TJ Walker breaks down Hillary Clinton's favorability numbers after the email scandal. A New York Times poll shows her net standing rose nine points and perceptions of her as a strong leader jumped 8%. Walker calls it scandal fatigue: decades of allegations have made people tune out attacks.
Questions this video answers
A recent New York Times poll
9 points higher
Up 8%
For the last three months
May 6, 2015
Chapters
For the last three months, Hillary Clinton has been pummeled in the media, the conservative media and the mainstream media like the New York Times over the issue of funding from her foundation as well as the email scandal. How's it affecting her polling ratings? So folks, it's been almost three months and daily Hillary Clinton has been pounded, pilloried, pummeled for her role in the email scandals involving her using her own servers as Secretary of State. She's been attacked for all of the funds from odious sources going to her foundation. And what has the result been on her public image? Well, three months ago her favorables were here and now after all this attacking, they've gone all the way down to nine points higher. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, Hillary Clinton's polling numbers are 9 points higher than they were before this so called email scandal hit. Additionally, those who view her as a strong leader, that's gone up 8%. This is according to the most recent New York Times poll. So what's going on? What's really going on? Now I know a lot of my conservative friends are scratching their heads saying this is insane, this is bizarre. Everybody has to hate Hillary. It doesn't work like that, folks. Now just because you can't attack a political opponent in the media doesn't mean you should and it doesn't mean it will be effective. You have to look at the context. Here's my theory as to what's going on with Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton has been in the spotlight now for almost a quarter of a century, as has her husband. And Americans have simply formed their opinions of her. Whatever flaws she has, and like everyone else, she has flaws. Most Americans who are not die hard Republicans and conservatives think that she is basically a hard working policy wonk. Basically somebody who cares about public policy isn't in politics to get rich. And after being told about how she's allegedly killed Vince Foster, Travelgate and Filegate, and all these scandals over the years that have always turned out to be nothing, the American public has simply concluded that the media, including the so called liberal New York Times, is the little boy who cried wolf once too often and they have tuned out. Doesn't mean Hillary Clinton is a locked to be the next president. It does mean there is scandal fatigue. And I don't mean people are tired of scandals. It means they're tired of being told there's a scandal and it just doesn't really seem like a scandal. So what does all of this mean? Does Hillary Clinton get a free pass? No. It does mean that if her enemies really want to take her out, they're going to have to be more judicious. They're going to have to actually make a case that is understandable and believable to people who aren't already die hard Fox fans, die hard Republicans and die hard Hillary haters. And that's the problem with this so called email scandal. It just doesn't seem like a scandal to any American who has email. Put it this way, it's as if liberals and Democrats tried again and again and again to paint Ronald Reagan as a racist. And every six months while in office, they would come up with some alleged tape or eyewitness testimony that he'd use the N word talking to some black staffer. Well, after seven and a half years, if every single one of those never had any substantiation, what happens to the next one? It's simply ignored by the American people because the American people had already decided that Ronald Reagan was not some Klan sheet wearing Klansmen. And that's really the problem that Republicans and conservatives and even mainstream media face when trying to cover Hillary Clinton. To just say this is a huge, huge scandal, when to most people nothing is there. It not only doesn't hurt her by the polling data we see, it's actually helping her. Whether it's a cause and effect, it's unknown. I'm not suggesting it's, you can prove a causality there. But her numbers are going up. And more important, her negatives, her unfavorables have not gone up. They've stayed the same. So you got to think, if you're Hillary Clinton, you got to be sitting there every day saying to the Republicans, to Fox and the media, okay, boys, talk some more about email, talk some more about Benghazi. It's only helping me.
