The Hillary Letters Don’t Matter

The Washington Free Beacon has released what they are titling The Hillary Letters. They contain a number of letters between Hillary Clinton (then Hillary Rodham) and radical leftist community organizer Saul Alinsky. Hillary had written her college senior thesis on Alinsky and apparently they had a rather friendly relationship. Hillary graduated from college and turned down a job working for Alinsky deciding instead to attend law school. The correspondence occurs mainly during her time in law school, including her stint as a summer associate working for radical left-wing law firm Treuhaft Walker & Burnstein.

Based on the letters there is no doubt that Hillary and Alinsky shared a deep friendship. It’s clear that Hillary was committed to Alinsky’s radical left-wing vision. Having said that, it’s also clear that Hillary didn’t always agree with Alinsky’s tactics. In the late 60’s and early 70’s they had the same policy goals but differed on how best to achieve them. Alinsky wrote the book Rules For Radicals (the letters indicate that Hillary was excited about its release) which he dedicated to Lucifer. In the book he encourages leftists to organize the working poor in order to force leftist change on the nation. Hillary wanted to change the nation from within, which is why she went to law school. She seems to have believed that Alinsky’s tactics weren’t viable long term.

The question at this point is why are these letters being released now. People have known for a couple decades that Hillary wrote her senior thesis on Alinsky. It has been rumored for years that they were better friends than she has let on. From the Republican standpoint information about Hillary’s associations with Alinsky haven’t made a lick of difference. In fact, the nation elected an Alinsky style community organizer as President in 2008 and 2012. With all the information out there about Obama’s associations with communists and unrepentant domestic terrorists, it didn’t sway the public against him. Why would anyone think that these letters will sway the public against Hillary? From the Hillary perspective, she’s got to be thrilled that these letters are out in 2014. They’ll be old news by the time she announces her candidacy and even older news by the time she actually faces voters.

While this information about Hillary is interesting we conservatives have to be careful what we do with it. It’s a little absurd to hold someone to their viewpoints when they were 20-24 years old. In Hillary’s case, these letters were written 40+ years ago. People change, their experiences help change their viewpoints. We conservatives should allow for that, especially when the viewpoints stated are so old. Hillary’s viewpoints from 40+ years ago may help explain her positions today. However if conservatives think they’re going to beat Hillary by pounding her over her relationship with a man who has been dead for 42 years they’re dead wrong. The public isn’t going to care about these letters, just like they didn’t care about Obama’s more recent associations.

All that matters in the 2016 Presidential race is what Hillary will do as President. It’s one thing to look to her record as a Senator from New York and as Secretary of State and make suggestions about what the future will be based on those records. It’s another thing entirely to hammer her over her friendship with Alinsky when she was in school. For that matter, just about every scandal from the 80’s and 90’s involving Hillary isn’t worth bringing up. Yes, those scandals say something about her character. However it’s old news that the public doesn’t care about. What will matter in 2016 is ideas and the candidates vision for the future of America. If we can’t win on Hillary’s record and her vision, we’re not going to win on her ancient past.

Here’s my point, if Obama’s past didn’t matter neither will Hillary’s. No one cared about Obama’s 90’s associations with terrorist Bill Ayers. No one cared about the fact that he was raised by communists.

Yes, people like us on the right cared about these things. I care about Hillary’s associations with Alinsky. However we have to face the facts, if the public didn’t care about Obama’s association with a terrorist 20 years ago they aren’t going to care about Hillary’s association with a radical revolutionary 40 years ago.

I’m not a liberal and I wasn’t blogging in 2001. At the time I thought the release of his arrest record was ridiculous. We knew Bush had been a drunk and that he had sworn off alcohol before he ran for Governor of Texas. You have to be willing to allow people to change in life. People grow up, they change their minds. In Bush’s case he discovered faith in Jesus Christ as an adult and swore off drinking.

In fairness, we have to at least allow for someone like Hillary to change her mind over the course of 40 years. On some level I think she has changed. She likes the trappings of power and in some ways it has shifted her away from the radical politics of Alinsky. She’s still a liberal, to the left of Bill and to the right of Obama. But can we say that she’s a radical in the Occupy Wall Street or even Cass Sunstein or Van Jones sense? I’m not sure the answer is yes.

I doubt that three percent of the electorate even know who
Alinsky was.
I’ll be that less than half that number know of any connection between the two.
How would they? Neither the RINOs nor the MSM would dream of mentioning it.

I agree that in 2008 the GOP should have hammered Obama on his association with Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers. They didn’t do a very good job because those two are easy to hate. One preaches sermons declaring “god damn america” and says all sorts of racist nonsense from the pulpit. The other is an unrepentant domestic terrorist whose group killed people in bombings.

The problem with going after Hillary with Alinsky is that no one knows who he is. He’s been dead for 40+ years, there isn’t a lot of audio or video out there on the guy. People aren’t going to take the time to read Rules for Radicals, they won’t read Hillary’s college thesis paper. Wright was easy to go after, his sermons were available online and his association with Obama was recent. Ayers is the same. Practically speaking, it would be very difficult to attack Hillary using quotes from books and newspapers that are decades old.

"Americans accepted Obama’s associations with Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright and a host of other radicals and communists."

Because - apart from Jeremiah Wright - they were mostly unaware of those associations, which were lied about by Obama and/or airbrushed out by the media. I cannot imagine the media ignoring parallel instances of youthful right-wing extremism - real extremism - by a Republican or conservative candidate.

