Anyone who knows me even passingly well knows that I was and am a huge fan of Hillary Clinton. I have long admired her as a politician and a public servant, and I proudly and enthusiastically voted for her in 2016. I was truly devastated when she lost to Donald Trump, bit even before then I was dismayed at the ways in which this woman was maligned, by both the right and the left, to such an extent that it was hard to recognize the real woman under the caricature. As Michael D’Antonio reveals in his new book, The Hunting of Hillary, this phenomenon has deep roots, and it began almost the instant that she entered politics as the First Lady of Arkansas.
At that time, the attacks on her usually focused on the way that she didn’t seem to perform her gender in ways deemed acceptable to the patriarchal establishment. She didn’t take her husband’s last name when they got married (though she eventually did); she didn’t have children (though she would do so eventually); and, perhaps most ominously for those who weren’t at all fond of the changing sexual and gender mores of the country at large, she had her own career and her own ambitions that did not revolve around her role as Bill Clinton’s wife. It wasn’t long before she was perceived as a threat and, as a result, received substantial, often unfriendly, media scrutiny.
When she became First Lady of the United States at the side of her Bill Clinton, the attacks escalated. In part, this was because she was seen by many — particularly those on the right — as having overstepped her bounds by being more involved with actual legislation than any First Lady before her. However, as the GOP repeatedly found that her husband was almost immune to damage (no matter what they threw at him, he seemed to be able to charm his way into the heart of the nation), they turned their ire upon her, and they found much greater success.
Again and again and again, Clinton had to bear the brunt of the changing terrain of American culture and society, particularly as the lines between journalism and entertainment began to blur throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Increasingly, it didn’t matter whether reports about her had any sort of basis in fact; all that mattered was that they were salacious and sold well. Increasingly, even well-established media outlets such as The New York Times began to give credibility to even the most ridiculous reports (if they were reported somewhere, they were “newsworthy”), even as a veritable cottage industry of anti-Clinton propaganda took shape, with numerous books printed and bought in such quantities that they frequently landed atop the bestseller lists. The rise of the internet, and the billions poured into the effort by billionaires with deep pockets, ensured that Hillary Clinton was never far from the minds of the American public and, more importantly, that those who hated her were given more and more evidence for doing so.
All of this came to a head, of course, when she ran for president in 2016, where she was faced not only with the right-wing outrage machine — that had already spent several years trying to take her down for her perceived failures in the affair in Benghazi — but also with Donald Trump, the most unscrupulous and mendacious man to have ever run for president. What’s more, she also had to contend with an army of Twitter trolls and the constant meddling of Julian Assange and Wikileaks, all of whom built on the foundations laid by earlier hostile journalists and politicians. Given all of this, is it any wonder that, as her presidential campaign wound to a close, that Clinton struggled with an “image problem?” How could she not, when so much air had been given to even the remotest hint of scandal?
D’Antonio’s book is at its most compelling and convincing when he drills down into the mechanics of these attacks and those who perpetrated them, figures like David Brock (who would later seek to make amends for his vitriol), New York Times columnist William Safire (who seemed to have an especial loathing of everything to do with Hillary Clinton, and even Peggy Noonan, the Reagan speechwriter who also seemed to have developed a personal vendetta against Hillary Clinton. As D’Antonio demonstrates, most of these people were content to fill the air with innuendo and suspicion, rather than attempt to corroborate their accusations with anything even remotely resembling substantive evidence. D’Antonio is quite skilled in ripping away the thin film of respectability to expose the mendacity beneath.
There are a few times in the book where D’Antonio wanders a bit in his analysis, particularly in his discussion of the Monica Lewinsky affair and the attendant impeachment trial. In these moments, Hillary takes rather a back seat, and one gets the feeling that he’s more interested in highlighting Republican mendacity and in re-litigating the entire sordid affair than he is in showing how this affected Hillary. Only toward the end of this part of the saga does he show how she had to thread a fine needle between being seen as a dupe for a cheating husband or a woman who abandoned her man in his greatest hour of need. As has always been the case with Hillary, she had to bear the brunt of the contradictory position that women occupy in American society.
The Hunting of Hillary is a chilling reminder of how difficult it is for women to occupy positions of power in American politics. At the same time, one can’t help but admire Clinton for her ability to survive all of this and keep going. Though there are some who would rather she disappear, she continues to be a voice for the marginalized and, to the surprise of some, has also proven to be quite the wit on Twitter (her ability to troll Donald Trump is unmatched). This book is essential reading for anyone who still struggles to understand the 2016 election.

