Leave the Clintons alone, or the AIDS kid gets it
The headline is harsh, I recognize. But it is only a shorter, somewhat editorialized version of the op-ed piece in the Strib, written by Sharon Schmickle, a former reporter at the paper.
Don’t dismantle the Clinton Foundation, Schmickle pleads; it does good work. And she quotes the entirely impartial Donna Shalala: Shalala says that only the Clintons can do it.
All in all, the article, along with the emotional photo of a young African AIDS patient used by the Strib (of whom there was no mention or evidence that he was helped by the Clinton foundation) was a remarkable piece of sandbagging. Because in spite of what a string of CEOs, politicians, superintendents, and other assorted putative miracle workers have told us, most people are eminently replaceable.
Well, okay, Issac Stern wasn’t replaceable, but the Clintons’ brand of violin playing certainly is.
Unless you believe, of course, that the special ingredients in the Clintons’ success includes dangling the prospect of a little diplomatic corruption in front of the marks. I mean why else would Saudi Arabia and Bahrain — countries not well known for their humanist sentiment — pony up so handsomely? Even Schmickle admits as much.
Charity Navigator refuses to rate the Clintons’ foundation because of its opaque “business model.”
But truly, Schmickle doesn’t need to worry. The Clintons are untouchable.
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