[Very interesting to read a British take on Clinton’s unpopularity. -egg]
Mrs Clinton’s former congressional colleagues—including the Republicans she wooed assiduously on Capitol Hill, though they had sought to destroy her husband’s presidency, and her, in the 1990s—speak even more admiringly of her. “I got on very well with her, she’s a likeable person. When it comes to dealing with Congress, she’d be a big improvement on Barack Obama,” says Don Nickles, a former Republican senator from Oklahoma who helped wreck the health-care reform Mrs Clinton tried to launch in 1993, and with whom she then worked to extend unemployment benefits. “She’s hard-working, true to her word and very professional,” says Tom Reynolds, a former Republican congressman who collaborated with her in upstate New York. “That’s not just in the Senate. She’s been like that all her life.”
This, to put it mildly, is not a characterisation supported by Mrs Clinton’s ratings. Around 55% of Americans have an unfavourable view of her; about the same number do not trust her (see chart). Yet, among those who know Mrs Clinton, even critics praise her integrity. She is a politician, therefore self-interested and cynical at times—yet driven, they say, by an overarching desire to improve America. More surprising, given the many scandals she has been involved in, including an ongoing furore over her use of a private e-mail server as secretary of state, not many of those who have dealt with her seem to think her particularly shifty. Even some of her foes say the concern about her probity is overblown. “People can go back decades and perhaps criticise some of the judgments that were made,” Michael Chertoff, who was the Republican lead counsel in one of the first probes into Mrs Clinton, the Senate Whitewater Committee, but has endorsed her, told Bloomberg. “That is very, very insignificant compared to the fundamental issue of how to protect the country.”
What then explains the depths of Mrs Clinton’s unpopularity, which on November 8th will drive millions of Americans to justify voting for a man whom they have heard boast of groping women? Having opened up a six-point lead in recent weeks, she is nonetheless likely to prevail. Yet she would return to the White House as its most-reviled new occupant of modern times. Mr Trump has suggested she could even be assassinated—and the experience of his rallies suggests he might be right. Neck veins thrumming, his supporters call Mrs Clinton “evil”, and a “killer”.
