Decatur Metro

Ask any anti-Hillary Democrat why they don’t support the New York Senator from Arkansas and they are likely screw up their face, open their mouths and find themselves, however briefly, at a loss for words. When the affronted questionee finally returns from that cold, dark place you’ve sent them, they will most likely settle on this seemingly uninformed response, “I just don’t like her.”

Now, if you are a political prude (and you probably are if you’re going around questioning the political beliefs of well-meaning strangers) you may be tempted to interject something like “Well, many thanks for the startling insight and analysis on 20th century politics David Habersham!” and storm haughtily back to the kitchen to finish off that bottle of dusty vermouth.

But wait just a minute, seemingly informed politico.

I would argue that even though you may have an arsenal of political history armed and ready to defend your position of Barak Obama (or Dennis Kucinich or even Ron Paul if you’re really counter-culture), you’re just using this wealth of knowledge to defend the fact that deep-down you really “just don’t like” Hillary either.

So, can this seemingly vague, yet wide-spread dislike of someone you don’t personally know ever be justified?

In his latest Slate entry, Christopher Hitchens takes a stab at it. He cites her willingness to bend the truth of her biography at whim, the partnership legally considered a “marriage” with Bill, and her inability to stand up for her past positions on the Iraq War and healthcare, as reasons for his and others’ distaste. All this considered, he closes with this remark…

“Indifferent to truth, willing to use police-state tactics and vulgar libels against inconvenient witnesses, hopeless on health care, and flippant and fast and loose with national security: The case against Hillary Clinton for president is open-and-shut. Of course, against all these considerations you might prefer the newly fashionable and more media-weighty notion that if you don’t show her enough appreciation, and after all she’s done for us, she may cry.”

But does this really get to the core reason for such adamant dislike or are these political moves just symptoms of a larger problem? Many politicians change positions for political expediency, but Hillary can invoke an unrivaled fury among both Democrats and Republicans when mentioned. So what’s all the fuss about?

Well, I would attest that its much ado about nothing.

I must admit that I haven’t read her autobiographical tome, “Living History”, but on the national stage, Clinton gives us little reason to believe that she stands for anything other than having led political life. Why is she running for President and why did she run for the Senate? I certainly don’t know. If it is simply the next step in a lucky career path, that might be a good enough reason for the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, but not for someone that hopes to take the nation’s highest office. She certainly isn’t alone in this regard. She seems to share this career path with both the current Commander-In-Chief and GOP contender Mitt Romney, among countless others. Each could be the to be poster child of Chris Matthews sadly titled new book, “Life’s A Campaign”.

When it comes to a President, this American citizen asks for a little more. I won’t rubber stamp another well-known public figure just because of name recognition. I can’t assume that because she’s lived in my television, “making change for 35 years” that she’s got the background to lead the nation. When I vet the presidential contenders, I want to know how life experience shaped each candidates’ positions, because I believe that only personal experience and belief can trump political expediency when faced with closely scrutinized decisions on a daily basis.

Under this rather modest scrutiny, Hillary just doesn’t seem to pass muster. She’s thrived as a Senator because she’s willing to compromise on nearly everything (see this Atlantic feature [subscription based] if you want more detail on her reinvention as a Senator). And while compromise is certainly a big part of the presidency too, the President represents an entire third of our government and needs their own guidance system of beliefs and foundation of experiences to guide them through the political landscape.

When Hillary Clinton looks into her past, does it seem like there is anything she can grab hold of that evokes her passion to a level that makes me think “she should be the one that leads us into the future”?

Nope. But maybe that’s just because I don’t like her.