Christine Chaplik, March 5, 2016
Most widely held view about Hillary Clinton is that she
lacks integrity and principle. Her email server scandal is a classic example of
her integrity and principle problems. Another such hot example includes her
scandal concerning whether she formed policies as Secretary of States to favor
major donors to the Clinton Foundation. Either of these issues could put her
into legal ordeals and end her campaign. No one knows when and how that will
happen. All Bernie Sanders needs is to wait for these episodes to unfold and
cash in on them.
Bernie Sanders seems to have stayed away from addressing
these scandals. Instead, he showed political modesty by not running sewer
campaign. But, the Republicans will not show such courtesy. Sooner or later
they will dig out the dirt.
However, Bernie has addressed Hillary’s corruption when it has
direct relation to his core policy issues. Particularly Bernie addressed speech fees of $675,000 that Hillary took from Goldman Sachs and demanded that she
show the transcripts of her speeches since she claims that she has sincere commitment
to taming Wall Street. But, Hillary refused to release the transcripts.
Perhaps it was difficult for Hillary to explain why she took
the money. One possibility is that she wanted to send a message that she would
not use populist rage against Wall Street during her campaign and would work
with Wall Street. But the boarder reason may lie in the fundamental
relationship between the Clintons and their wealthy friends and benefactors.
This very relation between Hillary Clinton and big money interest groups proves
that she will serve their (corporations/Wall Street) interests first and people’s
interests come in second. If she becomes presidents, she will definitely pursue
policies and regulations that will benefit the big corporations.
It is obvious that Hillary Clinton was paid huge sum of
money not only for speaking, but also for underlying commitment to serve those
big interest groups she took money from. In-depth investigation might reveal motive
for such payment and many more untold stories of corruption.
Bernie has much more material to work with, the extent of
Hillary’s corporate speaking is considerably greater. Her 2014 tax return shows
she received $9.68million as speech fees in 2013 alone. She raised about $21.7million from 91 speaking engagement from January 2013 to April 2015. These
talks made her a spectacularly wealthy woman.
Bernie Sanders could demand transcripts of all those 91
public talks Hillary earned speaking fees from. They might help to have a glimpse
into her real plan for the country. If he made these 91 talks an issue in every
speech, in every debate, in every interview, he could force it into the public
and media eye. Hillary knows this is a deadly issue for her.
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