Hillary Faces Down The Angry Men

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http://www.alternet.org/gender/hillary-faces-down-angry-men?akid=9967.277129.pmjcJ-&rd=1&src=newsletter782060&t=9



Three weeks after her release from a New York hospital with a blood clot on the brain – a health emergency mocked on the right as “Benghazi flu” — Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave Senate Republicans their day of rage over the Sept. 11 Benghazi killings on Wednesday.

From the intellectually underwhelming Ron Johnson of Wisconsin to the ever-angrier John McCain, with cameos by unimpressive 2016 hopefuls Rand Paul and Marco Rubio, Clinton stood up to the raging bulls with grace and fire of her own.

The stature gap between Clinton and those possible 2016 rivals – OK, nobody’s announced they’re running, but I couldn’t help thinking about it – was enormous. When Rand Paul huffed “had I been President at the time and I found that you did not read the cables [from Benghazi] I would have relieved you of your duties,” it wasn’t intimidating but funny. President Rand Paul? Try to say that without laughing.

Steely yet sometimes emotional, Clinton defended the State Department’s handling of the Benghazi story while not denying the underlying Libyan unrest or security troubles that caused it.