Israel Matzav: This part of Hillary Clinton's past should be fair game too

Tuesday, February 18, 2014

This part of Hillary Clinton's past should be fair game too

Byron York has a piece in the Washington Examiner, in which he argues that Hillary Clinton's past ought to be fair game in the 2016 Presidential campaign, assuming that she runs for President (Hat Tip: Memeorandum).

Of course Clinton's recent experiences are relevant to a presidential run. But so are her actions in the 90s, the 80s and even the 70s. It's not ancient history; it reveals something about who Clinton was and still is. And re-examining her past is entirely consistent with practices in recent campaigns.

In the 2012 presidential race, for example, many in the press were very interested in business deals Mitt Romney made in the 1980s. In the 2004 race, many journalists were even more interested in what George W. Bush did with the Texas Air National Guard in 1968, as well as what John Kerry did in Vietnam that same year. And in 2000, a lot of journalists invested a lot of time trying to find proof that Bush had used cocaine three decades earlier.

So by the standards set in coverage of other candidates, Clinton's past is not too far past.

That's especially true because there will be millions of young voters in 2016 who know little about the Clinton White House. Americans who had not even been born when Bill Clinton first took the oath of office in 1993 will be eligible to vote two years from now. They need to know that Hillary Clinton has been more than Secretary of State.

York goes on to describe some of Hillary's actions going all the way back to the 1970's, which ought to be relevant to her suitability to be President. I'd like to add a couple more.

One should be obvious to all of you from the picture above - the kiss and embrace of Soha Arafat, now the widow of Yasser Arafat, but then his wife, after Soha accused Israel of poisoning 'Palestinian' water with cancer-causing agents. Hillary later claimed that she didn't understand what Soha had said. Here's a contemporary New York Post headline.

But perhaps this less well-known but broader incident of anti-Semitism (and not 'just' anti-Zionism) from Hillary's early career should resonate more with American voters.

In his book American Evita, Christopher Anderson writes.
...
It was during this trip to his home state that Bill took Hillary to meet a politically well connected friend. When they drove up to the house, Bill and Hillary noticed that a menorah-the seven branched Hebrew candelabrum (not to be confused with the more common and subtler mezuzah)-has been affixed to the front door.

"My daddy was half Jewish," explained Bill's friend. "One day when he came to visit , my daddy placed the menorah on my door because he wanted me to be proud that we were part Jewish. And I wasn't about to say no to my daddy."

To his astonishment, as soon as Hillary saw the menorah, she refused to get out of the car. "Bill walked up to me and said that she was hot and tired, but later he explained the real reason." According to the friend and another eyewitness, Bill said, "I'm sorry, but Hillary's really tight with the people in the PLO in New York. They're friends of hers, and she just doesn't feel right about the menorah." (2)

Perhaps the American Jewish community can be awakened before it votes another anti-Semite into the White House....

Labels: anti-Semitism, Hillary Clinton, Suha Arafat, US presidential campaign 2016