Tuesday night’s debate featured a master class on lying from the lying liar who lies about her lies, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
She spoke for approximately 24 minutes, and aside from her opening statement – “I’m Hillary Clinton” – virtually every word that exited her mouth was untrue. But because Hillary appeared to be lady with mild socialist depression in a full-blown socialist insane asylum, nobody laid a glove on her.
Thus it is left to us to debunk her various obfuscations and untruths. Here we go.
“I have spent a very long time – my entire adult life – looking for ways…to find the ways for each child to live up to his or her God-given potential.” Well, unless you’re an unborn child. Then, get ready for a trip down the sink.
“Yes, finally, fathers will be able to say to their daughters, you, too, can grow up to be president.” Technically, you’ll have to marry a president first, however.
“Actually, I have been very consistent.” Anderson Cooper asked Hillary about her shifting positions on issues ranging from the Iraq war to same-sex marriage to the Trans-Pacific Partnership. She then dropped that whopper. Hillary has been one of the least consistent major party candidates in American history. She then dropped a series of lies about her own positional changes. And then she finally concluded that she had a “range of views, but they are rooted in my values and my experience.” Those values are “becoming president” and her experience is “reading the polls.”
“I did say, when I was secretary of state, three years ago, that I hoped it would be the gold standard. It was just finally negotiated last week, and in looking at it, it didn’t meet my standards.” This is plainly untrue. Here’s what she said in 2012 about the TPP: “This TPP sets the gold standard in trade agreements to open free, transparent, fair trade, the kind of environment that has the rule of law and a level playing field.” She didn’t hope it would be the gold standard. It was the gold standard. Naturally, PolitiFact labeled this statement “half-true.” That means it’s a huge, glaring lie.
“I’m a progressive. But I’m a progressive who likes to get things done…how to find common ground, and I have proved that in every position that I’ve had, even dealing with Republicans who never had a good word to say about me, honestly.” Nope. As Senator from New York, Hillary accomplished virtually nothing. Her name was attached to exactly zero legislation. Her only major impact on policy came in the form of Hillarycare, which drove Republicans to massive electoral victory in 1994.
“When I think about capitalism, I think about all the small businesses that were started…” The media drooled over the exchange between Hillary and Bernie over capitalism. But there is no distinction between the economic philosophy of Bernie Sanders and that of Hillary Clinton. She said she wanted to use government to force companies to “share profits with the workers” – a line straight from the Marxist playbook. She said she wanted the wealthy to “pay their fair share” – which meant everything. She said she wanted paid family leave, universal college tuition availability, and a bevy of other free goodies. As I tweeted before the debate, her competition with Bernie Sanders looked like this:
“It was pretty straightforward to me that [Sanders] was going to give immunity to the only industry in America. Everybody else has to be accountable, but not the gun manufacturers.” There is no special immunity for gun manufacturers. The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 was designed to prevent ultra-leftist jurisdictions from twisting tort law to make gun manufacturers liable for “public nuisance” in the way that manufacturers are liable for their pollution. The law does not stop lawsuits against manufacturers or dealers from being sued if they knowingly sell a product to a criminal. They can still be sued for design flaws, or negligence.
“Well first of all, we got a lot of business done with the Russians when Medvedev was the president, and not Putin….There’s no doubt that when Putin came back in and said he was going to be President, that did change the relationship.” Nonsense. Putin was always the leader of Russia, even when Medvedev was his puppet. Hillary knew Putin ran the country when Medvedev was president; Medvedev, for example, was president when Russia invaded Georgia in 2008. Hillary handed the Russians a reset button anyway. Hillary also advocated for taking on Bashar Assad – the same man she once called a “reformer.”
“I think while you’re talking about the tough decision that President Obama had to make about Osama bin Laden, where I was one of his few advisers, or putting together that coalition to impose sanctions on Iran…” Glomming onto the kill of Osama Bin Laden in order to explain her vote for the Iraq war was simply nonsensical. But the idea that she “put together the coalition to impose sanctions on Iran” is simply untrue. International sanctions against Iran have been on the books for decades. And Hillary was integrally involved in negotiating the end of those sanctions, as well as letting Iran enrich uranium.
