Charles Krauthammer discussed what the State Department’s inspector-general report criticizing Hillary Clinton’s e-mail practices means for her campaign Thursday on Fox’s Special Report.
“I think if you do any serious examination of the report, there are half a dozen instances in which the campaign has either been deceptive or simply lied,” Krauthammer said.
“But I think in the end the main effect is not this specific issue. Anecdotes only have an effect on a candidate if they reinforce a pre-existing conception. And with her and her husband [Bill], the pre-existing conception, since the early 1990s, is that they skirt the rules. They live on the edge, they feel the rules don’t apply to them.”
He continued, “When they’re caught, they do word games: ‘It depends what “is” is,’ they will stonewall, they will withhold information. In the end they may confess, but way after they have calculated — up until now, correctly calculated — that people won’t care.”
This scandal, however, is different, Krauthammer believes.
“But that’s not going to happen here; there’s not enough time for this to wear away. It’s going to weigh on her in the sense that she broke the rules — her own rules, this is her own department. This is the Obama appointee. You can’t say it’s Ken Starr or it’s the Republicans or it’s some right-wing conspiracy. This is their own people, and that’s why it’s so damning. There’s no escaping it even with word games — it makes it worse.”
Hillary Clinton’s E-Mail Scandal -- State Department Report