The Divisiveness of Hillary Clinton

I've been called divisive more times than I can count, and for the life of me, I can't understand why. Politics is a divisive business, it's true, and out country has gotten more polarized with every passing year. . . Why am I seen as such a divisive figure and, say, Joe Biden and John Kerry aren't? . . . I'm really asking. I'm at a loss. - Hillary Clinton in What Happened

Is this woman so self-unaware that she doesn't see the differences between her own actions and other politicians? I can give a few quick examples of her divisiveness:

Let's start with the news that her husband had been having an affair with a White House intern in the late 1990s. When Bill ran in 1992 he and Hillary did an interview where he seemed to say "I've had affairs in the past but I won't have any if I'm elected president". Hillary knew of her husband's long history with other women better than anyone. She employed a staff just to quash these women from speaking out. So she had no reason to doubt that Bill had indeed been having an affair. But that's not how she reacted. She denied everything and (this is the relevant part) blamed a "vast right-wing conspiracy". To no one's surprise, the affair was real but Hillary never went back and admitted that she'd been wrong to claim that Republicans made it up.

But that's ancient history. Just two years ago there was this exchange at a Democratic debate:

ANDERSON  COOPER: Which enemy that you made during your political career are you most proud of?

CLINTON: Well, in addition to the NRA, the health insurance companies, the drug companies, the Iranians; probably the Republicans

So Hillary named Republicans as enemies that she was proud to have. She refused to back away from that statement when asked about it later.

In July She tweeted: The Republican Party platform is so hateful, you'd think Donald Trump wrote it himself.

Then at a public fundraiser Hillary said some things that she'd previously been only saying to small, private groups: If I were to be grossly generalistic, I would say you can take Trump supporters and put them in two big baskets," Clinton said. "There are what I call the deplorables -- the racists, you know, the haters, and the people who are drawn because they think somehow he's going to restore an America that no longer exists. So just eliminate them from your thinking, because we've always had an annoying prejudicial element within our politics.

She later backed away from using "half" but it was too little, too late. Republicans knew that she really thought of all of us as deplorable.

All of this is very divisive. Hillary sees the world as us vs. them with "them" being the Republicans. You don't see Biden or Kerry doing things like these.

Then there is her book tour. I can remember losing candidates going back to Humphrey in 1968. They all took their loss fairly gracefully. Humphrey and Gore tough college for a while. McGovern, McCain and Kerry returned to Congress. Gore eventually reinvented himself as an environmental profit and Nobel Peace Prize winner. Mondale, Dole, Romney and Dukakis pretty much bowed out of politics. Carter reinvented himself helping to build houses for Habitat for Humanity.

Absolutely none of these losing presidential candidates wrote a book complaining about how they deserved to win then went on a speaking tour contesting the election. Hillary is unique in being the worst loser in modern history. And that makes her divisive.