By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK
Am I the one who is thinking about voting for Hillary? Not a chance. I have made my peace with voting for Donald Trump, warts and all. I don’t have much hope that he “will make America great again,” but he is the only chance we have to keep the Clintons from making it far worse than it already is.
I am not going to resort to the cliché about this being “the most important election of our lifetimes.” They say that about every election that I can recall. But it is an important election. Not only are the Clintons leftist ideologues; they are devious and dishonest leftist ideologues.
My interest just now is with Catholics who are voting for Hillary. The polls tell us there are quite a few of them. It is a puzzling phenomenon for me, especially in light of all the information that has come out about the influence-peddling that is at the heart of the Clinton Foundation.
Some of these Catholics may have been driven to back Hillary by the prospect of voting for Trump. Let’s exclude them for the moment for the sake of the discussion. The vast majority of Hillary’s Catholic backers would be voting for her even if her opponent were a more moderate Republican.
What do these Catholic supporters of Hillary say to themselves? Hillary is militantly pro-abortion, to the point of doing what Democrats once promised us they would not do: She favors taxpayer-financed abortions. She has led the charge to require religious institutions to provide coverage for abortion-inducing drugs in their employees’ health-care plans. In spite of her past statements defining marriage as a bond between a man and a woman, she now favors same-sex marriage.
She charges Donald Trump with not supporting our military commitments to our allies. Does that mean that Catholics who back her favor a more aggressive American military presence in the world? That can’t be. Liberal Catholics have a long record of calling for reduced American military spending and a less confrontational approach toward our enemies.
Do they like how tough-minded Hillary was when she worked to overthrow the government of Muammar Qadhafi in Libya? Did they do fist pumps when she proclaimed, with a chuckle, “We came, we saw, he died.” I defy a loyal reader of America or Commonweal to watch the news clips of Hillary making that statement and explain how what they are seeing fits within their view of the world.
Is it that Hillary’s Catholic supporters back her because they oppose Trump’s approach to trade? That can’t be. Check the publications that liberal Catholics favor. They have been in the lead in opposing “greedy” corporations that outsource American jobs. Well, that is Trump’s position. Are they now in favor of free trade and the benefits of global capitalism? Hillary has changed her mind so flagrantly on international trade agreements that The Washington Post decided to check the record.
She now says she is against the Trans-Pacific Partnership: “I oppose it now, I’ll oppose it after the election, and I’ll oppose it as president.” But, the Post writes, “She didn’t oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership when she was secretary of state, but rather promoted it. In 2012, during a trip to Australia, she called it the ‘gold standard’ of trade agreements.” What is it that liberal Catholics like about this? How adaptable she was when Bernie Sanders challenged her on this issue?
Is it that liberal Catholics do not believe the women who insist that Hillary led the effort to intimidate them into silence over Bill’s sexual advances, in some cases rape charges? All of the women? That is not the message we have been getting from liberal Catholics for decades now about the moral way to respond to women who make such accusations.
And finally, what of the long list of contributors to the Clinton Fund and organizations that paid Bill Clinton hundreds of thousands of dollars to make speeches? What do the Catholics who are backing Hillary believe was going on? We see the Clinton spokespersons on the talk shows barely able to keep a straight face when they make the case that there is no “smoking gun” indicating that Hillary acted directly while secretary of state to provide government access to any of these people or groups.
Why then do so many “good Catholics” (I’m not being sarcastic) intend to vote for Hillary? Let me make some guesses, trying to be as fair as I know how. If I am off the mark, I welcome hearing why from Catholics who back Clinton.
In some cases, it is an uninformed vote. We must not forget how many people are not “news junkies.” They don’t follow the issues. I am not saying they are stupid. Far from it. They may have great expertise in their professions, but they are “not that interested in politics.”
I am frequently struck by discovering how many bright and successful people there are who have — literally — never heard about the stories that rile all the commentators on Fox News: Hillary’s emails, her story about landing “under sniper fire” in Bosnia, “Filegate,” the missing Rose Law Firm files, Bill Clinton’s speaking fees, and so on.
These folks make up their minds on surface impressions. In Hillary’s case, they may be caught up in the emotions surrounding her position as the first woman candidate for the presidency. They buy the image the Democrats are pushing of Hillary as a friendly grandmother, and of Trump as a self-centered boor.
There are also those who are lifetime Democrats. They see the Democrats as the party of the “little guy.” That was why their parents and grandparents were Democrats, going back to the day when they got off the boat from Europe. They see the Republicans as the “rich man’s party.” These individuals are willing to overlook personal failures — even significant dishonesty, just as they do with their union leaders — in order to advance the Democratic Party’s agenda, which they see as in their economic interests.
I’ll give you an example of someone like that. He was ardently pro-life, a eucharistic minister in my old parish in a suburb of New York City about 30 years ago, a solid family man — who assured me that had never voted for a Republican in his life. He was a member of the Cement and Concrete Workers Union, who worked most of his life building the bridges that connect Manhattan to the rest of the world. He told me it was simple for him: “When the Republicans get in, I starve.”
You might say the Republicans were trying to save the taxpayers’ money when they cut back on spending, but for him that money came from his family.
If this man were still alive, I have no doubt he would be for Hillary. He was always honest with me. If someone pointed out her dishonesty, he would say, “All politicians are crooked.” If you told him she was pro-abortion, he would respond, “The Republicans never do anything to stop abortions.”
And what do I think he would say about the Clinton Fund? I think he would say that it is true that the Clintons have been trying to make themselves as rich as the East Coast bankers and Hollywood moguls that they socialize with — but that this is a character flaw he is willing to live with to keep the Democrats in the White House.
I think my old friend would agree that the Clintons would have been “rich” with the pensions they receive from their government jobs and book contracts once they left public office. But not like “rich” like the people who entertained them on Martha’s Vineyard and in Hollywood. Without the money that flowed in from the Clinton Foundation, the Clintons would always be nothing more than the “interesting” guests invited for the weekend at these places, never the equals of the Hollywood producers and hedge-fund managers.
The Clinton Foundation was a scheme to put them on equal footing with the movers and shakers. My old friend would have seen this as a character flaw of many in politics and show business, but, again, something he could live with the keep the Democrats in power.
Am I saying this should make us feel better or worse about the state the country is in? I am working on that one.
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