Hillary Clinton has been caught (red handed) using a personal server and personal email address to conduct sensitive government business. Her actions constitute a violation of at least two federal laws, one of which is criminal. Undoubtedly, the Chinese and Russians have been able to hack that account and steal vital national secrets. What she did was foolish, and disqualifies her from being President.
That said, I am not one of those citizens who actually believes he has a right to know everything the government does, when it does it or why. I don't think I'm entitled to know every personal matter ever experienced by the politicians that serve me or seek to serve me. In fact, I think the Federal Records Act, the Watergate Tapes, and the multitude of federal lawsuits against individual politicians were all - very - bad - ideas.
We are not entitled to know everything about everybody, even if they are a politician. We are not entitled to know about every conversation the Secretary of State has with the President of the United States. We just aren't. What the Secretary of State says to her staff during a crisis is important for history, but I do not have a right to know the details as they develop. What I am most concerned about is whether they get it right, not what communications they had in the process of getting it right or wrong. To insist that we be privy to every communication or every part of the process is to invite disaster. Decision makers and those who advise them must be free to articulate the good, the bad and the ugly. There must be an open discussion that is free from reprisal or the decision will be, at the very least, incomplete. It is not possible to make a good decision without good advisors, and it is not possible to get good advice from advisors who believe that speaking their mind will result in either personal humiliation, jail, extraordinary legal bills, general anxiety or personal destruction. The Clintons are particularly paranoid about that, which is undoubtedly one of the reasons Hillary set up her own personal server to hide her communications.
Let's be clear about what this is though. She violated federal law, she set up her server and email to, in fact, intentionally hide communications, and she felt she was entitled to do so. In the process, she also compromised national security. But, kind of like our bizarre debate about torture, our national policies have created this bizarre spectacle of a sitting Secretary of State, so afraid of her own frank communications, that she had to break the law in order hide them. Now, some would say: "Have the courage of your convictions. If you believe it in private, be willing to say it in public." To those people I say, pick your most uncomfortable decision and disclose, right now on Facebook, all of the various thoughts you had before coming to your ultimate conclusion. Let the public vet your inner most thoughts and fears. We are all more than willing to tell you where you went wrong. Better yet, disclose on Facebook your tax returns. Publish them for us all to see. Let's all take a look at your deductions and your expense receipts. Let's see how much you make. Let's see where you ate dinner on March 3rd and with whom.
The fact is that since Watergate, we have become too obsessed with our public servants and have created a truly dehumanizing experience for anyone wishing to serve. Your finances, your sex life, the things you said in college when your were 19, are all fair game and open to public ridicule. Nevertheless, once in office, even the most plastic politicians still cannot allow the rest of us to see every single communication they have in their official capacity. To do so would be irresponsible, and in a culture of irresponsible partisan politics, I cannot find it in my heart to blame a politician who does not trust that we the people will be fair in our criticism. After all, it's good television.
Like with everything else, the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction since Watergate. I really don't care how the job gets done, but I care deeply about the result. If Hillary needs to send 104 emails espousing bad ideas before sending one that precipitates a good result, I just don't care. Leadership is not easy, and there is no shortage of arm chair quarterbacks ready to use any ammunition they think they've found to embarrass an adversary for not getting the desired result. This is because true leadership has a second, and very ugly side to it. Sometimes leaders fail. One of my favorite pieces of advice came from one of my favorite law professors, Keith Beyler, who I'm sure heard it from someone else: "If you haven't lost a case, you haven't tried that many." In other words, to lose big, you have to be playing a big game.
American politicians are playing a big game. We are still the most powerful country in the world. World leaders still form their national policies around what our leaders think. Powerful nations still shape their national policies based on what they believe our leaders may or may not be willing to support. And the consequences for failure are enormous. Hillary Clinton obviously believes that she is above the law, especially if it is a bad law. For that reason, she should not be President. But we need to take a really close look at ourselves as a nation and decide whether we should require transparency in every aspect of public life, or whether maybe, just maybe, we should allow our leaders to lead.
Good decisions are never made in a vacuum. Neither are bad decisions. But the constant struggle between debate and disclosure has damaged our republic. Hillary Clinton should not be keeping secret email accounts, because she shouldn't have to. If you don't like the way she handled her duties, then don't vote for her. As a republic, we cannot absolve ourselves of the responsibly for having chosen poor leaders by acquiescing to poor policies and later crying about being misled. We are all smarter than that, and we should start voting like the responsible citizens we are.
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