The details of that are generally true. Snopes goes on of a leftist rambling rampage to nitpick about the terminology used. "Volunteered" vs. "appointed and accepted",
Wouldn't that make the meme nitpicking as well? Because, you know, "volunteering" is really the same thing as "appointed", right?
I don't think that's nitpicking at all. The assertion is that she willfully "volunteered" for the case which has a connotation that she gleefully raised her hand to defend a 42 year old rapist of a 12 year old girl.
Flip the script. What if the statement read:
To me this reads as because the defendant demanded a female lawyer as opposed the male he was originally assigned, the judge selected her from a list of female lawyers who defend low income defendants, much like how Public Defenders are assigned cases. So what? Happens all the time. A totally different connotation.
And specifically as to the "appointed" and especially the "accepted", this from the
WaPo article:
(The defendant)
asked the judge to replace his court-appointed male attorney with a female one. The judge went through the list of a half-dozen women practicing law in the county and picked Clinton. She has said she was not thrilled with the assignment but felt she had little choice but to take the court appointment — which the prosecutor in the case confirmed to CNN.From
CNN:
Mahlon Gibson (prosecuting attorney in the case)
told CNN on Wednesday the then 27-year-old Hillary Rodham (now Clinton) was "appointed" by the judge in the case, even though she voiced reservations...
Gibson said that it is “ridiculous” for people to question how Clinton became Taylor’s representation.
“She got appointed to represent this guy,” he told CNN when asked about the controversy.
According to Gibson, Maupin Cummings, the judge in the case, kept a list of attorneys who would represent poor clients. Clinton was on that list and helped run a legal aid clinic at the time.
Taylor was assigned a public defender in the case but Gibson said he quickly “started screaming for a woman attorney” to represent him.
Gibson said Clinton called him shortly after the judge assigned her to the case and said, “I don't want to represent this guy. I just can't stand this. I don't want to get involved. Can you get me off?”
“I told her, ‘Well contact the judge and see what he says about it,’ but I also said don't jump on him and make him mad,” Gibson said. “She contacted the judge and the judge didn't remove her and she stayed on the case.”Clinton "knew" he was guilty vs. Clinton "believed" he was guilty. Clinton laughed about it vs. she was laughing about something tangential that doesn't make her look bad.
If anything, seems like you're nitpicking the nitpicking. I'm pretty sure defense attorneys/public defenders often times know and believe their client is guilty. More from CNN:
"Once Clinton was assigned, Gibson said, she had a legal obligation to represent Taylor to the fullest, and she did."Clearly, this is more of an editorial site than a "fact check" site. Snopes internet editors interpreting for us what she is laughing about is not a "fact". It's an example of why Snopes is a bad source.
And clearly the blogger you cited interpreting for us what she is laughing about is not a "fact". It's an example of why the blog 'Ethics Alarms' is a bad source.
Snopes' "interpretation" seems to be correct based upon the reporter, Roy Reed, who was actually there interviewing her, "
As far as her laughing, God knows she was not laughing over the notion that this rapist was going to go free," said Reed. “I challenge any fair-minded reader of that transcript to make a case that Hillary Rodham was a coldblooded lawyer who was laughing over the plight of the 12-year-old rape victim."