2015-08-18 – Okay, I have separate email addresses for my personal business and my work. You probably do too. So you probably think it’s pretty strange that Hillary ran government business through her personal email.

That thought makes the Tea Party really happy.

But the truth of the matter is that until Obama began establishing rules requiring officials to run their business through government email, it wasn’t all that odd for government officials to own their own email accounts. Hillary was far from the only one. Republicans and Democrats alike operated from their own email accounts. Obama’s government-only email rule didn’t come into effect until Hillary was out of office.

The Tea Party wants to give Bernie supporters as many reasons as possible to reject Hillary. So you’re not going to see too much about how Hillary supports Obamacare in their campaign. You’re not going to see much from them about how Hillary supports equal pay for women or women’s health rights. You’re not going to see much from them about how Hillary supports marriage equality.

You’re not going to see them waste their energy on the real issues—on the issues that drive them wild. You’re going to see them put most of their effort trying to drive a wedge between Hillary and the people who support Bernie Sanders. That’s their route to victory. They are going to pound, pound, pound this fake issue until you begin to question Hillary, whether that takes a lot or a little.

I’m a Bernie supporter, but I am not going to carry water for the Tea Party.

I have to be honest. I like Hillary. I will be happy to vote for her if she becomes the nominee. But even if I didn’t, I would still consider it to be urgent business to defeat the Republicans. And so I say no to the Republican smear of Hillary.

Bernie says no to the smear. He has his priorities straight.

And then there are the independents, the folks who will make the difference in states where the vote will be close. If we support the lie today, can we complain if they believe the lie in November 2016?