Stop me if you’ve heard this one: A black man and a white man walk into a bar and beat Hillary Clinton. Why? Because she’s a misogynist.
Seriously. She hates women.
And now she has a lifetime of accomplishments for women to look back upon, um, fondly?
Married to Bill Clinton — check; lost Barack Obama — check; lost to Donald Trump– check. In most states I think that legally qualifies as bingo.
The rest of the stuff she imposed upon herself– the cheating, the lying, the covering up– will just be a footnote in history to those top three losers, er, losses, or whatever. That is, if she doesn’t end up in jail.
The first woman cabinet member convicted of treason will just another historic night to look forward to.
The Democrats have brought us so many historic firsts.
We’ll have to get even.
Seriously.
In all seriousness, Hillary Clinton’s loss to Donald Trump has one other salutary effect that hasn’t been spoken about. And it’s more important than any other thing: It tells our daughters that it’s never okay to sell out to the man.
A lifetime ago Hillary Clinton said “I do.” But she didn’t say “I do” to love and marriage, or to a man. She said “I do” to power. Because of that compromise, she lost the sympathy of the American people and, perhaps, maybe she lost whatever was human and sympathetic about her.
People were always uncomfortable with Hillary Clinton.
That was something wrong with her — something was seriously wrong with her.
She was stupid enough, in a paraphrase of Bill Murray, to want to be president of United States. And she set out upon it in exactly the wrong way, through a dower marriage provision enforced a long time ago. If she really wanted to shatter that glass ceiling for women, she shouldn’t have constructed a life that, by her own craftsmanship, was constructed of bulletproof glass.
Every time she tried to shatter that ceiling, the hammer, or the bullet, or whatever, bounced back at her.
The American people saw this all.
Today liberals are struggling to talk to their children about the election of Donald Trump. Fortunately for America, children really don’t listen much to their parents anyway. What they do, instead, is watch their parents, and their elders.
And we no longer have to talk to our daughters about the false choice that Hillary Clinton made. We don’t have to worry about telling girls that selling them into servitude to a man who cheats and lies is a proper path to power.
Hillary as a power is gone. What’s left is Hillary as a cautionary tale.
Politicians often forget that what we do is infinitely more important than the things we say.
The rhetoric of the campaign will be forgotten by all but a few of us who will remember it for purely professional reasons. What will be remembered is that the American people picked someone who did something with their life, even if he occasionally said something foolish, over a fool who picked a foolish life and lived it foolishly, even if she occasionally said something wise.
Hillary Clinton was a bad example for women to follow. She was beat by Barack and Donald — and Bill — because no self-respecting woman should sell what she has sold in quest for power.
And I’m seriously happy I don’t have to explain that to anyone anymore.
John Ransom is finance and economics writer/editor with offices in DC, Singapore and SE Asia specializing in global markets and security.