“We had a murderous dictator, Gadhafi, who had American blood on his hands, as I’m sure you remember, threatening to massacre large numbers of the Libyan people… Our response, which I think was smart power at its best, is that the United States will not lead this.” Hillary reportedly manufactured the Libyan genocide story out of wholecloth, and overrode US intelligence in order to push that narrative. If Libya was “smart power at its best,” it would be incredible to find out what “smart power at its worst” would be (well, other than Syria, Ukraine, Iran…). Libya became a haven for terrorists because we deposed a dictator who posed no threat to us. The notion that Iraq was a disaster area of American foreign policy but Libya is a great success story is patently insane. Hillary’s lies about Libya didn’t end there.
“I’ll get to that.” Hillary said this with regard to Benghazi. She never did, of course. Her response mirrored her response in Benghazi, by the way: “I’ll get back to that,” she said to our Libyan staff, then proceeded to do nothing.
“The Libyan people had a free election the first time since 1951. And you know what, they voted for moderates, they voted with the hope of democracy.” It would be important to remember that the Libyan government is currently operating with no control of the country, and is effectively a government-in-exile.
“I think it has to be continued threat from the spread of nuclear weapons, nuclear material that can fall into the wrong hands. I know the terrorists are constantly seeking it, and that’s why we have to stay vigilant, but also united around the world to prevent that.” Hillary said the spread of nuclear weapons represented the chief threat to the United States. She also negotiated the Iran nuclear deal. The statement that people around the world are united to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons is a plain lie, given the acceptance of the Iran deal, which makes Iranian nuclear development inevitable.
“Well, I’ve taken responsibility for it. I did say it was a mistake. What I did was allowed by the State Department, but it wasn’t the best choice. And I have been as transparent as I know to be, turning over 55,000 pages of my e-mails, asking that they be made public. And you’re right. I am going to be testifying. I’ve been asking to testify for some time and to do it in public, which was not originally agreed to.” Lies, lies, and more lies. She did not take responsibility for her email scandal any more than she took responsibility for Benghazi: she said she “took responsibility” but never admitted to having done anything wrong. Her email scheme was not allowed by federal law, but she was the head of the State Department and thus waived rules for herself. She may have been as transparent as she knows how to be, but that transparency involved setting up a private server, loading it with classified information, and then deleting some 30,000 emails. She only asked to testify after Congress demanded she testify. Fortunately, none of this mattered, since Bernie Sanders intervened to hand her his testicles in a jar by saying nobody cared about her emails.
“I want to make sure every single person in this country has the same opportunities that he and I have had, to make the most of their God-given potential and to have the chances that they should have in America for a good education, good job training, and then good jobs.” Not everyone can marry the president of the United States.
“This inequality challenge we face, we have faced it at other points. It’s absolutely right. It hasn’t been this bad since the 1920s. But if you look at the Republicans versus the Democrats when it comes to economic policy, there is no comparison. The economy does better when you have a Democrat in the White House and that’s why we need to have a Democrat in the White House in January 2017.” If Democrats are so great at economics, why is inequality as bad as it has been in a century? And saying that Democratic presidents preside over good economies seems to neglect the fact that Bill Clinton, for example, presided over a Republican Congress.
“We have to deal with the problem that the banks are still too big to fail. We can never let the American taxpayer and middle class families ever have to bail out the kind of speculative behavior that we saw.” In this debate, Hillary Clinton also backed Dodd-Frank, which legally enshrines too big to fail. Bailouts are now mandated by federal law, thanks to Hillary Clinton and Democrats. And Democratic policy loves bailouts – they are huge fans of crony capitalism, endless bailouts through stimulus packages and taxpayer giveaways.
