About Charles Hugh Smith
My articles My offerMy siteAbout meMy videosMy books
Follow on:TwitterFacebookYoutubeAmazon
Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump
This tells you everything you need to know about how Hillary will operate as President: there will be no honesty, transparency or truth, ever.
Hillary’s bid for the presidency is no longer defensible; it’s time to bring back Bernie Sanders as the Democratic nominee.
The issue isn’t Hillary Clinton’s health per se; what is indefensible is her response to legitimate questions of the American public regarding her health.
Hillary Clinton has disqualified herself to be President of the United States because she is incapable of telling the truth about anything. There is no such thing as truth or transparency in the Clinton persona and campaign; everything is an ongoing experiment in perception management.
First one narrative is floated; if the narrative shifts the public perception positively, it is defended to the death, and anyone questioning it is instantly accused of being a conspiracy theorist from the “vast right-wing conspiracy” that has been Hillary’s favorite defense for 30 years.
If this tried-and-true attack fails, then the questioners are accused of being sexist, partisan, etc.
If the first trial balloon narrative doesn’t gain public perception traction, it’s quickly dropped and another explanation is unleashed on a willing-to-accept-anything-as-“fact”-from-Hillary mainstream media.
So when the “overheated” explanation in 79-degree weather doesn’t get traction, then it is dropped in favor of pneumonia, which mysteriously puts most sufferers in bed but Hillary declares that she feels great.
This process of replacing explanations and narratives, interspersed with attacks on anyone who questioned the previous narrative, is repeated until the perception management result is satisfactory. Hillary is clearly incapable of honesty–the word has no meaning, because all communication is aimed at concealing or obscuring the facts of the matter and defending what is visibly indefensible as if perception management is the same as the truth. It is not the same, but Hillary is incapable of discerning the difference.
This reliance on attacking the questioner to delegitimatize what is a legitimate inquiry also disqualifies Hillary. The American public has a legitimate interest in how Hillary Clinton benefited from the Clinton Foundation’s hundreds of millions of dollars in contributions from overseas donors during her stint as secretary of state.
Hillary collapsing
The American public also has a legitimate interest in the health of presidential candidates. John F. Kennedy’s poor health was masked by a compliant media in the early 1960s, but that sort of duplicity is no longer condoned. The American public wants an accurate accounting of the candidate’s health.
As you view the clip of Hillary collapsing, study the body language of her multiple handlers. I’m not referring to the Secret Sevice agents; I’m referring to her private handlers and aides. Note their extreme defensiveness about anyone seeing what was happening to Hillary. Their way of propping her up doesn’t look like it was the first time they had to prop her up; their actions were practiced, automatic.
They are accustomed to propping her up and masking her true condition from the public. Study the clip; it’s all there, in plain view.
Their hyper-wary posture was not just an attempt to shield the candidate from anyone seeing a moment of weakness; their over-protective watchfulness for “eyes on the candidate” is 24/7. Their only job is to mask the truth of Hillary’s condition, whatever it may be.
This tells you everything you need to know about how Hillary will operate as President: there will be no honesty, transparency or truth, ever. Life for Hillary boils down to managing perceptions and hiding facts–inconvenient or otherwise. This is not a campaign strategy–it is her default mode of existence, the only way she knows how to operate.
Hillary’s health may or may not be decisive, but what is decisive is how she has banished honesty, truthfulness, candor and transparency. The issue for Hillary and her handlers is not the facts of her health; it’s how to manage public perceptions of her health in a satisfactory manner.
We don’t just need to know whether Hillary suffers from conditions beyond allergies and pneumonia. What counts most is whether she is capable of being honest, forthright and truthful about legitimate, important issues. She has clearly proven that she is incapable of being honest and truthful about anything, very likely because she cannot distinguish between plain, simple truth and perception management.
Let’s be honest for a moment, and confess that this is a character flaw that disqualifies the candidate from holding office. The last two presidents who saw their job as hiding the truth and managing perceptions were Richard Nixon during the Watergate era, and Lyndon Johnson during the War on Vietnam.Attacking every legitimate inquiry as a “vast right-wing conspiracy” is not governance; it’s a paranoia and distrust of the American public that leads inexorably to catastrophes like Watergate and wars of choice that drag on as the bodies and lies pile up.
It’s time to bring back Bernie Sanders, a candidate who can tell the difference between the truth and perception management, someone who isn’t an embarrassment to the nation. I understand that Hillary’s coronation as Head of the Deep State has already been scheduled by the Powers That Be, but that doesn’t mean we too must lose the ability to differentiate between the truth and perception management.
My new book is The Adventures of the Consulting Philosopher: The Disappearance of Drake. For more, please visit the book's website.
At readers' request, I've prepared a biography. I am not confident this is the right length or has the desired information; the whole project veers uncomfortably close to PR. On the other hand, who wants to read a boring bio? I am reminded of the "Peanuts" comic character Lucy, who once issued this terse biographical summary: "A man was born, he lived, he died." All undoubtedly true, but somewhat lacking in narrative.
Tags: Donald Trump,Hillary Clinton,newslettersent
