It’s almost Election Day, and Hillary Clinton is buzzing around the country trying to grab as many votes as she can in what time remains.

For several years now Hillary has reigned as the one and only queen bee in the Democratic Party’s hive, where she has been followed and fiercely protected by a community of lesser bees. They are the drones and the workers – well paid to be sure – who exist for the exclusive purpose of serving her royal highness.  In return, Queen Bee Hillary is expected to insure the perpetuation of the party’s political power.

In spite of her royal position, a queen bee does not directly control her hive.  Instead, she is continuously surrounded by swarms of minion bees, intent on meeting her every need, giving her food, and disposing of her waste.  In an actual apian colony, these attendant busy bees also collect and then distribute what is called “queen mandibular pheromone,” a substance that inhibits the workers from starting their own queen cells.

In a zoomorphic twist, the term “queen bee” has been used informally to describe a woman in a position of dominance or ascendancy over her peers and associates. The definition suits  -- or pantsuits -- Hillary well.  However, in a bona fide colony of bees, the queen is actually marked with a special color by which apiculturists can identify the year in which she was hatched.  This helps to determine whether she has grown too old to maintain a strong hive and must be replaced. 

Hillary Clinton has been functioning as the Democrats’ political queen bee for about a quarter of a century, ever since she and her honey-pot Bill landed in the White House.  There may have been other party pretenders willing to replace her  -- e.g. long-time United States Senators Barbara Boxer, Diane Feinstein, and, more contemporarily, Elizabeth Warren.   But over the long haul, Hillary Clinton has “made sure” (a term used repeatedly by President Obama) to remain significantly in the public eye.  Early on, it seemed that that her aspirations to become the first female president of the United States were not just indefatigable, but messianic. Now she is in the final push to fulfill her destiny as the most powerful woman on earth.

But as is the custom with queen bees, Hillary has consistently depended upon others to fulfill her promise.  Her aides and confidants form a tight group of loyalists who have “been with her” for years.  At the end of the second debate, when asked to name a redeeming characteristic of Secretary Clinton, Donald Trump responded, without hesitation, that she was a fighter.   But closer to the truth may be the fact that Hillary has successfully used others to fight for her.

The WikiLeaks revelations have made this clear, since just about every damning piece of evidence uncovered was initiated by somebody other than Hillary.  They reflect the often-troubled musings of close cohorts intent on cleaning up the messes made by their queen bee.  The more hacked e-mails that emerge, the more obvious it becomes that Hillary’s trusted lieutenants were risking their own hides to save hers.  Was it a matter of self-effacing fealty paying deference to the queen bee’s higher purpose?

The best way for an ambitious politician to circumvent the trap of censure is to let others cover her tracks or even commit her sins.  Hillary may have vaguely taken “responsibility” for choosing to use a private server, but that’s as far as her mea culpa has gone.  The WikiLeaks records now show that she was not above the blunder of ill-conceived  conduct.  On those e-mails, even her bosom buddies refer to her as “forgetful,” cagey, and in need of  direction.

Even more apparent is that Clinton’s lack of foresight, particularly in regard to the use of a private server, confounded her close associates,  who spent a lot of worrisome time and  effort mulling over the unwise  decisions of their queen bee.  One wonders how many more important matters were neglected while Team Clinton engaged  in the exchanging  an electronic blizzard of doubt and possibly despair.

Of course, it was a mess of Hillary’s own doing, not theirs.   But in the process, the reputations of her faithful underlings were sullied.    In his compromised e-mails, for instance,  John Podesta  is revealed as a ditherer,  stressed out by the  need to  control the damage  of his boss’s actions…or inactions.

Cheryl Mills, Huma Abedin and possibly others were shown to have been arbitrarily hustled back and forth from State Department assignments to those at the Clinton Foundation.  Nevertheless their having been awarded immunity during the prior Clinton e-mail investigation could  be good news for Hillary.  The costly professional bleaching of her server as well as the destruction  of  her undisclosed e-mails were also  chores undertaken by  others.  Meanwhile, the true culprit has masqueraded as a wide-eyed innocent, asking reporter Ed Henry, for example, if the term “wiping the server” meant using a cloth.

It’s not entirely clear how much Clinton actually knows about the tangled web of technology that could eventually be her undoing.  She likes to quip with millennials about electronic innovations like “SnapChat,” but that likely is the brainchild of her younger staff.

Ironically, Hillary’s closest confident and long-time “other daughter,” Huma Abedin now poses the greatest threat.   After all, it was the Clintons who introduced Huma to their good friend Anthony Weiner and took part joyously in the couple’s wedding.  Even after the former New York City Congressman was disgraced, Hillary did not censure him the way she now vilifies Trump for the far tamer open mic comments he made thirteen years ago.

Now the investigation of Weiner’s sexting with an underage girl in North Carolina has brought to light thousands of his estranged wife’s  work-related e-mails  that had been sent from  Weiner’s laptop.  They could be duplicates; they could contain sensitive or even confidential information.  But if Huma is found to have lied previously about disclosing all her e-mails, her immunity could be revoked.

Still, she is sticking to her story of not knowing how those e-mails got onto Anthony’s computer in the first place.   At the very least, in the manner of her long-time friend and mentor, Abedin would appear to lack good judgment.  She has not been seen lately as a passenger on the official Clinton plane, suggesting that she and Hillary are no longer “stronger together.”   But if Ms. Clinton is victorious on Tuesday night, don’t be surprised to find Huma– and maybe even her unsavory spouse -- back in the fold.   After all, more than ever, the queen bee would need attending.