On Friday's edition of Washington Week on PBS, Los Angeles Times columnist (and before that, longtime Washington bureau chief) Doyle McManus expressed dismay that Hillary Clinton was having ongoing political problems over the e-mail scandal. How could this political tumble happen, given that she "is an accomplished politician” and “has the smartest campaign staff in America” and “one of the smartest pollsters in America"?
Check the video for sincerity. It seems like McManus is dead-serious and puzzled here, not attempting to mock Team Clinton’s stonewalling and lying, even after PBS host Gwen Ifill played a set of clips illustrating Hillary’s changing spins on the scandal:
DOYLE MCMANUS, Los Angeles Times: So Anne, why has it taken Hillary Clinton so long to get to this point? Because she is an accomplished politician and has the smartest campaign staff in America and she has one of the smartest pollsters in America. It’s not like the public mood was -- should have been difficult to read.
ANNE GEARAN, Washington Post: No, that is exactly the question to ask. Did they simply not understand what they had in front of them at the beginning? It's starting to look like that. And another thing is – she has always said and still believes, clearly, she didn't do anything wrong. So she feels she is being pushed up against the wall for no reason. And the more she got pushed up against the wall, the worse it looked. And the more her own donors and supporters had questions.
And then they came to her and said, ‘We don't know what to tell people when they ask us what this e-mail thing is. Did you do something?’ ‘Well, no, I didn't!’ ‘But then, how do we explain it?’ It became a very circular problem where the very people she needed to be able to have go out on her behalf and say ‘There’s nothing here, folks,’ didn't know what to say.
Liberal journalists clearly feel bad this scandal is continuing, and Time’s Michael Crowley wondered out loud if this was just a media-enabled “summer hysteria” that might fade away. CNN reporter Jeff Zeleny stuck to political reality.
MICHAEL CROWLEY, Time: So Jeff, does this kind of tie off the bleeding artery? Will we see -- is it possible the e-mail story will fade, that this was actually kind of a summer hysteria and a lot of fun for the media to talk about, but maybe she’s able to turn a corner and move on?
JEFF ZELENY, CNN: In a word, no. Probably not. Because she has an important meeting on Capitol Hill in October with the -- an appearance before the house Benghazi committee. So that ensures this will keep going.
He also mentioned the ongoing probe by the FBI, and noted that only four in ten Democrats are now enthusiastic about her candidacy, down from six in ten. He tried to sound some note of optimism: "She has to rebuild this enthusiasm some way. But I think she's turned a corner."