“I represented Wall Street, as a senator from New York, and I went to Wall Street in December of 2007 — before the big crash that we had — and I basically said, ‘Cut it out! Quit foreclosing on homes! Quit engaging in these kinds of speculative behaviors.’” This is idiocy. Hillary did do this, but saying that Wall Street was engaging in risky behavior, and that therefore they should have give more loans to risky home buyers and stop foreclosing on bad buyers – well, that’s just dumb. Those practices led to the crisis in the first place.
“I never took a position on Keystone until I took a position on Keystone.” True, actually. But brutally stupid nonetheless. She also said she would not take a position on pot legalization. No shock there.
“I have been on the forefront of dealing with climate change, starting in 2009, when President Obama and I crashed (ph) a meeting with the Chinese and got them to sign up to the first international agreement to combat climate change that they’d ever joined.” The Copenhagen Summit in 2009 was an international fiasco for the United States. As Michael Bastasch notes, “the summit quickly fell apart and no legally-binding agreement was signed. The summit was widely regarded as a failure, and even Obama was disappointed in the results.” The United States ended up signing onto a non-binding agreement that pledged $100 billion in funding to impoverished countries.
“My plan would enable anyone to go to a public college or university tuition free.” College is not free. Somebody pays for it. Who? As always, the wealthy.
“I think that it was necessary to make sure that we were able after 9/11 to put in place the security that we needed. And it is true that it did require that there be a process. What happened, however, is that the Bush administration began to chip away at that process. And I began to speak out about their use of warrantless surveillance and the other behavior that they engaged in.” Hillary Clinton voted to reauthorize the Patriot Act in 2006. And Hillary’s supposed leadership against Bush-era abuses of the Patriot Act didn’t stop President Obama from expanding the use of surveillance far beyond what Bush ever did.
“Well, I can’t think of anything more of an outsider than electing the first woman president, but I’m not just running because I would be the first woman president….Well, I would not ask anyone to vote for me based on my last name.” False and false.
“California has had a paid leave program for a number of years….And it has not had the ill effects that the Republicans are always saying it will have.” California uses employee payroll taxes to finance paid family leave. That means all the costs of the program are hidden, rather than explicit. Businesses leave California and employment declines because of its high tax rates. Businesses hire fewer women if forced to pay higher taxes in order to do so.
“They don’t mind having big government to interfere with a woman’s right to choose and to try to take down Planned Parenthood. They’re fine with big government when it comes to that. I’m sick of it.” Republicans want to defund Planned Parenthood. That’s not big government. That’s small government. Further, it’s not “big government” to protect human life through force of law any more than it is “big government” to have murder laws on the books.
“I know we can afford it, because we’re going to make the wealthy pay for it. That is the way to get it done.” This myth, repeated ad nauseum by Democrats, is truly reprehensible. Rich people cannot pay for all the utopian programs proposed by the left. As John Stossel points out, “If the IRS grabbed 100 percent of income over $1 million, the take would be just $616 billion.” Both Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton worshipped at the altar of Denmark last night, but Denmark has lower corporate tax rates than the United States, and far higher taxes on the middle class. You pay a 200 percent tax on cars in Denmark — everyone. Socialism isn’t built on the backs of the rich. It’s built on the backs of everyone who earns, and that includes the middle class.
“Well, in addition to the NRA, the health insurance companies, the drug companies, the Iranians.” The Iranians are not Hillary’s enemies. They love her.
Hillary’s a liar. But Democrats don’t care, because liars prosper in a world where hard work and honesty are punished in the name of equality and the Great Socialist Utopia.
Ben Shapiro is Senior Editor-At-Large of Breitbart News, Editor-in-Chief of DailyWire.com, and The New York Times bestselling author, most recently, of the book, The People vs. Barack Obama: The Criminal Case Against The Obama Administration (Threshold Editions, June 10, 2014). Follow Ben Shapiro on Twitter @benshapiro.
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