Hillary as Nixon

In a noteworthy column entitled, “Hillary Milhous Clinton,” progressive-socialist Evan Thomas compared Hillary’s “resentful, suspicious attitude toward the press” to that of Richard Nixon. Whoa!

Thomas added that:

Like Nixon, she sees enemies everywhere. Like Nixon, she is guarded and secretive. Nixon was, by his own description, an introvert in an extrovert’s business. Hillary is not painfully shy like Nixon, but she hardly comes across as a politician who loves people. Reporters who have long covered the Clintons note that . . . Hillary prefers to stay holed up in the waiting room for as long as possible.

Thomas elaborated, writing:

We have now been watching Mrs. Clinton on the national stage for more than two decades, since at least 1992 when her husband first ran for president. If you think that past is prologue, there is every reason to believe that President Hillary Clinton would spend her presidency lashing out at her enemies as she ducks small scandals and possibly large ones. She would be aggrieved and dodgy.

[She displays] Nixonian tendencies to try to stonewall and cover up. Her handling of the Clinton Foundation and email controversies is right out of the Nixon play book: Treat every new revelation as old news, attack the messenger as biased, reveal only what you have to—the old “modified, limited hangout,” in the parlance of Nixon aide John Ehrlichman.

[A President Clinton] will be easily aggrieved and suspicious about the media. She will be self-righteous about her own essential goodness. She will have a sharp temper, though she will tolerate her husband’s excesses. She will run an aggressive PR operation that will stonewall as long as possible.

Thomas concludes that “Nixon’s downfall was predictable,” with personality flaws “well known before he was elected. So are Hillary’s.”  

So are Hillary’s!

Tom Galvin, a former reporter for the liberal New York Daily News, seconds Thomas’ comparison of Hillary to Nixon:

there’s just always been something awkward about her relationship with the American electorate. [After] “Tricky Dick” . . . re-emerged in 1968 he was the “New Dick.” And that lasted just long enough for his paranoia, and darker angels, to resurface. No one ever doubted Nixon’s strategic brilliance, his understanding of power politics and ability to navigate policy issues. But he was an awkward, and ultimately, untrusted figure. Hillary Clinton is edging dangerously close to this narrative.

Liberals comparing Hillary to Nixon seems not-so-subtle longing for an alternative.