Surely the Germans must have a word for “the shock of the totally expected.” It’s as if ennui were a 300-pound man, sitting on your chest. In English we call it “Clinton fatigue,” and it’s what I felt — what I’m still feeling — after yesterday’s announcement that Hillary is officially in the running.
Here’s Roger Kimball to explain that old feeling:
But here’s the thing. The public is fickle. The invulnerability accorded to celebrity comes with a statute of limitation. The Clintons are a bit like Captain Hook in Peter Pan: they’re being followed by a voracious creature carrying a ticking clock. The clock is supposed to warn them of the presence of the beast. But it cannot account for the upsurge of boredom, the onset of Clinton fatigue, which is an unpredictable catastrophe just waiting to overwhelm them. Nor can it account for the sudden tsunami of outrage, which Hillary’s long career of lying and incompetence, not to say outright illegality, has been massing off in the distance for years but which just might crest and overwhelm them at any moment.
Will the public prove fickle as Roger thinks? Or will it succumb to 300 pounds of ennui and go with the “inevitable” candidate?
The best, the absolute very best we can hope for is 19 months of that laugh. That forced, screeching, barking thing, as bereft of sincerity as it is of amusement.
19 months of that. Or nearly ten years of it if we aren’t so lucky.
Whatever you think of her accomplishments (if you can identify them), whatever you think of her policy proposals (if you can nail them down), you’re still left the most condescending and the least candid major Democratic contender since… well, since the last one they nominated. All revealed in that inauthentic laugh.
The only thing I fear more than a decade of listening to that, is finding out what makes her laugh for real.
I’ll have more later, once the 300 pounds of ennui have left my chest.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member