This is a 30 tweet long message so I've stuck it together to make it readable:
Peter Daou @peterdaou
- THREAD. Why Hillary hate is at the core of the current crisis in US politics. You can't understand Trump if you don't get Hillary.
- Hillary Clinton has been aggressively vetted and formally investigated (by Republicans) for decades. NO WRONGDOING HAS EVER BEEN FOUND.
- But Hillary receives more hate, more rage, more fury than serial killers or child murderers. TRUMP IS PRESIDENT BECAUSE OF HILLARY HATE.
- The hatred for Hillary is wildly disproportional to the facts of her life. Disconnected from reality. She has SAVED CHILDREN'S LIVES.
- Male politicians who voted for the same policies are given a pass, but she is labeled a murderer for her national security-related votes.
- Hillary's haters drop a word like "Benghazi" as though it conjures instant evildoing. But endless investigations have exonerated her.
- The same people who shout "Benghazi" are completely silent on Trump's Yemen raid, which tragically cost many innocent lives.
- The same people who call Hillary a liar are silent on the lies of other public figures. "Politicians will be politicians," they shrug.
- When Hillary earns money, it's "corruption." When other (male) politicians do, it's success. An absolutely vicious double standard.
10. Once again, I repeat: HILLARY CLINTON HAS NEVER BEEN FOUND GUILTY OF WRONGDOING. And her haters will NEVER admit that basic truth.
11. Here's where Trump comes in. Hillary was being vilified by the media, by the right, and by the left BEFORE Trump was a candidate.
12. Before Trump ran, Hillary was being slammed by pundits with terms like "imperious, paranoid, petulant, devious."
peterdaou.com/2015/03/hillary-decoder/
13. FACT: No matter WHO ran against Hillary, the 2016 election was going to be about demonizing her to the point where she couldn't win.
14. The news media spent SIX HUNDRED CONSECUTIVE DAYS on Hillary's emails. No Trump story, however egregious, got even one tenth the focus.
15. The 2016 election was about the destruction of Hillary Clinton's reputation. The great travesty is that Team Sanders played a huge role.
16. Bernie spent 2015 on an uplifting, positive, progressive message. Encouraging & exciting. Then he pivoted hard negative against Hillary.
17. I chronicled every attack, every TV appearance by Tad Devine and Jeff Weaver calling Hillary corrupt and evil. It was brutal and unjust.
18. Sanders/Stein supporters threw dollar bills at her in the street, one of the most repugnant political spectacles in American history.
19. Meanwhile, the corporate media treated Hillary with dripping disdain while celebrating the ratings Trump's antics got them. Disgraceful.
20. The result of this Hillary-bashing was that by the general election, her public image was severely damaged. Trump just surfed the hate.
21. Given the choice between a hated man and a (wrongly) hated woman, the man wins every time. WE ARE NOT BEYOND GENDER BIAS IN AMERICA.
22. The immense disproportionality in who Hillary is and how she is perceived is also the hallmark of the Trump presidency. Skewed reality.
23. If everything seems topsy-turvy, if right seems wrong and up seems down, you can trace it back to the merciless vilification of Hillary.
24. When a lifelong public servant devoted to the rights of women and children can be seen as a devil-monster-witch, reality is lost.
25. Acknowledging and rejecting the mangling of Hillary's public image by the media, the right and the left is key to dealing with Trump.
26. Hillary's bashers yell that I should "move on" and that it's ALL HER FAULT. She's "flawed." She skipped Wisconsin. Empty talking points.
27. If we quietly accept the unfair, unjust and too often sexist assault on Hillary's character, we are embracing "alternative reality."
28. The original problem, the root cause of our dilemma, is the character assassination of Hillary in 2016. Trump is just a by-product.
29. Every single time we fight the lies and smears against Hillary, we are fighting to regain our grip on truth, on facts, on decency.
30. Dislike her, disagree with her. But to despise her more than the worst people on the planet is UNACCEPTABLE. I, for one, won't forget.