Can Gowdy and Benghazi Raise Hillary's Dishonesty Polls to Unelectable Polls

The chairman of the House Select Committee on Benghazi, Representative Trey Gowdy, and other Republicans have complained that the State Department has delayed providing emails and other documents involving former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and some of her top staffers that are related to the Benghazi investigation. Gowdy and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy threatened last month to withhold certain State Department spending to force Department officials to move more quickly to comply with Committee requests for documents. Now, House Republicans are acting. Yesterday the House Appropriations Committee said that a budget plan for the State Department withholds nearly $700 million - 15% of the agency's operational funds - until "requirements related to proper management of Freedom of Information Act and electronic communications are met." A spokesperson for the Appropriations Committee said the budget plan withholds funds until State develops and implements a plan to reduce a backlog of FOIA and congressional requests. State Department spokesman Alec Gerlach called the proposal "counterproductive" and said it would further constrain resources needed to meet sharp increases in requests for documents in recent years. The State Department achieved nearly a 14% reduction in its appeals backlog last year, according to Gerlach, but he added that State's FOIA caseload has more than tripled since 2008 -- jumping from 6,000 requests to nearly 20,000 last year. The number of congressional oversight requests has also dramatically increased, Gerlach said. Gowdy said in a statement that the Committee has tried many ways to get the State Department to produce needed documents, including talking to officials, writing letters, sending subpoenas, conducting hearings and suggesting cuts to the Department's budget. Gowdy said :"The committee has been patient, but that patience has worn thin after months - and in some instances years - of non- compliance with congressional requests and subpoenas....The explanations and excuses are tired and unpersuasive. Regrettably it sometimes takes money to get agencies' attention." The Committee requests for documents are "reasonable and relevant to the Benghaz probe," Gowdy said, adding that the Committee should have emails sent or received by top State Department officials before questioning those witnesses. ~~~~~ A federal judge who supports the position of Congress last week ordered the State Department to release monthly batches of Clinton's email correspondence from her time as Secretary of State starting June 30. Clinton, the frontrunner 2016 Democratic candidate for President, used a personal server and email address while serving as Secretary of State, which is the reason given by State Department for the delays. State has said it needs more time to scan and release in electronic form the 55,000 pages of paper copies of emails selected and sent by Clinton to the Department. The Department has released nearly 300 emails relating to the 2012 attack on the US diplomatic post in Benghazi that killed four Americans, including US ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens. ~~~~~ While Representative Elijah Cummings, the senior Democrat on the Benghazi Select Committee, said cutting the State Department's budget : "will only further slow down and drag out the Republican's taxpayer-funded political attack on Secretary Clinton. It makes no sense to cut the department's budget while continuing to give the Select Committee a blank check." However, the budget proposed by the GOP-controlled House Appropriations Committee actually provides the full amount requested by President Barack Obama for embassy security at more than 275 diplomatic facilities overseas, including facility upgrades and increased security personnel, as recommended by a review board appointed by the State Department to investigate the Benghazi attacks. To help pay for the improvements, the budget bill eliminates voluntary contributions to the United Nations and other internationa organizations. ~~~~~ In closely related news, two new polls released yesterday show Hillary Clinton's favorable rating hitting a low not seen for many years. The CNN/ORC poll has Hillary's favorability rating at its lowest since 2003, at 46%, while the new Washington Post-ABC News poll has it at its lowest since 2008, at 45%. Why? The answer is 'Honesty.' The Post-ABC poll shows just 41% think she is honest and trustworthy -- a number that has continued to fall amid her e-mail controversy and other issues. It was at 46% in late March. A majority of Americans - 52% - now say Hillary Clinton is not honest. But, she still lead all oponents, both Democrat and Republican, in 2016 general election polls. It could be related to the GOP's perceived lack of connection with voters. While people generally don't see Clinton as honest, they think she's better when it comes to understanding the problems of people like them - at 49% to 46%. That's not as good for her as it was, but it's still positive. It's also far better than the GOP's nominal frontrunner, Jeb Bush. For Bush, the numbers are reversed. While people say 45% to 40% that he's honest and trustworthy, they say at 55% to 35% that he doesn't understand the problems of people like them -- a huge 20-point gap that is significantly larger than Clinton's honesty problem. And, it's a mirror image of what happened in 2012 -- where President Obama was leading Mitt Romney by 3% overall late in the race -- but when people were asked who understood them more, Obama led by 8%. The Post-ABC poll asked this question about either party twice in 2014. In January, people favored Democrats on this question 46% to 37%. In October, it was 48% to 35% -- double digit differences favoring Democrats both times. ~~~~~ Dear readers, Hillary Clinton brings obvious liabilities to the 2016 presidential race -- most of them she created herself -- but as long as she and Democrats are seen as more in touch with average Americans, it's going to be difficult for the GOP to capitalize on her character flaws. That goes a long way to explaining why she delivered her emails as paper copies -- to delay their usability while seeming to comply and making it possible for her to attack the State Department for delays that, in fact, she created herself. It also explains why she destroyed the email records on her private, and possibly illegal, email server -- and why she has so far refused to turn it over to US Archive experts who could recuperate most of the erased emails. AND -- that is why Trey Gowdy is absolutely right to ask for the withholding of State Department funds until somebody with authority in the Obama administration -- Secretary of State Kerry, Attorney General Lynch, or President Obama -- quits hiding the full facts of what happened in Benghazi from Congress, which has the constitutional right to oversight and review. Then, if Americans still care at all about the honesty of their government and President, they may finally decide that Hillary Clinton is simply not worthy to be President of the United States.