Hillary Clinton Is Out of Fucks


Hillary Clinton appeared at Recode Wednesday in conversation with founders Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher, and to steal a headline from myself, she is out of fucks.

It was fascinating to watch. She didn’t hold back. You can watch the full thing below or continue on for some highlights.

Here are some good bits, courtesy of the recode live blog:

On emails!!!

“The over riding issue that affected the election that I had any control over — because I had no control over the Russians. Too bad about that — was the use of my emails. The way that it was used was very damaging. The New York times covered it like Pearl harbor.

On Goldman Sachs speeches

“I have to say, Walt I never thought someone would throw out my entire career…because I made a couple of speeches…Men got paid for the speeches they made…I got paid for the speeches I made…I take responsibility for every decision I made, but that’s not why I lost”

On the vast right-wing conspiracy
“What is hard for people to accept, although now after the election there’s greater understanding, is that there are forces in our country…who have been fighting rear guard actions for as long as I’ve been alive…We were on a real roll as a country despite assassinations, despite setbacks, expanding rights to people who never had them in any country was frankly thrilling. I believe then as I believe now that we’re never done with this work. Part of the challenge is to maintain the focus and energy to move forward but you have to understand the other side is never tired either.”

On fake news
“Fake news…lies that’s a good word too…The other side was using content that was just flat out false and delivering it in a very personalized way. Above the radar screen and below.”

On the DNC

“I inherit nothing from the Democratic party. It was bankrupt. It was on the verge of insolvency. I had to inject money into the [DNC] for it to keep going.”

On the RNC

“They raised…best estimates are close to $100 million…to build this data foundation. They beta tested it. They ran [hundreds of thousands of surveys]. Trump becomes the nominee and is [given] this tried and true…platform.”

On Russia collusion
“I think it’s fair to ask how did that actually influence the campaign and how did they know what messages to deliver. Who told them? Who were they coordinating with or colluding with?…The Russians in my opinion could not have known how best to weaponize that information unless they had been guided by Americans.”

“Within one hour of the Access Hollywood tapes being leaked, the Russians or say Wikileaks—same thing—dumped the John Podesta emails. They were run of the mill emails. “Stuff that were so common. Within one hour they dumped them and then began to weaponize them. They had their allies like Infowars say the most outlandish, absurd lies you could imagine. They had to be ready for that.”

On Putin

“It’s important that Americans…understand that Putin wants to bring us down. He was an old KGB agent.”

On Obama

“Barack Obama saved the economy and he doesn’t get the credit he deserves, I have to say that [because people don’t know that.]” Clinton re: democrats not investing in creating content.

 

This post is being updated.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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