“What’s to “look into”? Why not a straightforward “yes”? She said “I’ll look into it,” and the, opaquely, “I don’t know the status, but I will certainly look into it.” What “status”? Who even has an idea what that means? Does she not own the rights to her speeches?”

—-Law prof. and eccentric blogger Ann Althouse, reacting to Hillary Clinton’s evasive response “I will look into it,” when asked during the recent debate if she would release transcripts of her high-priced speeches to various corporations, like Goldman Sachs.

Two points before I discuss Althouse’s analysis:

1. Somehow I missed this in my review of the debate. I shouldn’t have, but I was so pummeled by the sheer awfulness of it all that my observation skills were obviously impaired. Not as badly as most, however: the number of journalists who have praised that festival of platitudes and lies as “the best debate so far” are every bit as pathetic as Donald Trump’s throng. There is no excuse for being that estranged from reality.

2. To anticipate the complaints: I’ll stop posting on Hillary Clinton’s lies, deceits and unethical machinations when she stops engaging in them. That is not only fair and responsible, it is the only way to foil the Clinton game, which consists of making everyone sick and tired of pointing out how corrupt they are.

Professor Althouse nailed Hillary on this. She continued in part…

We’ve got to be able to look at the evidence, and in this case that means the transcripts of those speeches. What is the meaning of the money that supports her campaign and that — supposedly entirely aside from campaign finance — has made her and her husband very wealthy? She wants to say, they just offered the money, and all she did was show up and say some words, words of her choice, words, for example, about the experience of stress in saying we need to kill bin Laden.

Who can believe that? Without the transcripts, we should — for our own protection and because it’s most likely — infer that what is in the transcripts would be harmful to the argument she’s making to the great masses of Americans. We should infer that she told a different story to the elite insiders. It was the most reasonable interpretation even before she resisted releasing the transcripts. The inference is stronger now that she’s resisted giving us the transcripts. She needs to release the transcripts to refute the interpretation that we are otherwise compelled to make.

Bingo.

Althouse also quotes this smoking gun quote from the New York Times:

Joel Benenson, Mrs. Clinton’s pollster, gave little indication at a Wall Street Journal breakfast with reporters that the transcripts would be forthcoming. “I don’t think voters are interested in the transcripts of her speeches,” he said….On Friday, Brian Fallon, Mrs. Clinton’s press secretary…  said that “Bernie Sanders, like Karl Rove before him, is trying to impugn Hillary Clinton’s integrity without any basis in fact.” He labeled this “character assassination by insinuation” and said Mr. Sanders should either show his evidence that the money has influenced her or drop the subject.

“I don’t think voters are interested in the transcripts of her speeches”—-This kind of statement is signature significance for a dishonest candidate and organization, and it’s pure Clinton. Call it “the presumption of corruption and ignorance”: the translation is “Voters don’t care about honesty and integrity, just what goodies our candidate will give them.” Bill’s primary defense of his Monica lies was that nobody should care how the President comports himself in the White House, or what lies he tells if they involve sex. Donald Trump’s campaign is based on the same logic. Voters are stupid, gullible and have no values! Paul Begala:

“Voters do not give a shit. They do not even give a fart… Find me one persuadable voter who agrees with HRC on the issues but will vote against her because she has a non-archival-compliant email system and I’ll kiss your ass in Macy’s window and say it smells like roses.”

I love that quote from one of the all-time Clinton minions, because it throbs with the unapologetic ugliness of these people, and the contempt with which they view the public: sheep to be sheared, pigs to be slaughtered.

As for the self-evident weasel-words accusing Sanders, Althouse swings and knocks them over the wall:

Insinuation? It’s inference. The absence of evidence is a basis for inference. To withhold the evidence and then demand that we not make an inference is a tricky move, and — ironically — the trick is to impugn the integrity of anyone who makes the inference. Your integrity is impugned for impugning her integrity.

Hillary Clinton is not the worst candidate in this race, but she has the most unethical supporters.