I am not politically savvy. I do not hold at my fingertips facts and data concerning all the current political issues. I am a middle aged, female, schoolteacher falling in the average range in most all demographics. However, I know with the deepest conviction that I could never, ever vote for Hillary Clinton. I do not respect her, I do not trust her, and I do not relate to her.
My bosses, all five of them, are strong, honest, and hardworking women. Any of them would make a better candidate for president than Hillary Clinton. It concerns me that society is so ready to elect a woman as president that it is willing to accept any one.
Respect
I do not know one single woman who would put up with Bill Clinton’s cheating games for her career. All the women in my world are strong. They have values and convictions. And they do not just spout them; they follow through them with actions. Stop telling me that a politician’s personal life has nothing to do with their political life. Who you are crosses barriers. People cannot put up fences for his or her different worlds (when you do try to do this in the South-we say you are “two-faced”). In September 2012, Historian William Chafe spoke to US News about his Clinton book, The Politics of the Personal. When Chafe was asked if Hillary knew or was surprised about the affairs, he said. ” …I think she was always aware of the likelihood that he was carrying on one-night affairs. When those became politically explosive, as happened on many occasions, certainly never more so than with Gennifer Flowers in 1992, she really had to decide how she was going to respond. What she did was to decide to save her husband, to rescue him. And she understood that one of the consequences of that was she would gain in terms of her own ability to exercise political power.” Why didn’t she do what the strong women I know would have (and have done)-kick his butt to the curb (president or not)? Every woman in America would be campaigning for Clinton now if she had. Her career would have gained because her actions would have been true.
Trust
Benghazi. She lied, people died, and then she lied again. People died. And when she was pushed for answers, she got miffed. Kyle Becker in the January 23, 2013 Washington Free Beacon says (in reference to Clinton), “Public accountability does matter, Mrs. Clinton. The days of Washington politicians pretending to hold themselves accountable during staged hearings that lead to nothing have to stop…” She screwed up, she changed her stories, and she was not held accountable. I am accountable for my job every single day. Aren’t you? Real women make mistakes, and true women admit those errors. Journalists who urge for the voters to get past Benghazi and move on clearly did not lose a family member in a botched operation that Clinton guided, touched, and then lied about repeatedly. I do not understand why every American does not ask for Benghazi answers daily? The business is unfinished and people died in Benghazi.
Relate
The day a woman is elected president the angels above will sing. It will indeed be glorious. I want to be able to relate to that woman. Oh, I do not mind if she is wealthy or a member of high society. Or if she is of a different race or culture. But I do want to be able to have a connection with her. Is she a mother, has she nursed a sick child in the middle of the night and then gotten up to work an eleven hour day, has she made a mistake and publically admitted it? Is she real? Does she have goals and dreams? The female bosses I work for balance many jobs-children, spouses or significant others, work, keeping up a home, and friendships, among other duties. And when they laugh or cry or stumble, I can relate to them. I understand them. So I work harder for them, for the company, and for myself. There is a connection. I cannot connect to Hillary, because I cannot see past her constructed and polished façade. Who is she really? I cannot find one single thing she has done for me to make me become better, or one single thing I have in common with her beyond the fact she is a woman. I do not relate to her.
But simply being a woman is not enough. I want to vote for a woman who has standards, who can say I messed up, who won’t put up with less than love in a relationship, who has compassion, who is truthful– like the strong and smart women I am surrounded by everyday. That woman is not Hillary Clinton.
Therefore, I cannot vote for Hillary Clinton. Ever.
