Released Hillary e-mails show how Clinton Foundation donors bought themselves State Dept. access

It's really not hard to put this together. On the one hand, you've got a highly ambitious, money-grubbing politician who is obsessed with becoming president - but who has to settle for Secretary of State because actually getting elected proves difficult when you're an unappealing and totally inept candidate. On the other hand, you've got this person's ex-husband - oh, sorry, ex-president husband - who along with her has set up a "global charity" that rakes in big dollars from the most influential people in the world. The very same people who are likely to come before the State Department with all kinds of issues. So who do you think is going to get the quickest attention from the Secretary of State? Perhaps the very same people who are lining her pockets via this shameless Foundation? You'd presume that if you have a lick of sense, but you would also welcome evidence that proves it. And now we have it, via the latest release of the Hillary e-mails she so desperately tried to keep out of the public eye.

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The Washington Post reports on the pattern these e-mails reveal. People who gave generously received generous attention from the Secretary of State:

The e-mails that mention donors — numbering a few dozen out of the thousands of pages of messages released so far — do not show that financial supporters were able to alter policy decisions. But the dynamic points to one of the unusual aspects of Clinton’s record at the State Department. Because she and her family have raised so much money over the years from wealthy individuals and major corporations — for political campaigns as well as the sprawling global charity founded by her husband, former president Bill Clinton — her public business as secretary inevitably brought her in contact with private interests that helped boost her family’s philanthropy and income. Republicans have accused Hillary Clinton of potential conflicts of interest in mixing her public and private work. Clinton aides declined to comment for this article but have waved away such suggestions in the past. They have said that interactions with prominent players in the world of finance and politics are to be expected of a secretary of state and that there is no indication of any impropriety. The e-mails show that, in some cases, donors were granted face-to-face contact with top officials.

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For the most part the Post played in pretty straight in writing this story, but you have to love (as in, not love) the comment about "Republicans" accusing Hillary of conflicts of interest, as if no one but her partisan opponents sees a problem with any of this. The story details a myriad of examples where Clinton Foundation donors, including George Soros and Bill Gates, got access and prompt attention for any number of matters. Now let's consider the ClintonWorld defense that the Secretary of State would naturally come in contact with folks like this as a result of what the job entails. That is actually true, which is the very reason it's inappropriate to be running a global foundation seeking dollars from such people while simultaneously doing the job of Secretary of State. If Soros, Gates and others want to bring matters before the State Department, let them do it in the normal way. Given their status, you wouldn't think they'd have a hard time getting a phone call returned by a State Department that played it straight. Instead, because of the Clinton Foundation, it was easy for these guys to skip to the front of the line simply by writing a check. And people at this level know full well that this is how Hillary plays. You want access? You pay. The Clintons are first and foremost all about money for themselves, and the people who have it figure it's easier to just pay up than to object on the basis of some ethical principle, assuming they would even be inclined toward any such objection. No wonder Hillary is getting so aggressive in her attacks on the Benghazi committee. Without the committee's work, we would never have known she used a private homebrew server exclusively for all her work-related e-mails, and we would not be reading any of the information that now reveals just how big a self-serving schlock operation she was running at the State Department. She's hoping that she can discredit the committee to such an extent that the media will stop covering any information that came to light as a result of its work. I don't think that's going to happen, but I suppose I should not underestimate the media's willingness to do the bidding of Democrats. Covering up what's coming to light is really Hillary's only hope at this point, and she's going to need the help of the press to do it.

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