Where there’s smoke there’s fire

The prize quote of this incendiary political year may go to Hillary Clinton. In response to Donald Trump’s charge that the Clintons set up a pay-for-play arrangement that granted big contributors access to Clinton while she was secretary of state, she said, “My work as secretary of state was not influenced by any outside forces. I made policy decisions based on what I thought was right to keep Americans safe and protect our interests abroad.” Clinton added, “I know there’s a lot of smoke, and there’s no fire.”

Can there be smoke without fire? I asked an expert. My son, Jay Thomas, has spent most of his professional life as a firefighter. He tells me: “Very simply put, where there is smoke there is, or was, fire. Smoke is a by-product of combustion. There are three stages of fire: smoldering, incipient, and free burning. Each one [emits] smoke.”

The Clintons have been lighting and trying to put out “fires” started by the combustible material of their shifting ethics and morals at least since Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas. Earliest memory recalls Hillary Clinton making a killing in the cattle futures market. A 1994 report by Charles R. Babcock, staff writer for The Washington Post, revealed a type of smoke screen surrounding her dubious practice:

“Hillary Rodham Clinton was allowed to order 10 cattle futures contracts, normally a $12,000 investment, in her first commodity trade in 1978, although she had only $1,000 in her account at the time, according to trade records the White House released yesterday.

“The computerized records of her trades, which the White House obtained from the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, show for the first time how she was able to turn her initial investment into $6,300 overnight. In about 10 months of trading, she made nearly $100,000, relying heavily on advice from her friend James B. Blair, an experienced futures trader.

“The new records also raise the possibility that some of her profits—as much as $40,000—came from larger trades ordered by someone else and then shifted to her account. …”

It always seems the Clintons manage to escape accountability for anything that would lead to the arrest, indictment, conviction and jailing of just about anyone else.

The Associated Press, hardly a right-wing entity that the Clintons frequently complain about, first reported the story about Hillary Clinton’s foreign visitors to the State Department, who “happened” to have given large amounts of cash to the Clinton Foundation. The wire service received a partial schedule and has requested the rest of her calendar by Oct. 15. The State Department has said it won’t provide the calendar until after the election, possibly by Dec. 30.

How convenient for her. It’s been seven months since a federal judge ordered monthly releases of her daily schedule.

Hillary Clinton’s ethical challenges might stand out more were it not for Donald Trump’s own record when it comes to telling the truth.

In the end, will it matter? If we care too little about ethics and morals in our leaders, it shows we do not hold these virtues in high regard. That says at least as much about us, as it does about them. And that’s not blowing smoke.

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