A political scientist who remembers the 1990s says it was "back to the future" watching Hillary Clinton on Tuesday dispense with questions about her State Department email in a meeting with reporters.
"I've seen this press conference many times, and so have you," Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics, told "MidPoint" host Ed Berliner on
Newsmax TV Wednesday.
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Sabato was referring to the presidency of Bill Clinton — the era of "Travelgate, Filegate, Monicagate and this gate and that gate," he said.
It was a moment in history when the leader of the free world said under oath to a special prosecutor, "It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is."
And it could happen again as Hillary Clinton readies herself two decades later to try to swap White House roles with her husband, said Sabato, author of a forthcoming book,
"The Surge", about the 2014 midterm election.
Former Secretary of State Clinton spent 20 minutes on Tuesday defending the security, legality, transparency and "convenience," if not the wisdom, of using personal e-mail to conduct sensitive government business.
Clinton ultimately pronounced herself law-abiding and transparent, and she declared off-limits her
private email server, which Republicans want to inspect.
"I recognize the approach, the technique," said Sabato.
Likewise, he said, anybody "who lived through the Clinton administration" might have experienced déjà vu on Tuesday, and flashed back to the rhetorical moves the first couple employed to defuse controversies and scandals.
Expect more of the same if the email controversy persists, said Sabato.
Clinton and her surrogates are "going to say, 'We've answered the question,' " he said. "Of course they haven't answered all the questions, and they're going to say in a month or two, 'That's old news.' "
Clinton is still "highly, highly probable" to become the 2016 Democrat nominee for president, because there is no internal challenger of her "caliber," said Sabato.
"You can't beat somebody with nobody," he said.
If Republicans want the general public to view Clinton's email practices as a legitimate issue, they should step back, he said, with the 2016 election still far off and Clinton not even a declared candidate.
"It doesn't make a lot of sense to bring partisanship into it," he said. "Right now, her opposition is the news media. The news media may be basically Democratic and liberal, but they enjoy a good fight with anybody, and they're having one with Hillary Clinton.
"If you make it partisan, then you're going to guarantee that no one is going to listen at all," said Sabato.
Sabato, joined on air by writer and commentator Linda Tirado, also discussed a controversial
letter to Iranian leaders signed by 47 Republican Senators — who are being called "traitors" by some critics of their decision to insert their voices into U.S.-lead nuclear talks with Iran.
Tirado called the letter "stupid," "shortsighted," and a "bad idea," but not the work of traitors.
"The Congress is a co-equal branch and therefore they're entitled to send any letters they want," said Sabato. "You can argue about whether it's the wisest way to influence the policy, but you certainly can't call it treasonous. That's well within their rights as a co-equal branch of government."
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