Is there an American political leader who has achieved so much, while simultaneously being reviled by so many? Inevitably, the hatred is misplaced or born of falsehoods and conspiracy theories. In this book, D'Antonio takes readers on a journey through this relentless opposition to Hillary Clinton, and also her impressive achievements despite this endless push-back and opposition. The author provides plenty of evidence and examples, which makes for some depressing reading. However, it's an interesting read, and sure to make readers think about the state of US politics today, and the enduring negative forces of sexism that continues to influence too much of contemporary politics.

A pro-Hillary Clinton book that lays out all the statements and actions against her in her political career.

Thanks to the publisher for the ARC.

Time and again, [Donald Trump] resurrected his favorite enemy, Hillary Clinton, as if she possessed powers that made her more than human and thus someone to be feared despite her retirement from politics.

Journalist, CNN commentator, and author of a number of histories and biographies Michael D’Antonio tackles the subject of why Hillary Clinton, a lifelong public servant and one of the most qualified candidates ever to run for president of the United States, has for four decades also been a looming boogeyman of the right.

This subject is endlessly fascinating to me, and although Hillary-as-demonic-force is strongly associated with the further reaches of the right, much of the myth around this concept has permeated more reasonable, fact- and logic-based media as well. It’s a bit of where there’s smoke, there’s fire, and a lot of good old sexist, misogynist, patriarchal bullshit.

It would almost be funny if it wasn’t so detrimental and potentially dangerous. Still, there are moments of levity. When D’Antonio covers the range of sexual rumors attributed to Hillary, the ridiculousness of this giant criss-crossing web of conflicting conspiracies is laughable. She can’t be frigid AND a lesbian AND a swinger. It just underscores how those who like to frame her as a monster barely have any preference about what form that monster assumes.

The genesis of hating Hillary came when she was married to Bill Clinton as he ran for governor of Arkansas and — horror of horrors — she didn’t take his last name. Pearls, consider yourself clutched! She already had an established career herself as an attorney and had published under her maiden name, among other reasons for not wanting to change it, let alone the biggest two I can think of: she didn’t want to, and who cares (didn’t change mine either!). D’Antonio pulls no punches about her ambition and aspirations, another target she’s been repeatedly pummeled for which also began to come under fire around this time, but it’s really no surprise with her own professional successes by that point that she didn’t want to change her name and was interested in continuing her own upward career trajectory.

But her second big sin at that time was that she didn’t conform to southern standards of gracious, carefully cultivated femininity. She was described as not being “stereotypically womanly or feminine,” and D’Antonio notes, “There it was, the trump card that anyone could play, at any time, against any ambitious woman. No amount of achievement or intelligence could exempt Hillary Rodham from standards of femininity determined by society at large and enforced by anyone who chose to take on the job.”

The foundations were further laid for criticism in that she really just did so much, both personally and publicly. She was an extremely active and engaged First Lady of Arkansas, not to mention her accomplishments while serving that role for the nation. But in a typical catch-22 against women, this was perceived negatively, as well as the fact that the more that you do, the more something occasionally won’t work out or will be badly received.

From establishing this starting point against the backdrop of her education and the era’s feminism, D’Antonio methodically goes down the list, debunking the infamous scandals and conspiracies that have been pinned to her: Whitewater (the Clintons actually lost money on the real estate investment), Vince Foster’s suicide (a tragic event made even more so by a nonsensical murder conspiracy), being called a bitch by prominent figures (hypocritical Newt Gingrich, whiny bro/Kenneth Starr protege Brett Kavanagh); Benghazi, Pizzagate, the emails.

Much of this is already easily google-able but D’Antonio has a good narrative style and is very thorough in his approach. He also helpfully ties events into their context, through figures like “political radio performer” Rush Limbaugh, and relates incidents to the wider narrative that was continually building around her.

He also puts political concepts into context, like the worsening of health care accessibility and why so many people who are protected in this area find it difficult to care about those who aren’t. Or the tricky difficulties particular to Fox News viewers: “As literacy experts have discovered, 95 percent of Americans fail a standard test that involves reading opposing newspaper editorials and evaluating their claims…multiple studies would find Fox viewers even less well informed than average when compared with those who use other news sources. In effect, Fox News made people who already struggled with information they received less knowledgeable.” Perfect.

