So my invariable agreement with Edgar Allen Beem and respect for his good judgment ends. He surely nodded at his keyboard in finding Hillary Clinton “tougher than any of those wannabes on the right,” able to hold her own “in the mudslinging inside the Beltway,” and by virtue of those qualities and experience, “better qualified to run this country than any man in either party.” Edgar overlooks Hillary’s record: her White House health care initiative failure; her support as U.S. senator of the baseless, illegal, and immoral war on Iraq – squandered resources and empire run amok; subservience to Zionist racism and denial of any human dignity to millions of Palestinians, and, as secretary of state, her lack of significant achievements.

Weigh that against what are likely our agreed recognition that the major, even existential, issues of our time are reversing headlong destruction of our only environment; ending the rule of corporate greed and re-establishing a society that serves the common good (e.g., like the ’50s and ’60s); ending U.S. exceptionalism, militarism, and empire, and rejoining a world of justice and cooperation; restoring the rule of law and right to privacy that 9/11 became an excuse for subverting in creation of a security state, and doing right by the millions of hard-working undocumented immigrants, necessarily come here to survive after NAFTA ended their livelihoods. Has Hillary Clinton done anything significant to meet these challenges? Are these disqualifications insignificant?

William H. Slavick
Portland