How will you deal with the “vast right-wing conspiracy” always trying to “undermine” you if you are elected? This is just one of ten “good questions” liberal blogger Paul Waldman wants to ask Hillary Clinton, if she ever has a press conference before November 8. He’s not the only journalist clamoring for another press conference. After all, it’s been 269 days since her last one. Because of this, some journalists have had extra time to think on the types of thoughtful questions they’d ask Hillary if they had the chance. Except asking thoughtful, critical or tough questions seems to be an impossibility for liberal journalists like Waldman. His latest “10 Good Questions for Hillary Clinton,” posted in the Washington Post’s Plum Line blog this weekend, strikes the same favorable, lenient, even apologetic tone Clinton has always experienced from the press.
Waldman’s eye-roll worthy list begins with the aforementioned “vast right-wing conspiracy” question. As you will notice in the following questions, he typically begins each by going out of his way to defend Clinton against her critics.
There’s no question that the “vast right-wing conspiracy” you described almost 20 years ago will be mobilized in force to undermine your presidency. There will be lawsuits, a blizzard of FOIA requests, constant congressional investigations, and who knows what else. From what you’ve seen, how does that opposition affect the work the administration does? Are there lessons from how your husband’s administration and Barack Obama’s administration dealt with it — not to mention your own experience with things like Benghazi and the email controversy — that you plan to apply?
In a question about cybersecurity, Waldman prefaces his question with a conciliatory remark about Clinton “apologizing” for using a private e-mail system as Secretary of State. Waldman conveniently leaves out that Clinton never apologized for lying repeatedly to the American public about doing exactly that.
You’ve said it was a mistake to use a private email system while you were in the State Department, and you apologized for it. One of the issues that controversy raised is the question of the security of intra-government communication. If you become president, how do you think people who work for you should communicate electronically, and what would you like to change about the way federal government systems operate now? Are you going to be giving special instructions about what people should and shouldn’t use email for?
Shifting to her predecessor, Waldman laughably praises Obamacare as “a great success” that could only be improved if it was even “possible” with evil Republicans “determined to destroying it completely.” Maybe he runs in the same insulated circles as Jimmy Kimmel?
The Affordable Care Act has been a great success in many ways, but the exchanges are experiencing problems now, with some insurers departing because they say they aren’t making enough money. Can you name two or three of the most important changes you’d like to make to the law to shore it up? Do you think it’s possible to get Republicans, who have voted to repeal the ACA over 50 times, to ever pass a bill to improve it when they’re so determined to destroying it completely?
Again, Waldman asks, How can any Democrat President get anything done when Republicans won’t work with them?
The Obama years have taught us that “reaching out” to the opposition doesn’t work if they have their own incentives not to cooperate with the president. If they hold on to one or both houses, Republicans could conclude that the strategy of total opposition has worked pretty well for them, and they ought to just keep it up. You have a lot of liberal policy ideas that would require legislation. What will you do if they refuse to enact any of them, and you have to fight just to keep the government open?
The last one is basically a “tell me how to do my job” question. Waldman literally asks for Clinton’s advice on how journalists can be more “fair” (ie: favorable) to her as President, if she’s elected. As if Clinton ever needed help in that area.
No one can deny that your relationship with the press has been less than comfortable, and pretty much every president thinks their coverage is less than fair. What do you think reporters ought to do when it comes to covering the president that they haven’t done in the past?
The lack of tough questions could be because Waldman has a history of defending Clinton and her predecessor for supposedly having stellar, “scandal free” reputations. At the same time, he has no problem attacking Trump as a “little dumber and more extreme” than a “typical Republican politician” “but just a little.”