And of course there’s plenty of space devoted to the vitriolic obsessiveness with which Trump hates her, making a fascinating case for precedence in deep history: “the president and others needed her in the way that ancient peoples needed ghosts and goblins and devils. Historically, demons were unconscious projections of the insecurities and negative impulses of their creators. ‘They’ were heaped with sins and shortcomings so that “we” could feel pure.” He goes on to rightly call Trump the “least qualified major-party candidate in modern times,” thus explaining his need to label his opponents with “the traits that marked him.” Crooked being the obvious example coming to mind.

In truth, Clinton had always been regarded by her opponents as more monster than person…As such, it wasn’t enough for her to be defeated in an election. Instead, she had to be humiliated and then obliterated that even history would forget her. (Officials in Texas actually voted to remove her from history lessons taught in the state’s schools but reinstated her after a public uproar.)

I mean…thank goodness there was an uproar? But what in Stalinist revisionist history hell?

It’s also strange because her approval rating as First Lady was quite high at 67%, and “she would also rank highest when Americans were asked which women in the world they admired most, eclipsing even the glamorous Princess Diana.” D’Antonio adds that “Although Hillary’s poll numbers indicated her popularity, the picture was complicated by the fact that very few people were ambivalent about her.”

So many of the criticisms against her, or supposed evidence of her immorality and/or evil, are so patently ridiculous but it’s clear that they lodged into Americans’ collective psyche. Like David Brock’s 1994 article in The Spectator which notes that the Clintons’ cat, Socks, “often threw up.” Imagine, for a moment, that your morals were judged in part on the gastrointestinal behaviors/shortcomings of your pets. Just imagine what this person has been up against throughout her entire adult life in the public eye. The mind reels. And that’s not even touching on her clothes, or the political minefield that is her appearance in general:

Inference via wardrobe was not something men endured, but just as her hairstyles were regularly plumbed for meaning, Hillary’s garments were reviewed as if they signaled the contents of her soul.

I suppose there’s nothing shockingly new or groundbreaking here, all of this should register as quite obvious, but D’Antonio writes smoothly and compellingly, and following the build-up of this mythology piece by piece is just staggering. In the end it made me respect her infinitely more, although I can only wish that material like this would reach the eyeballs of those who need it most.

As a politics junkie who was a Hillary supporter in 2016, this book was everything to me. The author really detailed Hillary's political history and how much she has achieved in her career. She has broken so many barriers as a woman, and has never gotten the credit that she deserves. For many women in the US, the misogyny that led to the demise of Hillary's presidential run is no surprise. It was really well-researched and a great read about the woman who should've been our president. I'd definitely recommend this to all the political junkies out there.

This book confirms much of what I have suspected all along: that there must have been a concerted effort to "go" after Hillary Clinton. I have read many of the absurd stories promoted by right wing sources and wondered how could anyone believe any of it. Indeed, I have some friends who believe them all. Michael D'Antonio lays out a detailed explanation of all those who have sought to damage Hillary Clinton with their absurd and false claims. The hypocrisy of the right never fails to amaze me!

As the title clearly indicates, this book traces the efforts of various Republican politicians and media moguls over a forty year period to discredit Hillary Clinton. The animosity and vehemence of these attacks and misinformation campaigns, as Michael D'Antonio clearly shows, were informed by overt and covert misogynistic expectations and ideas that continue to plague US society. today, For most women, this should be no surprise, and in fact, most of the incidences/scandals covered in this book (e.g. Whitewater, Bill Clinton's affairs and Hillary's responses, the so-called "Pizzagate" conspiracy, and the email controversy) have already been covered in various other monographs, including several books authored by Hillary Clinton. However, what this book does well is contextualize each of these incidences, providing the necessary background information to understand the full import. This contextualization and attention to facts, however, is largely undermined by the author's use of loaded rhetoric to describe Hillary Clinton's enemies, and as a result, I fear that the skeptical reader may find it difficult to accept the author's conclusions. Thus, in the end, it is unlikely that this book will move beyond preaching to the choir and actually change anyone's minds.

I don’t exactly know what I was expecting with this book. Perhaps a non-bias narrative. This book is basically a love letter to Hillary Clinton. No one is so perfect, especially in politics. The book begins with the bashing of current President Trump. This can be off putting to many readers. There can be a pro Hillary narrative without bashing a current standing president, whether you like him or not. It’s not patriotic. This why we vote and have elections. This book, clearly written by a man, made me ashamed to be a woman at some points. I do not recommend this book. Even if you adore Hillary and all that she has done for our country, this book spreads lies and breeds hate.