Yes, yes, it all looks bad, the whole HRC selling State Department access to Clinton Foundation donors thing. But that's how the game is played, you poor pathetic fool! What kind of a naif thinks this isn't the dynamics of interactions between politicians and their funders and which has been such since time immemorial? (SPOILER: the Smoking QPQ starts at Paragraph 9)

According to the punditry , in order to make any effective case against the untoward entwining of HRC during her tenure as Secretary of State with her family Foundation, one would need a clear cut case of quid pro quo, or in English, tit for tat. You do this and I do that. If you don't do this, then I don't do that. Something simple enough that even the dumbest TV talking head could grasp the interaction and make the inference that something very smelly is going on and who could bring themselves to communicate this to the rest of us. Which might cause concern among the voters and perhaps the Congress and even perhaps to some intrepid FBI agent or Justice Department or something.

In the absence of any such quid pro quo, pundits are left to pontificate on how HRC could have given so little thought to appearances, which the hoi polloi are bound to misinterpret, since we lack the sophistication of the Beltway cocktail circuit.

But occasionally, even the insiders may be concerned about the boundary stretching that went on during Hillary's term in the DOS - it can even rise to the level of "Troubling"(!) as occurs in this article in Vox by Jeff Stein:

4 Experts Make The Case That The Clinton Foundations Fundraising Was Troubling

This is a decent article which points out that what Clinton did was different from the typical greasing of the skids and gladhanding that goes on between most of our politicians and their donors: HRC was dealing with tax deductible donations which according to law may be anonymous (any disclosure the Foundation does is voluntary and there have been notable gaps) and which may include foreign nationals and companies and governments - something that is excluded in our internal domestic political finance schemes (despite the giant loopholes in the Citizen's United decision). Also, Clinton's purview was not confined to domestic policy since now we are in an international arena with an entirely different set of players and motivations not to mention opening up new territory like arms sales, access to foreign players and leaders, etc. But, as even this article cautions us, that there is no quid pro quo that has been unearthed so far.

But Stein does clear up one nagging question that the punditry keeps asking the Clinton spoxpeeples - how come it's okay for Secretary of State Clinton and hubby to get stuff from furriners but President Hillary can't? Oh! It's unconstitutional for a President or First Lady to accept gifts under the Emolument Clause in the Constitution.

There is a word which keeps popping up - "troubling". "Troubling" is the new synonym and shorthand for "stinks to high heaven" and "why isn't this person resigning?" and "where's the Special Prosecutor? ". To me a pair of underwear riding up is troubling, but it's not the word I would choose to describe my feelings about a major Cabinet figure found giving the finger to the FOIA, storing state secrets on private servers in basements, and trading access and more to donors.

Ah, if only there was some concrete case of some Foundation Donor who got not simply access, but something concrete. Something they were clearly not entitled to by any independent measure. Something that might be against the best interests of the country. If only such a case exists.

But Dear Reader, it does. It has been reported. It's out in the open. There is someone who was both a Clinton campaign contributor AND a donor to the Foundation who made a request to be appointed to a position they were clearly not qualified for, was added to the list of nominees for that position and ultimately actually enshrined in the position by either the Secretary herself or her highest staff with her knowlege.

This article in Daily Caller details the direct ask from the donor for the favor in an email to Huma Abedin: Clinton Donor Asked For State Department Position

This article by ABC News, which did most of the heavy lifting on this story, details the appointees lack of necessary qualifications, i.e. the apparent inability to get a security clearance plus it also makes clear that he was added by "S" (the Secretary) and/or Mills.
Records Sought For Clinton Foundation Donor Placed On Intel Board

This article in the WSJ Hillary's Strange Security Adviser is a good summary of the appointee's campaign activities, the fact that when the appointment became public, the primary goal of the people behind the scenes in State became to "protect the Secretary and Under Secretary's name" and that Cheryl Mills asked for press "stall". The situation was contained with the rapid resignation of the person in question. Then any information about the appointee was scrubbed from the any information about the Board. The author opines further:

This is also why Mrs. Clinton kept control over her home-brew email server. The Citizens United release shows that messages about ISAB appointments were forwarded to Mrs. Clinton’s personal account—where they fell into a black hole. Were there email discussions about the personal-profit merit of appointing Mr. Fernando? Ask Mrs. Clinton’s webmaster, Bryan Pagliano. Or not. He recently invoked the Fifth during a deposition 125 consecutive times.

So, in summary, there is a case where there is an apparent ask, there is an apparent fulfillment of the request, then there is apparent cover-up and obstruction. I have heard people posit that for any situation to qualify as a true quid pro quo that would have legs it would require a situation where:

The request was inappropriate, the request should not have been considered and would not have been considered by a reasonable person in the same situation, any action taken was intentional, and the action could be argued to be against the true best interests of the country and could be construed by reasonable people as simply a reward for dollars.

What do you think? Is there fire to go along with the smoke?

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Epilogue:

I believe that the reason the press and the punditry are not adequately covering the actions of HRC while SOS is because she is running against the political equivalent of Jeffery Dahmer. But imagine in an alternate universe that her actions and obstructions and such were covered to the degree that they deserve to be and that she actually made a pragmatic decision to resign as the candidate.

Wouldn't we be left with Tim Kaine who is the same DLCer, centrist, deal-maker that HRC is, but without the scandel attached? Or, could we not default to the only other person who ran for the nomination meaningfully - Bernie Sanders?

If elected, what sorts of precedents is the election of Hillary Clinton setting for future Cabinet appointees, future Presidents, and future politicians who now see the way to personal enrichment is clearly to set up family foundations and then to muddle the boundaries between non-profits and politics as much as is humanly possible? And of course, to join a Speakers Bureau and take elocution lessons. Is this Our Brave New World?

I notice that Rhode Island politicians have already noticed this formerly little noticed path to wealth. A number are embroiled in a scandal involving their association with local non-profits which they control, whose assets may be questionably distributed, and for whose benefit they collectively pass public grants for. It really seems like an example of what Hillary writ large, writ small on a state page. The salt in the wound is that the tax status of the non-profits essentially creates an income deduction for graft!