Does Gennifer Flowers at Monday's debate hurt Hillary or Trump more?

[Gustaf]

It doesn't matter, it's disgusting.

And why is it disgusting?  Pray tell, why?
If someone called me an Alt Right member, a Klan Sympathizer, a racist, a xenophobe, and a homophobe, I would think the gloves would be off.  Gennifer Flowers is a reminder of how Bill Clinton lied about his affairs and how Hillary complied.  That's a character issue for her; it's not just personal at this point, and neither is Monica Lewinsky.

You know ..... When we read comments like this, it baffles the mind as to why some take offense when we refer to a minority of trump supporters as "deplorables."
Well ..... here is a perfect example of one of the bottom of the barrel deplorables.

Fuzzy .... go to church and tell you pastor what kind of an ass**** you are conducting yourself as.
Also, ask your congregation to pray for you.

I was joking earilier, but, right now, I'm as serious as a heart attack.  It would be nice if we had a different kind of campaign.  But Hillary is no less responsible for the tone of the campaign then Trump.

Gennifer Flowers, Monica Lewinsky, Juanita Brodderick, Kathleen Willey, et al, represent the hypocrisy of Hillary Clinton, a hypocrisy that ought to be front and center in evaluating candidate character.  They bear witness to Hillary's hypocrisy on victims.

Gennifer Flowers represents someone who was in the position she was in due to the powerful position of Bill Clinton.  As was Monica.  As was Kathleen Willey, Paula Jones, Juanita Broadderick, and the rest of women who were victimized by Bill and Hillary Clinton.  The way they were victimized by Bill is obvious.  They way they were victimized Hillary ought to be obvious; she sought to discredit the allegations of female victims of sexual harassment.  On the campaign trail for herself, Hillary goes on and on about how female victims ought to be believed.  But to prepare that very trail for herself (and there's not doubt that she was thinking about being POTUS every day she was FLOTUS) she worked with others to discredit Bill's accusers, implementing a "nuts and sluts" campaign to discredit the victims and destroy their credibility.  This is the woman so many women take special pride in as the woman who they hope will be "Madame President".  

I have done many different things in my professional life, and one of them was facilitating Domestic Violence groups for male perpetrators of violence against their female partners.  It would take a long time to discuss the particulars of Batterer's Intervention Programs, but the main aims of these programs are to bring the members of those groups to accept responsibility for their past actions, accept the consequences of their actions as something they brought on themselves, and commit themselves to a lifestyle of non-violence and non-coercive behavior in their relationships with their female partner(s).  In doing this, there is much discussion of male privilege and the beliefs that many men hold that justify these beliefs, where they come from, as well as exploring equality-based, non-violent, non-threatening ways of conducting their lives as it pertains to their female partners.

It would be nice to say that the folks who come to these programs are prepared to take responsibility for their past actions and develop introspection.  In reality, many of these folks deny the offending incident(s) occurred, say the police lied, say the victim lied or manipulated, allege that the victim was fabricating facts in order to gain the upper hand in divorce and child custody issues, how "crazy" the victim is, all the times the victim has been on the "nut ward", all the victim's meds, etc.  These discussions would go on and on if group facilitators didn't cut them off, and they would receive endless support from other group members if group facilitators.  Getting these folks to merely accept responsibility for their past actions, let alone truly examine the attitudes and values that perpetuate coercive behavior, if not outright violence, is a daunting task.

This part of my life experience came after the year 2001.  It certainly changed my opinion of the Clintons and their conduct during the 1990s (and, indeed, during Bill's tenure as AR Governor).  Bill Clinton is an irreconcilable misogynist, in the vein of Bob Packwood (another abuser excused by the Feminist movement due to politics).  The degree to which these male perpetrators refuse to accept meaningful responsibility for their actions is really quite an eye-opener.  It is often a major accomplishment to get such folks to acknowledge their responsibility to walk away from a heated argument that could end in violence if they don't leave, or accept their female partner's right to do the same, and that's a pretty low bar.

As I have taken in a large bank of negativity about female victims from their victimizers, Hillary Clinton's active discrediting of Bill's victims is something I find pretty deplorable.  (Oooh, there's that word again!)  She trashed victims because they were an obstacle to HER ambitions, and if that isn't deplorable, I don't know what is.  Whatever Hillary can and can't do in her life credibly is, I suppose, up to the individual observer, but an advocate for victims of sexual harassment and domestic violence is something this woman can't do credibly until SHE takes responsibility for how SHE treated Bill's victims.  Since I have a family to support, I'm not going to hold my breath until it happens.

And, no, I'm not giving Donald Trump a free pass on his behavior.  Some of his comments about women are things that reveal him to having a misogynistic view of life.  His views of women are not mine, and not the one's I would want in my sons, or in the future husbands of my granddaughters.  I've grudgingly accepted that in order to get the issue positions of Trump (which I'm in significant agreement with) the persona comes with it (and I will not deny that this gives me pause every day).  I'll even go so far as to say that my vote for Trump is not entirely in the bag.  But I have empathy for victims.  Hillary's behavior says a lot about how she would treat any victim of Bill's who was an obstacle to her aims.  My view of Hillary as a person of putrid character isn't something that's been weaved from whole cloth.

Then how do you view Trump's direct attacks on the women that accused Bill Clinton? Don't you think Hillary Clinton siding with her own husband is more understandable than that?

[Gustaf]

Trump should offer Flowers and Monica Lewinsky a hefty salary to stand behind him on stage at every public appearance from here on out.  They should be paid to say nothing and just stand there.  If we're going to be over-the-top, let's be whole hog, eh?

What does Hillary have to do with either of them? If we're going to hold her accountable for all of her husband's actions, then I guess she also helped to balance the budget... just saying...

Hillary actively worked to orchestrate the campaign to discredit Bill Clinton's accusers back in the 1990s.  Today, of course, she insists that victims be believed.  And she gets a free pass on this.  She actively worked to help Bill avoid responsibility for his actions because SHE wanted to be President at some point in the future.  It's a statement about HER character. 

A quick googling indicates there is actually no evidence for this just like there isn't for any of the deluded conspiracy theories about Clinton.

Whereas, Trump, as you conveniently ignored, directly attacked these women: "He dismissed Paula Jones as a “loser” and suggested that Clinton would have gotten into less trouble over Monica Lewinsky if he had had an affair with a woman who was more “beautiful.”"

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/05/24/donald-trump-once-described-bill-clintons-women-as-unattractive-losers/?utm_term=.a6c13c9e9656

[Gustaf]

No I saw those things. So she might have made a few private remarks about these women (none of this constitutes conclusive evidence obviously). Your jump from that to "she orchestrated a smear campaign to destroy them" is just your own bias.

And, furthermore, your assumption that this was because she is power hungry is also just your own idea.

[Gustaf]

No I saw those things. So she might have made a few private remarks about these women (none of this constitutes conclusive evidence obviously). Your jump from that to "she orchestrated a smear campaign to destroy them" is just your own bias.

And, furthermore, your assumption that this was because she is power hungry is also just your own idea.

Folks get to draw their own conclusion about public figures.  I'll allow the average voter to decide Hillary's and Trump's motives for themselves.

...and you didn't get the point.