What difference does it make …

I was having this discussion with someone the other day. 

They were going off about Hillary’s e-mails, Whitewater, the Rose Law firm papers, Benghazi, the shady deals with the Clinton Foundation, and yet Hillary seems to get a pass on everything.

I agreed.    

But to quote Hillary herself, I also said:  “What difference does it make?”   

I’m convinced the general public doesn’t really care about any of Hillary’s shortcomings.  So she doesn’t need to pin all her woes on a vast right-wing conspiracy or Republicans obsessed with “phony scandals.”  It’s a waste of time.  Most people aren’t paying any attention in the first place. 

Because the public, frankly, doesn’t care what she’s done, or why, now or in the past.  

In short, nobody but Fox News and a handful of fringe sites are paying any attention to any of Hillary’s past or current baggage.  It’s not even a blip on the radar for most people.  Hillary may be a pathological liar and a weasel – or not – but it doesn’t matter to a large part of the population. 

She hasn’t convinced the public to trust her; it’s more that they believe there’s nothing to see here.  Politicians lie, Hillary lies, so what’s new?  Interminable hearings about Benghazi, what happened to Hillary’s State Department e-mails and minutiae like whether or not she signed this paper or that when she left the State Department are all just background noise.  Who cares? 

None of this is going to make a damn bit of difference if she runs for President.  It will all be old news by then.  Some believe that’s why Hillary’s getting this all out of the way now.  

She needn’t worry.  The public doesn’t care now, and will care even less by then. 

And it’s not just Hillary’s foibles the public doesn’t care about; it’s pretty much everything that doesn’t impact them directly and immediately, whether that’s ISIS, the Ukraine, Afghanistan, Iran’s nukes, terrorist plots, taxing the rich, campaign financing, the national debt, etc. 

Sure, you may believe some of these are actually very important issues which could determine the overall security of the nation and the fate of millions of people, but it’s all too complicated and boring for most folks.  If the talking heads on TV can’t explain something in 20 seconds or less, people lose interest in learning more.  So they don’t.  Consequently, they don’t care. 

Think about it this way: only about 37% of eligible voters actually voted in the last election cycle. The rest apparently didn't care.  Or had something better to do.  Any questions?  

So what does interest the public?  What does the public care about?  Hard to tell.   

But it’s not politicians, for sure. And it’s certainly not whatever politicians are doing, despite how much media coverage they get. Regardless of how important politicians think they are, and how much they believe the populace eagerly awaits their pronouncements, very few people really care who the politicians are or what those politicians are doing.  

It’s all a never-ending Punch and Judy Show for most Americans, with Republicans whacking away at Democrats and Democrats whacking away at Republicans, with neither side accomplishing much of anything worthwhile in the end. 

It’s vanity theater; infinitely more interesting to the actors than the audience.  

Some Republicans may care what Republican politicians do.  Some Democrats may care what Democrat politicians do.  But most of the public are neither Republicans nor Democrats; they don’t give a rat’s patoot what Republican or Democrat politicians do, much less what they say.

With today’s 24/7/365 news cycle and the myriad of media outlets, there’s simply too much to digest. It’s truly an information overload.  And since all these media outlets are competing to get the public’s attention, “news” that isn’t dramatic and visual enough gets short shrift.    

That’s why coverage of riots, protests, fires, cop shootings, ferry sinkings, plane crashes, and natural disasters crowd out everything else.  Dramatic visuals hold attention; lengthy discussions of foreign and economic policy do not.  House or Senate hearings on whatever?  Yawn.    

Even scandals – unless they involve sex, drugs, murder, or celebrities involved of any of those – just don’t glue people to their TV or computer/smartphone screens anymore.  

Imagine, then, how little interest there is in arcane stuff like Hillary’s inability to manage two e-mail accounts. The general public is more interested in Hillary’s latest hairdo.  I suspect that if she does decide to run for President, she’ll focus on the fact she’s a woman, and would be the first woman President, rather than her record. 

Is that a bad thing? 

Honestly, it’s the smart thing.  If I were advising her, that’s what I’d recommend. 

Why should she get bogged down with all the dirty laundry of her past – especially when nobody obviously cares about it?  Why bother?  The more promising path is to run to become a milestone in American history: the first female U.S. President.  

Wouldn’t that be something to tell your kids and grandkids about years from now? That you helped elect the first female U.S. President?

You know what they’ll say then? 

What difference does it make ...