What Happened

After Hillary Rodham Clinton gave in to critics and baked cookies, I was not a fan for many reasons, but if asked who was a better writer, Hillary or Bill, it was no contest. I always enjoyed her books more and have always taken her more seriously than her weaker half. When I started and failed to read Hard Choices, it was because it read more like a compilation of her daily planner with a few adjectives. It made Elizabeth Warren’s A Fighting Chance feel like a sumptuous feast, and Warren’s book was dry. So even though What Happened hit the market with a firestorm of controversy, I was reluctant to bite because maybe HRC lost her touch.
HRC is back and better than ever with What Happened. As I was reading it, I was struck by how timely her references were. She was relatable, funny, less guarded and stilted than she had become in her prose in Hard Choices. I know that a person running for POTUS has no time, but if she wrote a daily blog in the same way that she wrote the early chapters in her book, I think that more people would have voted for her. Hindsight is 20/20.
What Happened is a thematic book, not told chronologically, which normally I find problematic, but maybe because everything is so fresh, I was able to follow along without getting confused. I have no idea if generations who did not experience the events that she referenced first hand will feel similarly or feel confused by the jumping around. As the book progresses, it transforms from memoir to analysis and policy then back to her future and reflections.
I don’t agree with critics’ assessments that she is making excuses. I actually think that she is laying out everything in hopes that another younger person will take notes, seize the baton and continue the work without hitting the same potholes that hampered her progress. HRC writes with a sense of urgency and mortality that is missing in her earlier books perhaps because she is more concerned than she even details in What Happened. I tend to agree with her on this point, which is why despite earlier reservations, I ultimately voted for her.
I am glad that HRC finally threw some much deserved shade, but she is ultimately too classy to not throw a redemption life vest to ameliorate her deserved condemnation of the New York Times and James Comey for their role in jeopardizing our country’s future. On a less serious note, I have always hated Matt Lauer since I was a young child when he got his unfortunate start on PM Magazine before he would go on to do drag as a serious journalist instead of clinging to his entertainment origins where he barely belonged. When she took a moment to critique his unsurprisingly crap Commander in Chief Forum, I retroactively felt that she earned my vote again. I am always here for Lauer slams. I was also delighted that she is an adherent of apocalypse by A.I., i.e. Judgment Day-bold choice and giggled that she acknowledged that it does make her sound wacky.
While she has been the only Presidential candidate during the 2016 election to strongly advocate for Black Lives Matter, I did have to give a little side eye at her parallel of the movement with Arab Spring opening the door to the Muslim Brotherhood. I’m just hoping that she borrowed Bill’s whistle because otherwise she has strikingly improved from her early missteps. HRC isn’t the only person to pair Black Lives Matter with issues of gun violence, but it has always seemed like apples and oranges to me. Even on their worst day, most Americans are not prepared to model the United Kingdom and demand that law enforcement not have guns. I don’t get it, but hell, I was not Secretary of State or a Senator so what do I know (that Lauer should not be viewed as a serious journalist…oops, did I already write that).
After dealing with Presidon’t with more class than I thought that she should be expected to muster, I’m willing to sign a waiver regarding all my past grievances against HRC. I couldn’t do it, and if you think you could, you’re lying to yourself. What Happened is a necessary reminder that there is a real person behind the name and even though her natural tendency to discuss substantial issues in a pedantic way can be dry, it is essential to moving forward.