Saturday, July 02, 2016

The party of impunity seems to think that indictment is normal

Rumor has it that today is the day that Hillary Clinton has an interview with the Federal Bureau of Investigation in regards to her use of a private email server and email account. We've been waiting for months for this investigation to come to an end and no one knows for sure when that will happen.

Interestingly, Bill Clinton had a meeting with Attorney General Loretta Lynch aboard her plane on the tarmac at an airport in Phoenix. It is hard to imagine what would be so urgent that he needed to talk to her then and there. If he wanted to prevent an indictment, his plan would surely backfire after such a public meeting. I mean to say, that boarding Lynch's plane and delaying takeoff for 25 minutes is a very public way of saying that whatever he wanted to say to her is about more than grandkids.

Naturally, Lynch had to defend the meeting. But I have to wonder. Given the circumstances, what kind of power does Bill Clinton have that could convince Lynch to allow him to board at all? The US Attorney General is well aware of the laws and knows she would create a conflict of interest by having that meeting with Bill Clinton. She already has a conflict of interest since she was first appointed as a US Attorney by Bill Clinton in 1999.

Loretta Lynch is one of the most powerful women in the world. She doesn't have to have a meeting with Bill Clinton if she doesn't want to. Or does she? If Bill Clinton has any kind of power over her at all, that would give the lie to anything said by Barack Obama that there has been no political influence over her handling of the case.

So, Lynch has had to state publicly that she will accept any recommendation from career prosecutors at the FBI. She has had to make it clear that she is beyond any conflict of interest. So if the FBI does recommend indictment, she will accept that decision and refer Hillary Clinton for indictment. What that means in so many words is that if such a recommendation came across her desk, someone in the FBI believes that a grand jury could be convinced that a crime has occurred.

Now take a step back. Hillary Clinton is the presumptive nominee for the Democratic Party to run for president of the United States against the Republican nominee. Any normal person would decline the nomination until this issue has drawn to a close and her name is cleared. Her name will not be cleared by any stretch of the imagination. Yes, dear Clinton supporters, you do have to worry about those emails. Is this the new normal?

Are we, as a nation prepared to accept candidates for office who are under criminal investigation? I think that is what the Democratic Party is asking us to do.

Robert Menendez has been indicted for corruption charges and somehow, remains a superdelegate who can vote for Clinton. Chaka Fattah has been convicted on charges of racketeering and had the good sense to resign. (the last time I looked, he was still on the list, but things move fast in politics)

Take note that both of these superdelegate stories are from the Washington Post, not the Washington Times or WorldNet Daily. These are totally confirmed fact-checked stories. In both cases, it is all about money. Fattah had the good sense to resign as superdelegate and lost the last primary election due to his looming case against him, so at least the voters figured him out. But Menendez will soldier on to the convention as if nothing happened.

The Democratic Party used to be the party of the people. They used to support unions, they used to fight free trade agreements, they used to fight for social justice. But as the outcome of the deliberations on the Democratic Party platform for this year shows, they're still very concerned about money in politics. No, they're not that concerned about getting big money out of politics, they're concerned about losing they're sources of big money.

This is just another reason why I support Bernie Sanders. Clinton, Menendez and Fattah, all represent the dialing for dollars class of Congress member. Instead of spending time legislating for the people, they spend up to two thirds of their time calling very wealthy people and asking for money. What a demoralizing job.

Sanders doesn't waste his time calling wealthy people for money. He doesn't get caught up in complicated schemes to raise more money. He is dependent upon the people alone for his campaign contributions. He has done this for 14 elections and is doing the same for this election. He is even fundraising for delegates to the convention that can't afford the cost of travel and lodging to get there.

Sanders doesn't take the big money so he can stay focused on the issues most important to the people he serves. Without the influence of big money, he can vote on the merits of the legislation rather than the money behind it. If he becomes president, he can sign bills into law by following the same principles.

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