Hard Times For the Clintons

Give the Clintons credit.  They have at least enough self-awareness to understand when they have not been self-aware.

Hillary Clinton let slip a moderately damaging assessment of her family's post presidency finances.  "We were dead broke," she said.

Should she run for president, she will find those four words as ubiquitous as Mitt Romney's offhand 47 percent comment.  She will have to explain ad nauseum what she meant and that she does really understand what truly broke really means.

This will likely grow tiresome.  Neither Clinton entered the world with guaranteed millions and both, especially Bill, understand what poverty feels like. Saying "dead broke" instead of struggling to meet responsibilities was a huge error in judgment.

The Clintons, however, did the right thing.  When confronted with their own version of tough times, like good free market entrepreneurs, they cashed in.  People wrongly envy Bill Clinton's huge speaking fees.  There is nothing wrong with making top dollar.  The onus lies on those who pay the fees, especially if they pay from the public purse.  Bill Clinton or the town dog catcher can ask a million dollars to speak.  No one has to pay.

Problem is that being Democrats comes with connection to the party's ideology. One cannot just comfortably defend a million (or tens of millions) dollars honestly made. Nationally, the Democratic Party has moved well to the Left of the centrist comfort zone Bill Clinton always claimed.  If Hillary runs in 2016, Leftist candidates such as Martin O'Malley (does anyone doubt that this failure is running for president?) will hurl this statement back at her over and over.  Clinton will face class warfare, this time against her and the profits reaped by her family after the presidency.

Our Liberal to the North and Our Conservative to the South

In Panhandlia, we see and hear more about what goes on in Virginia and Maryland than our own state capital. On Tuesday, the Washington Examiner ran an interesting story about a tale of two governors.

The Center for Public Integrity assessed each state for their potential risk in terms of public corruption. Virginia graded at F, Maryland at D-, and West Virginia at D+.

It should be noted that West Virginia received praise for making improvements over the past two years, presumably an endorsement of changes occurring under Governor Tomblin.

The reactions from our neighbors could not be more different.

Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell's office noted that the state administration would review the study, which emphasized the ease at which laws and rules might be avoided or broken, not actual corruption. "If there are areas in which Virginia can improve, the governor wants to know what they are."

Quite reasonable.

Now Maryland's response. Governor Martin O'Malley's office attacked the report, disagreeing with "findings and flawed methodology."

Nice work. Thank you for proving that conservatives care more about good government than liberals.

New Jersey under Governor Chris Christie was cited as the highest graded state.

Check out War On Rural Maryland blog

http://www.waronruralmaryland.com/

This blog, created by Maryland legislators, describes Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley's radical policies that win the approval of elite leftists, but harm folks that own farms and live in the country.