To steal a line from Hillary Clinton, the explicit comments Donald Trump made in 2005 that came out Friday are deplorable and have been rightfully condemned by (basically) everyone.
This also includes the GOP candidate’s running mate. There have also been calls for him to hand over the race to Mike Pence. It won’t happen.
Donald’s comments were clearly disgusting and don’t fall “banter,” “guy talk” or “locker-room talk.” They were much worse. If you were surprised by such comments, you clearly hold the man in a higher regard than I do.
He has since come out and apologized, which is surprising for a man who doesn’t even ask God for forgiveness. Along with that, his wife Melania condemned the statements and said they weren’t from the man she knows.
This, though, hasn’t stopped the piling on of the Donald.
Enabler-in-chief?
Now, I am not here to defend Donald nor to defend his comments as my views on him have been made quite clear. I am, though, a big fan of intellectual continuity. To me, there’s no sense in being pro-life while supporting the death penalty.
It’s extremely important that if we, as a society, are going to condemn Donald then we must do the same to Hillary. It doesn’t make sense to paint him as terrible but leave out Hillary who in her time has made equally deplorable comments.
Hillary is by no means clean when it comes to poor treatment of women. She who tweeted that all victims of sexual assault should be believed does not have a great record of doing so.
Hillary has repeatedly smeared her husband’s alleged victims of sexual misconduct. This is not just me; in the past week and a half the Washington Post and New York Times have both published stories detailing Bill’s past transgressions.
First, Hillary did a lot to try and squash the stories of Bill’s accusers in the 1990s. While I admit that some of these stories are secondhand, they are from reliable sources who remain friends with the Clintons.
Hillary is not dumb enough to say such terrible things in public, especially if there is a chance of a hot mic. She publicly denied the story of Gennifer Flowers, whom Bill admitted to have had an affair with in 1998.
Hillary called her “some failed cabaret singer, with not much of a resume to fall back on.” She also told Esquire magazine in 1992 that she would “crucify” Flowers if she could questioned her.
Former White House Communications Director George Stephanopoulos wrote in his book that Hillary said “we have to destroy her story” when another woman accused Bill of sexual assault.
Zero morals
There’s also the famous rape trial where Hillary defended the rapist.
The biggest implication from this is that there is an inherent difference in being a good defense lawyer and being a bad person.
Hillary did her constitutional duty when called upon — I’m not denying or criticizing her for that. If anything, I commend her for doing so.
I’m also not not calling her out for some of the legal moves she made. Looking at the underwear and recognizing the issues regarding how the police handled and tested the evidence was just Hillary being a good defense lawyer. If I were a lawyer, I would’ve done the same.
But that wasn’t all she did.
In released audio tapes, Hillary said that she lost her faith in polygraph tests after the alleged rapist passed one (and subsequently laughed) when interviewing with Arkansas reporter Roy Reed. This could be interpreted as Hillary admitting her knowledge and belief that the defendant was guilty. That is why it is so shocking what Clinton accused the victim of in an affidavit on page 34.
Hillary used “sources” to say that the victim “emotionally unstable” and “stubborn;” that she sought after and fantasized about older men who she had claimed assaulted her before.
Hillary also used a child psychologist to be an expert witness, claiming that children in early adolescence fantasize about sexual experiences (quite Freudian, isn’t it?). These actions are morally and ethically reprehensible whether you agree with her politics.
Double trouble
I’m not here to defend Donald’s comments since they’re horrendous and there’s no arguing for that. I’ve been in a multitude of locker rooms in my life and, so far, I’ve never heard anyone advocate for sexual assault like Donald did in the leaked audio.
I don’t, however, excuse Hillary’s words and actions in the past. It is extremely and intellectually dishonest to go after one person for comments made long ago and not apply that same logic to the other person.
“I’m not voting for a man who brags about sexual assault, or a woman who covers it up,” said Austin Petersen, the former Libertarian presidential candidate of this year’s race.
We’ve chosen two terrible people, America.
Senior staff columnist Jorden Smith is a political science junior and president of the College Republicans. He can be reached at opinion@thedailycougar.com.
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“Let’s not forget the other candidate’s sordid past” was originally posted on The Daily Cougar