RUTHFULLY YOURS

Cosmopolitan published an interview on Tuesday that I think was with Hillary Clinton — although I can’t be completely sure, seeing as her answers sounded more like they had come from a robot than an actual human being.

I’m not exaggerating. This interview was so boring and so unproductive that Cosmo clearly struggled to even come up with a headline for it.  After all, the one that it went with — “Hillary Clinton Responds to Bernie Sanders’ Remark That She’s ‘Condescending’ to Young People” — was not even really accurate.

Sure, Hillary was asked about the remark, but she didn’t exactly answer. In fact, she exactly didn’t answer, responding with “Well, he’s criticized me for so many things in the last week, I’m not going to respond to his comments.”

Then — just like a perfectly functioning machine — she swooped in with a preprogrammed political talking point:

“I will say this,” she said. “I’m excited that so many young people are involved in this campaign.”

“I think it’s great if they support me, if they support Senator Sanders, the fact that they are committed to being part of the political process is a great development,” she added.

Whoa . . . so Hillary’s thoughts on this are, in essence: I like young people. It is good for young people to like politics. It is good. Hot take, Hil!

Her answer to a question about a controversial skit she performed this weekend with Mayor de Blasio that featured a joke criticized by some in the media as racist was equally (read: not at all) insightful:

“He has addressed it, and I will really defer to him because it is something that he’s already talked about.”

Bold.

Even her answers to questions that should clearly have inspired at least a touch of humanity were completely devoid of it. For example, when asked about who should pay on dates from a feminist perspective, she responded:

Look, I think splitting the cost on a date has to be evaluated on a kind of case-by-case basis. You know, many years ago I remember doing that, and I know a lot of young people who even today do because they kind of consider more casual dates, group dates, to be ones where everybody pays their fair share, but I think you also have to be alert to the feelings of the person that you are dating. If it’s important to that person to either split in the beginning of the relationship, or for one or the other of you to pay for whatever combination of reasons, you know, you just have to evaluate that and take it into account. So I don’t think there is a hard and fast rule, at least that I have ever seen followed in every instance.

Sure, I agree with that. Want to know why? Because everyone would. It isn’t saying anything. It sounds exactly like an answer a machine would spit out if you asked it, “What is an appropriate answer to who should pay on dates?” There was clearly room to add some spice here. This was the perfect opportunity for a little humanity. I mean, you’re really going to go with phrases like “evaluate and take that into account” when talking about romance? Why not throw in a barf-worthy line about you and Bill? If you can’t add a little personality when discussing dating life, when on earth can you?

The interview seems to indicate that maybe she just can’t. Her snooze-worthy answers — chock-full of phrases like, “Well, I think that’s a great question, and I hope that more people will begin to address that” and, “That is certainly my goal” and, “I am working hard to secure the Democratic party nomination” — made for an interview that was almost too boring to read at all.

Then again, maybe that’s the point. After all, it seems to me like the more people see of Hillary Clinton, the less they seem to like her.

— Katherine Timpf is a reporter for National Review Online.