Let's put our heads together on the Clinton e-mail scandal

[paulthompson]

169. One more thing

I want to add a bit more. I most definitely wouldn't be working on explaining this scandal if I thought it would help elect Trump! I wouldn't vote for Trump if he was the last person on Earth!

That said, I'm fully confident it won't come to a Trump vs. indicted-Clinton general election. The FBI is working full speed to make a decision one way or another by mid-May, as has been reported, precisely to avoid having some shocking thing come out right before the November general election. If this scandal is as bad as some fear, there still will be time for voters to pick Sanders, or for the Democratic establishment to find a replacement for Clinton to win the nomination with her delegates.

There are about 800 delegates chosen in June, so as long as any bombshell drops before then (if there's a bombshell!), Sanders should win the nomination. I'll bet that's part of the reason why the FBI has a self-imposed mid-May deadline, at the latest. It's not that they're pro-Sanders, but it would be crazy for them to come out with an indictment recommendation just after literally all the states have voted in the primaries!

The bottom line is, the facts are the facts, and if Clinton did a lot of unethical and/or criminal things, the powerful Republican media echo chamber will make sure the voters know all about them if it's Clinton in the general election. What we need to do is educate voters now, while there's still time for a Clinton alternative, so we can avoid the worst case scenarios.

What would be a tragedy is if it turns out that Clinton is obviously politically mortally wounded, but the media is so pro-Clinton that most voters don't learn about that until after she wins the nomination. Look what happened to Rahm Emmanuel in Chicago recently, where he managed to hide some awful things until just after his reelection. Then, once it was too late to matter, his popularity plummeted.

We have to fight hard to make sure that doesn't happen in this case.