Posted on 06/05/2003 3:53:29 AM PDT by BigWaveBetty
Edited on 04/13/2004 2:42:41 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
(referring to a Joe Klein article about Hillary aide Maggie Williams' grueling testimony before Congress)I swear, for the life of me, I can't think of one single instance when a conservative woman described herself as "sobbing" or "gasping for breath". These people are so, so, so....dramatic!"They smashed up lives and didn't notice," Klein wrote.
He laid out in harsh terms how Hillary's chief of staff, Maggie Williams, had broken down in tears while testifying the previous week at the hearings chaired by Sen. Alfonse D'Amato. Williams was saddled with large legal bills, virtually abandoned by her patrons in the White House. "How could the first lady allow her chief of staff to spend $140,000 on legal fees?" Klein asked. "Why hasn't she come forward and said, 'Stop torturing my staff. This isn't about them. I'll testify. I'll make all documents available. I'll sit here and answer your stupid, salacious questions until Inauguration Day, if need be'?"
Hillary was sobbing when she called Jane Sherburne, the White House attorney in charge of scandal management.
Had Jane read the Klein column?
Yes.
"It's killing me to let this happen," Hillary said. She wanted to testify, to make it better, to take care of it. "Every bone in my body tells me that's what I should do."
She could not stand by and let Maggie be hurt so, have others dragged in.
"How is Maggie?"
Sherburne said they both knew Maggie was both vulnerable and tough. She was willing to throw herself in front of any train and get beat up.
Hillary's voice caught and she gasped in short breaths.
Chelsea and her mother wearing the same shade of lipsick is downright scary!
WalMart for a book signing? Oh, how the mighty have fallen!
Did any of you ever see the movie She-Devil? Meryl Streep's character was previously a successful romance writer who wrote a stinker of a book titled 'Love in the Rinse Cycle,' after stealing Roseanne Barr's husband, who was portrayed by Ed Begely Jr. The look on Meryl's character's face when everyone passes by her signing table is one I'd like to see on Hillary.
I suppose Hillary thinks she will endear herself to the common people by doing her little signing at WalMart. Does anyone really believe she'd be caught dead there otherwise? While she's there, perhaps a helpful sales associate could point her in the direction of cosmetics and the shampoo aisle.
Love the tag line, but that wouldn't be Heinz ketchup, would it?
Gag alert: a flattering profile of John Edwards in the WashPost:
How did it come to be that Edwards, who just turned 50 this weekend and whose entire political career consists of one election and four-plus years in office, convinced himself that it was his duty -- or right -- to run for the White House? It is his right, he told voters during a recent New Hampshire swing, because, "I hope you agree with me this is still a country where the son of a mill worker can go toe-to-toe against the son of a president of the United States."
Big "whatever," John.
LOL! Special today on Suave, Mrs. Clinton!
LOL! If the salesperson is really on thier toes they'll suggest one of those at home dry cleaning kits as well.
Certainly the only reason hillary would lower herself to Walmart is the 'I'm one of you' angle she's working on for the '08 election.
In the book, Clinton comes across as exasperated at times and detached at others. [Maybe the use of three ghostwriters explains why she "comes across" different ways at different points in the book] She chronicles some of her emotional experiences as if she were watching from afar. But a close reading really may provide some insight into one of the most complex characters in contemporary national politics.
Clinton appears through her writing to be able to separate the man who is her husband from the man who was the president. She shuttles back and forth from the personal to the political, without dropping a stitch. She says the couple agreed to see a marriage counselor. [She should have seen Dr. Smith and Dr. Wesson, but that's just my opinion] Keeping a stiff upper lip during such tribulations, she writes, is what one must do. She says she coped with her marital problems in the same way a forklift operator would cope with his -- you get up and get through the day. [A forklift operator? Was she thinking of her butt as she wrote this, or was this a sly move on the part of one of the ghostwriters? I mean, really, don't all of us get up and get through the day, regardless of occupation?]
full article
In another apparent instance of factual dispute -- this time with Blumenthal -- memoirist Clinton "describes in bitter terms the months of chill between them afterward, never more painful than when they went to Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts for a vacation following his testimony," the AP reports. " ' Buddy, the dog, came along to keep Bill company,' she writes. 'He was the only member of our family who was still willing to.' While on the island, she felt 'nothing but profound sadness, disappointment and unresolved anger. I could barely speak to Bill, and when I did, it was a tirade.' "
But Blumenthal, on Page 465 of his book, recounts a phone call from the Clintons to his hotel room in Italy on the night of the president's Aug. 17 televised speech admitting his "inappropriate" relationship. "About ten minutes after it ended, my hotel phone rang: it was the president, asking what my reaction was," Blumenthal writes.
"I told him it was all right. Hillary asked me what I thought. I told her the same. . . . They handed the phone to James Carville and Mark Penn. . . . I could hear the president and Hillary bantering in the background. . . . They were still working as a team." Lloyd Grove, WashPost
Great news! Barbara Bush has a book in the works. Supposed to be quite spicey.
Never mind the blockbuster autobiography by that other former first lady. We hear Barbara Bush's latest is so hot that her publisher's in-house libel lawyers are asking her to tone it down. Which makes us wonder which of the famously frank author's least favorite people should be assuming a defensive crouch or purchasing a Kevlar vest.
"Reflections," Bush's memoir of the eight years between her husband's and son's presidencies, is being published Oct. 14 by Lisa Drew/Scribner. We hear that the recently completed manuscript -- every word written by the 77-year-old wife of George Bush the elder -- contains nearly a dozen passages that have caused the lawyers heartburn. In a couple of instances, we're told, the author has agreed to changes, but in most cases, she's sticking to her guns.
Yesterday we surveyed several Bush family friends to get an idea of which people might be the best-selling author's juiciest targets. The speculation includes cartoonist Garry Trudeau and New York Times pundit Maureen Dowd[Can't wait to read what Barbara has to say about the dowd!] (relentless critics of the current President Bush), 1980 Bush campaign speechwriter turned Bill Clinton aide David Gergen, Democrat Ann Richards and independent candidate Ross Perot ("that woman" and "that horrid little man," respectively, in the Barbara Bush lexicon) and Republicans Patrick Buchanan, Steve Forbes and John McCain, who drew Bush blood in various political campaigns. WashPost
Isn't blubba's book due out around the same time?
Is she, or isn't she?
That's what all the pundits are asking this morning about Hillary Clinton's great book adventure, but they're missing the point.
Of course she's telling whoppers, but that's not news.
She — and more to the point, he — knows that the chattering class won't buy her story that she had to gulp for air, that she cried and yelled and hollered and stomped her size 10 flats when Bill finally told her that yes, the vast right-wing media conspiracy had actually got it right, he generally did wear his pants around his ankles in the Oval Office. Buddy the dog was the only member of the family who would have anything to do with the president for days, maybe weeks, afterward, so great was Hillary's fury. (Now we know why Buddy threw himself in front of the car.)
This is not the version of events as told by Sidney Blumenthal, the faithful lady-in-waiting to Hillary. link to rest of column.
Gag alert: x42 gave a commencement speech at some fancy private school in Boston yesterday; more Bush bashing and rehashing of the same old "world is becoming more interdependent" theme, story here.
Golly gosh! Squidy's going to be in big trouble with the beastly one!
What is she, Star Wars? I wonder if the news station will have someone out at midnight to show us how many hillary fans will line up in the rain to buy her book? NONE, ZERO, LOL,LOL!
What on earth has the author of this piece been doing?
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