“Bill Clinton is massively overdue for a #MeToo reckoning” (Robyn Urback, CBC News, Oct. 11). Instead, he is set to travel North America on a multi-city Canadian and U.S. speaking tour with Hillary (last stop Los Angeles Forum next May; cheapest ticket $62; most expensive $2,349), despite being “the practical embodiment of everything the movement was designed to reject: abuse of power, privilege, double standards, harassment, sexual abuse and trauma.” If we lived in a world that was “just and good,” Urback writes, “one of America’s most well-known and unrepentant sexual predators would be forced to cancel his speaking tour before it even begins.”
Given former president Clinton’s long history of sexual abuse, and Hillary Clinton’s support of wars that have brought death and devastation to millions of women and children, on what moral ground can Michelle Obama lecture men about their treatment of women?
Given former president Clinton’s long history of sexual abuse, and Hillary Clinton’s support of wars that have brought death and devastation to millions of women and children, on what moral ground can Michelle Obama lecture men about their treatment of women?
#MeToo’s fine effort has pushed Democrats and liberals to join in exposing numerous sexual predators such as Harvey Weinstein, Matt Lauer, and Charlie Rose — and Donald Trump. Will the Democrats and liberals now expand their justifiable outrage against the president to include William Jefferson Clinton? And what about Michele Obama, who will be joining the Clintons for six of their arena programs? Given former president Clinton’s long history of sexual abuse, and Hillary Clinton’s support of wars that have brought death and devastation to millions of women and children, on what moral ground can Obama lecture men about their treatment of women?
What about the Iraqi mothers who anguished as their children perished during the Clinton administration’s criminal sanctions against that nation (an estimated 500,000 during 1993-2001) — supported by first lady Hillary Clinton? Former U.N. humanitarian aid official Denis Halliday called the sanctions “genocidal,” and resigned in protest against the terrible loss of life. They were “a cruel tragedy” and “crimes against humanity” — a clear violation of the International Genocide Convention that the United States signed and ratified. (Cornell Chronicle, 1999).
What about Bill Clinton’s 1998 bombing of an alleged al-Qaida weapons factory in Sudan that was in fact a plant which “produced 90 percent of its pharmaceutical products”? According to the Boston Globe, the bombing will ultimately cost the lives of thousands of Sudanese, “many of them children ‘who have already suffered and died from malaria, tuberculosis, and other treatable diseases.’ ” Will Democrats and liberals express outrage at this violence against Sudanese children?
What about Hillary Clinton? As senator from New York, she enthusiastically supported the Iraq invasion; will her Democratic and liberal supporters now confront her about the millions who have been killed, maimed and displaced — most of them women and children? Scholar Stephen Zunes (Truthout, Feb. 7, 2013) points out that Clinton’s public record is well documented: it includes her vote and advocacy for the invasion of Afghanistan; her enthusiastic support of the unconstitutional NATO bombing of Libya, now overrun with warlords and al-Qaida terrorists; and her “emphatic, unwavering [support] of Israel” — despite its decades-long occupation and violence against Palestinians. Women and children — allegedly Clinton’s deepest concern — have been the greatest victims in all these conflicts.
Will the powerful and huge protests that erupted against Trump in January 2017 and ’18 rise again to confront the Clintons? If history is any guide, it is doubtful, given the absence of Democratic-liberal outrage at Bill Clinton’s Iraqi sanctions; Hillary Clinton’s support for the Honduran military coup of 2009 against President Manuel Zelaya that has led to the murder of thousands of indigenous and union activists, journalists, and human rights advocates; and her backing of the Saudi war on Yemen, the greatest humanitarian crisis in the world. The coup and Saudi attack began on Obama’s watch, a fact dropped down Orwell’s memory hole and erased from history.
Despite the Clintons’ monstrous record of violence against women and children, Democrats and liberals who allegedly support the #MeToo movement will line up for the arena tour, exposing themselves as partisans without principles, whose primary concern is the political party of the criminal, not the crime. They will continue to boast of their hatred for the vile and violent Trump while ignoring the Clintons’ crimes — revealing a historic stench of moral hypocrisy.
John Marciano
Ashland Daily Tidings
John A. El-Amin says
MeToo- the Clinton’s have been punished??? Really??? What of the millions of Iraqi, Sudanese, Libyan, Afghan and Palestinian children who are suffering NOW!!
Mrs. Obama’s husband , every Tuesday, gave his direct ok to missile strike whomever his thugs deemed a “threat” and if children or innocents were in the vicinity – well, they were ” collateral damage”; as filthy an American term if there ever was one.
No Sir, the Clinton’s have NOT been punished and if they were, that punishment was insufficient.
Ditto Mr. Obama, Mr. Cheney, Mr. Bush( both of them), Rumsfeld, Rice ( both of them too)Wolfowitz and Kissinger- this rogues gallery has no end.
Galt says
Dear John,
I appreciate your writing and I read this opinion with an open mind and much affirmative head nodding. However I have one major disagreement with you: we, ( all people, not just Progressives) have to distinguish between past and present wrongs. I, most certainly abhor the acts and memory of Adolph Hitler, (to cite an extreme example of the worst.) and I am at a loss to explain or even understand the Ostrich like response of the German people. Yet when I visit Germany, I do not spit on the people or land. That is, we remember past acts of evil in order to prevent the repetition of those acts. We must be much more alert and responsive to present bad acts and actors, since they obviously did not get the message or learn its meaning. The Clintons have been punished. We can certainly debate the sufficiency of that punishment, but what is gained by heaping more ignominy upon them? Your article seems (to me) to be an argument that without total and slavish adherence to meaningless consistency our efforts are worthless. I disagree. We should remember those defects of character which you underscore, but meaningless “stoning” merely for foolish consistency, might be an evil itself. (” A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” RW Emerson)
Bill sims says
Very well said. John sounds like one of those folks that claimed Hillary was just as bad as Trump. It’s not surprising that he uses “ whataboutisms” to attack the Clintons and Michelle Obama like right wingers do to defend Trump,s deplorable behaviors. I almost expected him to say “What about her emaills?” I wish LA Progressive would give me a break from this kind of bull.
RonWF says
The Clintons have been punished? Seriously? They have used their connections in government to become fabulously wealthy. Only when they were safely out of office and beyond any chance of regaining office did the left slowly and grudgingly come to start to push them slightly aside. Whereas when it comes to someone on the right, even the slightest hint of impropriety starts a feeding frenzy regardless of any examination of the actual facts. Take ex-Rep. Keith Ellison as an example. His history of sexual abuse was ignored by the Democratic Party and buried by the media. He is still Deputy Chair of the DNC and is now Attorney General-elect of Minnesota. Would that have happened if he was a Republican?
This is pointed out not as “whataboutism”, but to highlight the sheer hypocrisy and lack of credibility of the left. The left will be taken seriously when – and only when – it takes accusations of sexual abuse seriously in an equivalent fashion regardless of the politics and power of the accused. Until then the left is simply further abusing abused women by using them as political weapons instead of treating them as actual human beings. It’s despicable.