All that matters in the 2016 Presidential race is what Hillary will do as President.

Having a "deep friendship" in college, when someone finds their worldview and vision of life, where there is a clear documented symbiosis of vision with the 'godfather' of lies, the neo-Marxist who loves everything about Stalin but merely chooses different tactics to implement marxism in the world by subterfuge and deceitfulness ... who dedicated his book to Luficer ...

This isn't ... "I didn't inhale" ... or some other youthful indiscretion! This is the evil at Hillary's core. This should be a part of defining who Hillary is and how it WILL dramatically affect what she will do as President in 2016.

To the extent that this gets any MSM play at all, it will be in the form: "The right has dredged up some old letters between Hillary Clinton and the late social critic Saul Alinsky, but the American people aren't interested in debating the youthful indiscretions or enthusiasms of the candidates. Rather, they want to hear about the candidates solutions for today's problems."

Keep in mind, this would only be said about the youthful indiscretions and enthusiasms of liberals. Such youthful indiscretions on the part of a conservative would be said to "raise serious questions" about the candidates character and fitness for office.

The problem with going after Hillary with Alinsky is that no one knows who he is. He’s been dead for 40+ years ...

I would love to be a consultant for a POTUS candidate and produce the 30 second video primer to introduce the world to Hillary's deeply close personal friend and mentor with their shared marxist vision ...

Following the mess caused by eight years of 0bama's marxist islamic rule, I think the voting public would catch the drift ...

Electoral outcomes are influenced by voter intensity. Conservatives need to know what they are up against, even if the media and ignorati waffle, and oppose it as if their lives depended on it. Like Obama, Hillary formed her leftist views in youth and has not changed a whit. Is she not carrying out precisely the plan she stated to Alinsky — to work from within the system? Like Obama’s, her career has been empty of accomplishments, and she will campaign on platitudes, feelings, and estrogen. Both still share Alinsky’s goals and will work to achieve them once in power; do you approve?

....like they know Cloward and Piven, and so on.

0bama's Real Crime

The most salient part of the book takes us back to Columbia University, where Root himself was a political science and pre-law major while Obama was ostensibly in the same major at the same school at the same time. This is the part of the book where Root unveils his counter-intuitive and astonishing “reverse birther” theory. In the name of avoiding spoiler alerts, will leave the readers to unpack this themselves.

The bigger point about Columbia is that Root outs this Ivy university as being ground zero for the planning and hatching of the murder plot. As he says, “it all started at Columbia.” He buttresses his argument with the fact that Cloward and Piven hatched their evil scheme in the 60’s -- as professors at Columbia.

Root adds that “my classmates at Columbia didn’t just hate capitalism. They were also atheists who openly despised Judeo-Christian values… we spent our days learning, discussing and debating a plan to destroy America from within.”

The problem with going after Hillary with Alinsky is that no one knows who he is.

Then use this as a way to educate them. I would love to see HiLIARy trying to defend her Alinsky thesis

Keep hammering the point

In theory it would be great to educate folks about Alinsky. However let’s be realistic here. You’re not going to get people to listen when we talk about Alinsky because to make the connection between Alinsky and Hillary requires too much thought. In fact, to view the connection negatively requires too much time.

So in other words, they don’t know Alinsky is. How many people outside of Free Republic readers and listeners of Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity (who may all be the same people) know who Alinsky, Cloward or Piven are? Honestly, if you went on the street I guarantee 95% wouldn’t have the slightest idea who any of those people are nor would they particularly care.

You way under estimate how many people are now aware of that....but moreover, you way underestimate the power of a campaign. You are thinking like a Republican consultant - you are trying to meet the voters in their ignorance instead of running a campaign to enlighten them.

I think you overestimate the ability of the public to understand or appreciate the danger of socialism. It was easier when the Soviets still existed, they were a direct threat and it was relatively easy to rally people against extreme leftists. (to say nothing of leftists bombing buildings and kidnapping people in the 60’s and 70’s)

However since the collapse of the Soviet Union it’s become increasingly difficult to campaign against themes like socialism or communism. Part of it is that conservatives ceded control of the government schools to the left decades ago. We’re now reaping that reward, kids graduate predisposed to oppose capitalism if they even know what it is. Worse, they graduate expecting government to “do something” about every problem because that’s what they’ve been taught for 12 years.

We used to be able to rally some of these people to our side based on shared hatred of the Soviet Union or shared ties to what remained of the church or capitalism. These days those ties have been destroyed and it’s going to take more than a campaign to fix the problem. How can you campaign against something that people don’t recognize as a problem no matter how much you tell them it is?

Certainly you make some good points that I agree with, but the idea that these letters do not matter unless the majority of the public at large understands them is where you are wrong. They matter, meaning they should be talked about - not because they are a magic bullet.

A lot of things matter to a degree in an election - a flip of 2-3% can make a tremendous difference. If Hillary can be radicalized, then that could be 2-3% easy. Could cost her some Wall Street money up front also.

I agree that a 2% swing could be the difference. In that you’re right, radicalizing Hillary might work. There’s a flip to that though. The attempt to radicalize Hillary could easily gain her sympathy, especially among women voters. It’s also possible that radicalizing her will result in a no net gain for conservatives or even a net loss.

When Obama was radicalized (never enough but the attempt was made) in 2008 the left and media cried racism. They’ll cry sexism this time around.

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