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Talk about contrasts. I interviewed both women currently running for president the same day: Carly Fiorina by telephone in the morning and Hillary Clinton face-to-face in the afternoon of December 29th. Carly is conservative and Hillary is a leftist. Carly spent her career in the private sector, becoming the first and only female CEO of a Fortune 50 company. Hillary has spent her career in government. Carly is a leader. Hillary is a manager. Carly has a positive favorability rating. Hillary’s is negative. I’d love to watch them debate one on one.
They both appeared on the same “Meet the Press” broadcast in September, though at different times, and I asked Carly: “Chuck Todd interviewed Hillary Clinton first and he seemed to be almost worshipful as he did so. Then you came on and he got the daggers out. The tone was drastically different [because you’re a pro-life woman]. If you should surge in the polls, do you see mainstream media as a possible obstacle to your nomination and election?”
“Well, the mainstream media is an obstacle to any conservative nomination,” she responded. “The mainstream media is hopelessly biased. This is not a news flash, and Chuck Todd was hostile, in part, because he knows, as Hillary Clinton knows, as the mainstream media knows — that I am Hillary Clinton’s worst nightmare…”
“I would agree with that.”
“…I am her worst nightmare because she won’t be able to talk about the things she wants to talk about. She wants to talk about the ‘War on Women.’ She wants to talk about the historic nature of her candidacy. She wants to talk about anything but her track record and her accountability, and I will force her to talk about those things. So, the fact that the mainstream media is not on my side is not a news flash. The question is: who is going to be our nominee? Who is tough enough to stand up against that and throw every punch back in their face? And I think I’ve demonstrated I have the capacity to do that, and if we get another nominee that can’t and Hillary Clinton is gonna win.”
“I think about what happened to Sarah Palin early on when she was surging in the polls,” I said. “She became almost demonic to the mainstream media, so you’re expecting that I would assume — a similar kind of assault on you.”
“Of course, of course. Will they try it? Yes. Will it work with me? No.”
As one of the outsider candidates for the Republican nomination and I asked her about Republican leadership in the Congress. She said, “I’m disappointed in the leadership of the House and the Senate. I made no bones about that. [I’m] disappointed they passed the Omnibus Spending Bill. Increases our debt. Increases our spending levels and there are a couple of good things buried in there, but basically the Democrats got what they wanted, so yeah I’m very disappointed. Frankly all of my energy right now, and I think where most of our energy needs to be for the time being is electing a nominee who can beat Hillary Clinton. Because it’s pretty clear that without leadership in the White House, we’re not going to get leadership that can change things for the better in the House and the Senate. Tom, you’ve probably heard me say before, there’s a big difference between management and leadership. The political class of both parties are managers.
They operate within the system. Well, operating within the system isn’t working for the American people anymore. It’s why I’m running for president. It’s why I’ve rolled out a blueprint to take back our country. Because until you challenge this system at its core — by for example radically simplifying the tax code — and changing the way government budgets our money, until we change this system at its core, — which is going to take an outsider with executive experience — we’re going keep getting deals we don’t like. Government is going to keep getting bigger and bigger and bigger as it has for forty years under Republicans and Democrats alike. You can’t keep doing the same things and expect a different answer.”
“The UK recently declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization,” I said. “Do you think the United States should also?”
“Well, it’s clear they are. Declaring someone a terrorist organization doesn’t necessarily mean anything with this administration. Yes, I think it might be helpful, but what I think would be more helpful is if this administration actually had a strategy to defeat ISIS. If Hillary Clinton actually had a strategy to defeat ISIS. She doesn’t. If Donald Trump actually had a strategy to defeat ISIS, he doesn’t. We need to defeat ISIS. Let’s just start with that, because they are the most clear and present danger… This administration, without a doubt, has been, umm, a kind way to say it would be say ‘overly politically correct.’
An accurate way to say it would be ‘delusional.’ They have been denying the nature of the threat. They have been willful in terms of ignoring facts. It is delusional to go to Paris a couple of weeks after a terrorist attack and talk about global warming. And it is ignoring of the facts to continue to say: ‘Our strategy is working,’ and ‘ISIS is contained,’ the day of a terrorist attack in the United States.”
Podcast of my Fiorina interview
I’d love to watch Carly debate Hillary this fall, but first she has to win an uphill fight for the Republican nomination.
