U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI), a lower-tier presidential candidate with high aspirations, announced she is suing former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for $50 million after the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee said Russia is grooming “somebody who’s currently in the Democratic primary” for a third-party run, and reportedly called that person, “a favorite of the Russians” and “totally” a “Russian asset.” It does not appear Clinton ever named Gabbard directly.
“They’re also going to do third-party. I’m not making any predictions, but I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who’s currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate,” Clinton had said.
A Clinton spokesperson later did not deny the former Secretary of State and former U.S. Senator was referring to Gabbard.
Gabbard’s explanation for why she is suing Clinton exposes exactly why she is unfit to be president.
“This is my life that we’re talking about here,” The Hill reported Gabbard said on Fox News Thursday night to Tucker Carlson – three months after Clinton’s remarks. “When you have someone as powerful as Hillary Clinton seeking to smear my reputation and essentially implying that I’m a traitor to the country that I love, what she essentially is doing is taking my life away.”
We know that President Donald Trump would take to Twitter to attack anyone who made disparaging remarks against him, even private citizens, but most politicians would turn the other cheek and ignore the insult. Why dignify it with a response – much less a lawsuit?
What would Congresswoman Gabbard do if a Hillary Clinton, or a Vladimir Putin, or an Emmanuel Macron, or the head of the Republican Party, made similar comments about a President Gabbard? Would the nation have to witness and live through yet another thin-skinned president railing against being called a name, and turning to the courts for support? Haven’t Americans had enough of that already?
Gabbard’s thin-skin not only did not allow her to move on, she felt it appropriate to draw the U.S. Armed Forces into the controversy.
“For me as a soldier, as every service member does, I took an oath of loyalty to our country — the country that I love, willing to put my life on the line for our country — deploying twice to the Middle East to do so,” Gabbard added. She took a similar oath when she became a U.S. Congresswoman, but she had to drag our entire military into her battle.
Gabbard also told NBC News that her lawsuit “should have been for $50 billion.”
“What is your life worth to you? What is your honor and loyalty, your identity worth to you?” Gabbard asked a reporter. “What she has done has very directly attacked who I am as a person.”
Again, this happens to politicians – and certainly presidents – daily.
In fact, after Clinton’s remarks became public, Gabbard attacked Clinton, calling her “the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party.”
Clinton did not sue Gabbard.
No one likes to be smeared, whether or not the allegations are true. When you’re a prominent elected official, it comes with the job. Turning the other cheek, moving on, and being the bigger person is the sign of a good leader, a strong leader, a leader who shows good judgment and has the perspective to focus on what’s really important to those she or he is serving. Gabbard has exposed she is not that leader.
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