
There hasn’t been a more whiny, self-pitying, deluded load of literary claptrap than Hillary’s new book since Kim Kardashian’s ‘I was empowering women’ defense for posting naked bird-flipping selfies. It’s an absurdly self-indulgent tome
Such was Hillary’s self-confidence she would win, it emerged this week she even paid $1.6 million for the property next door to her home to house her Secret Service detail once she was elected.
Yet she lost.
The reasons for this have been raked over so voraciously since last November that there is nothing new left to say.
But that hasn’t stopped Hillary saying it all over again, for page after page, chapter after chapter, moan after moan.
It’s not so much a book as an elongated case for the defense of abject failure, presented by a lawyer who’s just lost a slam-dunk court battle that no good lawyer should ever have lost.
Readers are left in absolutely no doubt who’s to blame, and it’s most definitely NOT Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Oh no, she’s absolutely the last name on the list of culprits for the most humiliating beat-down in US political history.
The list of people and entities that Hillary DOES blame is so long, it’s frankly laughable.
It was James Comey’s fault: ‘If not for the dramatic intervention of the FBI director in the final days,’ she wails, ‘we would have won the White House.’
It was Vladimir Putin’s fault for waging a ‘personal vendetta’ against her. ‘I never imagined that he would have the audacity to launch a massive covert attack against our own democracy,’ she rants, ‘right under our noses – and that he’d get away with it.’
It was ‘odious hypocrite’ Julian Assange’s fault for supposedly aiding and abetting Putin. She says of the Wikileaks founder: ‘I had to face not just one America-bashing misogynist, but three. I’d have to get by Putin and Assange as well.’
It was Barack Obama’s fault: ‘I do wonder sometimes about what would have happened if President Obama had made a televised address to the nation in the fall of 2016 warning that our democracy was under attack,’ she snarls. ‘Maybe more Americans would have woken up to the threat at the time.’ She also slams Obama for telling her to ‘lay off’ Bernie Sanders: ‘I felt like I was in a straightjacket.’
It was Sanders’ fault for ‘resorting to innuendo and impugning my character’. Hillary spat: ‘His attacks caused lasting damage, making it harder to unify progressives in the general election and paving the way for Trump’s ‘Crooked Hillary’ campaign.’
The list of people and entities that Hillary DOES blame is laughably long, and includes Bernie Sanders, Barack Obama, James Comey, Vladimir Putin, Julian Assange and the media
It was also Sanders supporters’ fault for ‘harassing my supporters online’ with attacks that were ‘ugly and more than a little sexist.’
It was GOP leader Mitch McConnell’s fault for putting partisanship ahead of national security: ‘McConnell knew better,’ Hillary slammed, ‘but he did it anyway.’
It was the mainstream media’s fault: ‘Many in the political media can’t bear to face their own role in helping elect Trump,’ she fumed, ‘from providing him free airtime to giving my emails three times more coverage than all the issues affecting people’s lives combined.’
In particular, she says it was the New York Times’ fault for reporting on her emails in such a relentless way that it ‘affected the outcome of the election.’
It was Today Show host Matt Lauer’s fault for grilling her during a NBC presidential debate about her emails to the extent she was ‘ticked off’ and ‘almost physically sick’.
It was Fox News’ fault for ‘turning politics into an evidence-free zone of seething resentment.’
It was Green Party candidate Jill Stein’s fault: ‘There were more than enough Stein voters to swing the result, just like Ralph Nader did in Florida and New Hampshire in 2000.’
It was men’s fault: ‘Sexism and misogyny played a role in the election. Exhibit A is that the flagrantly sexist candidate won.’
It was women’s fault, especially those who joined anti-Trump marches after he won: ‘I couldn’t help but ask where those feelings of solidarity, outrage and passion had been during the election.’
It was white people’s fault: ‘He (Trump) was quite successful in referencing a nostalgia that would give hope, settle grievances, for millions of people who were upset about gains that were made by others…millions of white people.’
It was black people’s fault, especially Black Lives Matter protestors who questioned her commitment to their cause and heckled her at events. Hillary accuses them of being ‘more interested in disruption and confrontation than in working together to change policies.’
It was former Vice President Joe Biden’s fault for saying the Democratic Party ‘did not talk about what it always stood for’ in the campaign, which was ‘how to maintain a burgeoning middle class.’ Hillary seethes: ‘I find this fairly remarkable, considering Joe himself campaigned for me all over the Midwest and talked plenty about the middle class.’
It was her aide Huma Abedin’s husband Anthony Weiner’s fault for the teenage sexting scandal that blew up just before election day – forcing the emails back into public focus.
Also it was the Electoral College’s fault. And also Jill Stein, sexism, Matt Lauer, Fox News and Mitch McConnell’s fault. And black people’s fault and white people’s fault and Joe Biden’s fault. And the fault of Anthony Weiner – who’s ex-wife Huma is still around, seen here Tuesday
It was the ‘godforsaken’ Electoral College’s fault because she won the meaningless popular vote by three million.
Finally, it was history’s fault: ‘The problems started with history,’ she insists. ‘It was exceedingly difficult for either party to hold onto the White House for more than eight years in a row.’
Summing things up, Hillary asks herself: ‘What makes me such a lightning rod for fury? I’m at a loss.’
Hmmm, where do we start?
The truth is that everyone knows exactly what happened.
Hillary ran a diabolically elitist and blinkered campaign that basically boiled down to this mantra: ‘Trump’s disgusting, his supporters are a basket of deplorable idiots, I’m a brilliant woman, my husband used to be President, and I have lots of rich, famous friends – so vote for me.’
As sales pitches go, this was right up there with Pepsi trying to convince us Kendall Jenner could end all America’s racial tensions by handing out cola to cops at protest marches.
America didn’t vote for Hillary because they didn’t like what she represents and rejected her vague, unimaginative vision for the country.
It’s as simple as that and to pretend otherwise is to ignore the harsh, cold reality that the most qualified candidate in history lost to the least qualified candidate in history.
America didn’t vote for Hillary because they didn’t like what she represents. She is doing herself no favors with her book tour and also doing huge damage to Democrats moving forward
Hillary is doing herself no favors with this prolonged, agonizing Loser tour.
In fact, with every new appearance she makes to complain ever more bitterly about the unfairness of her defeat, and to blame an ever longer list of people other than herself for it, she is further diminished.
More worryingly for the Democrats, what she is doing is causing huge damage to the party’s chances of rebounding from the catastrophe of last November.
Hillary has become a walking, whining by-word for political disaster and carries with her an overpowering stench of electoral death.
This book is thus utterly pointless.
Nobody wants to hear any more about ‘what happened’.
It happened, and we all know why. End.
Now please Hillary, for the love of God, just accept you blew it and shut up, before you take your party down with you.