Hillary Clinton finally faced down her critics on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week. She fired back at Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) when he tried to get her to acknowledge that the entire story of an anti-Islamic video inflaming mobs who then murdered Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other brave Americans in Libya had been, to put it charitably, wholly unsubstantiated. All along, Hillary had acted as if this was someone else’s issue. She was, after all, the secretary of state who gets “1.43 million cables come into my office” a week. They’re all addressed to me, she petulantly shot back.

Now, just for a moment, let’s consider that statement. Can she really mean she has put in place no system for determining what she must see? She describes a process she allowed to stay in place for four long years that apparently is like drinking from a fire hose. No, that would be 1.43 million fire hoses. The military has a standard protocol for distinguishing routine cables from those that deserve higher priority and those that are urgent. An imminent threat to American lives would seem to justify an urgent category, wouldn’t you think?

That she was allowed to dance through this hearing with the press corps audibly swooning in the aisles is a national disgrace. “The Clintons have no shame,” their man George Stephanopoulos told us, “and that’s a great advantage in politics.”

And the Hillary press corps that exclaimed: “Memorable!” “A vivid impression!’” “A riveting performance”? They can gush. They can’t blush.

Maybe she’ll reprise it as a one-woman show on Broadway. Already, they are talking her up for 2016. Why not? With her incredible lightness of being, what could stop her?

Recall that famous political ad she ran in 2008. It’s the spot they called “3 a.m.” It shows a red telephone ringing urgently. The announcer talks about the call that might come into the White House at that hour. You and your family need to have a tested leader there when a crisis erupts somewhere in the world.

Like a crisis in Libya? With all due respect, Madame Secretary, those in mortal danger who called you at 3 a.m., who sent more than one of those “1.43 million cables” you complained of, got no answer. They got a busy signal.

But this total avoidance of responsibility is one of the longest running acts in Washington. As first lady, Hillary presided over the collapse of health care negotiations. She has seemingly swum away from that shipwreck without ever admitting that she was at the helm when the liner struck the rocks.

Worried about losing the liberal lock on Congress in 1994, she told Newsweek (Oct. 31, 1994) that abortion was “wrong.” She has spent the rest of her career pushing this “wrong” thing throughout the world.

Let’s not forget about her outrageous show of temper in Ottawa. Her open and tactless attack on Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government was unprecedented in all of Canadian-American relations. Even the liberal Toronto Globe and Mail was surprised by her “hot under the collar” choler.

Was she planning to celebrate the bicentennial of the War of 1812 by starting another?

Hillary denounced Harper for what? For trying to help save the lives of African mothers — without offering them abortions. Call the Nobel Peace Prize Committee.

Fox News’s senior analyst Brit Hume reviewed her tenure at Foggy Bottom. There’s no treaty, no doctrine, no breakthrough, no resolution of any intractable international problem. There’s no one thing for which she can credibly claim responsibility — except the skillful avoidance of responsibility.

Don’t worry, though. If your family members come under attack, if — God forbid — you lose a loved one overseas, you can be sure Hillary will be there to pat the casket, to caress the flag, and to go on TV to offer an emotion-filled testimony about them. Here’s a phone card. Save it for that 3 a.m. call.

Ken Blackwell served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Human Rights Commission (1991-93).