Hillary Clinton and the Perks of Being Powerful

From Charles C. W. Cooke at National Review:

The obvious question, then, is this: Given all that we now know, why is the very idea that Clinton may have committed crimes that require punishment still being met with such disbelief? If you are willing and able, forget for a moment that a conservative is posing that challenge, and suppose instead that it has come from a Black Lives Matter activist, or from Glenn Greenwald, or from anybody who is a part of our present conversation about judicial and structural inequality. In such an instance, what do you imagine is the best answer that you would be able to give? Certainly, the government has a great amount of leeway in these circumstances — as so often in life, prosecutorial discretion rules supreme. But to acknowledge that is not to answer the underlying question so much as it is to restate it in different words: To wit: Why, given that the government can choose whom it wishes to prosecute, is it ridiculous to imagine that it would choose to do so if the case involved Hillary Clinton? Meditating upon that inquiry, I cannot help but think that the answer is, “because Clinton is running for president, because she is extremely famous, and because Loretta Lynch is the attorney general.” Is that just?

Well, yes.

The Department of Justice is notoriously reluctant to pull the trigger on a prosecution if their doing so could be construed as an overtly “political” act, or if it could swing an election (especially if that possible swing is away from the president’s own party). In a vacuum, one can make a reasonable case in favor of the overall prudence of this approach. But one cannot credibly deny that, whatever virtues it might have to recommend it, this preference will inevitably accord to its beneficiaries a form of legal privilege that is not available to most people who are suspected of having crossed the same statutes. To the many intelligence officials who have been prosecuted by the Obama administration in the last seven years, “she’s running for high office” would presumably not represent a convincing reason for sparing Hillary Clinton the consequences of her indiscretions. Nor should it.

Not anymore. The Ted Stevens case, Scooter Libby, General Petraeus. The primary consideration seems to be, is the target an enemy of the Regime? If so, indict!