Clinton book rips Hyde on impeachment ("Soviet-style Show Trial" Alert)

WASHINGTON--Hillary Rodham Clinton writes in her new book that she saw a "double standard'' in how Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.) dismissed the news of his adultery that surfaced while Hyde was presiding over impeachment proceedings against her husband.

Hyde, then the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, was "particularly intransigent'' in his opposition to a compromise that would have let the president escape with a censure rather than an impeachment trial, Clinton writes in Living History.

After being outed by Salon, an online magazine, Hyde acknowledged on Sept. 16, 1998, that he had a five-year affair with a Chicago woman in the late 1960s, when he was married. Salon during that time was critical of Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr's probe of Bill Clinton's fling with Monica Lewinsky.

Hyde, who was then 74, blamed the Clinton White House for the story and called his affair a "youthful indiscretion.''

"Despite my many personal and ideological differences with Hyde, I was sympathetic to his distress,'' Clinton writes, "although mystified that he didn't see the double standard in his reaction.''

Clinton's much-anticipated book, which fueled speculation she is laying the groundwork for a 2008 White House run, hit bookstores on Monday. The book, which snagged Clinton a $8 million advance, already has blockbuster potential.

Publisher Simon & Schuster spokesman Victoria Meyer said the company on Monday added another 100,000 to its initial order of 1 million copies.

In the 528-page memoir, Clinton tells of her family's roots in Chicago, her Park Ridge youth, her transition from a Goldwater Girl to a Democrat, her turbulent eight years as first lady and her decision to run for the Senate from New York.

Clinton's autograph session at a Manhattan bookstore drew a crowd--some waited overnight to get in--and she will be on the book tour circuit this summer. She will hit most big cities between her regular Senate duties.

Clinton, who stayed popular in Illinois through all the White House scandals, reaches Chicago at the end of June. She has remained in constant contact with her friends from Park Ridge and they will throw her a party on June 27, which will be followed by a fund-raiser for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

On June 28, there will be a breakfast to benefit her political action committee, called HILLPAC, followed by a book-signing at Women & Children First bookstore at 5233 N. Clark.

Clinton writes how as a kid, she and Park Ridge buddy Betsy Johnson Ebeling--still her good friend--sneaked downtown to look for ghost voters following the 1960 election, when Mayor Richard J. Daley was accused of stealing votes for John F. Kennedy.

Clinton went off with "total strangers'' to a "poor neighborhood'' on Chicago's South Side checking names against registration lists.

The girls had to sneak because they would not have been permitted to go if they asked their parents. Clinton writes when her father found out, "he went nuts. It was bad enough to go downtown without an adult, but to go to the South Side alone sent him into a yelling fit.''

She tells how her late father, Hugh Rodham, who once ran a drapery business at the Merchandise Mart called Rodrik Fabrics, could not stand waste. His feelings were so strong that if Clinton or one of her two brothers forgot to put the cap back on a tube of toothpaste, "my father threw it out of the bathroom window.''

Clinton's big flop as first lady was her health care plan, a 1,342-page proposal. She writes that she wanted to give Congress only an "outline of principles that would shape the health care reform legislation,'' say, 250 pages.

She changed her mind at the behest of former Rep. Dan Rostenkowski (D-Ill.), the Chicagoan who headed the Ways and Means Committee.

"But we subsequently learned that Congressman Dan Rostenkowski expected us to produce a detailed bill, complete with legislative language.''

Giving Rosty what he wanted turned out be, Clinton writes, "a tactical mistake for us.''

Clinton reflects on one of her biggest flaps, which happened just before the Illinois primary, on March 15, 1992, at the now-shuttered Busy Bee Restaurant at 1546 N. Damen.

"I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and given teas," Clinton told reporters, trying to deflect charges from challenger Jerry Brown, who accused Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton of steering business to his wife's Rose law firm.

"His wrists are narrow and his fingers tapered and deft, like those of a pianist or surgeon."

Now his hands are "like their owner, weathered, but still expressive, attractive and resilient.''

After transferring from Maine East to the new Maine South in her junior year, Clinton ran and lost for senior class president, "which did not surprise me but still hurt.''

Clinton is blunt when she writes about the impeachment proceedings chaired by Hyde and writes it fell short of how the House Judiciary Committee handled matters during the 1974 Richard Nixon impeachment--which she worked on as a Democratic staffer.

"I was disgusted when Hyde announced that the committee would be calling Kenneth Starr as its main witness.''

During the "Soviet-style show trial procedure, Starr had to admit that he had not himself examined a single witness before a grand jury.''

I remember, cyn. Have it bookmarked.

Conservative radio hosts could use this Clinton spotlight to focus on the real legacy of Bill and Hillary: It's NOT the sex, it's the NATIONAL SECURITY.

Did you know that when Bill bombed the Sudanese aspirin factory in Aug. '98, it was on the basis of a sample from one cup of soil? He didn't even tell two of his own Joint Chiefs of Staff until after the bombing, and told the press there were things they couldn't know. Secretive, dishonest, shadow government = Clinton.

Creators Syndicate - www.creators.com 12/27/98 L. Brent Bozell III:

"Bill Clinton's decision to unleash the dogs of war as he tip-toes on the precipice of impeachment conjures up a vision of White House defense lawyer Greg Craig appearing before Congress declaring: "The President's military action was evasive, incomplete, misleading, even maddening - but it's not impeachable." There's no dodging the suspicion that Clinton is seeking to save his bacon by dropping some megatonnage on Saddam Hussein. After all, it's just what he did when he bombed Osama bin Laden's alleged facilities in Sudan and Afghanistan this summer. Both actions were launched with little or no consultation with Congress, and with too little consultation with the service chiefs at the Pentagon. Oh my, how the talking heads like Alan Dershowitz and NBC anchor-in-training Brian Williams are going nuts over that suggestion. How vile! How unpatriotic! What hypocrites. How about the Democrats? In 1983, Clinton defender John Conyers called for Reagan's impeachment for invading Grenada. (For good measure, he earlier called for impeachment over the Gipper's alleged "incompetence" in dealing with unemployment.) In 1984, as he ran for President, and again in 1986, Jesse Jackson suggested Reagan should be subject to an impeachment probe over U.S. actions in Nicaragua. Rep. Henry Gonzalez called for impeachment in 1983 over Grenada and again in 1987 over Iran-Contra. The National Organization for Women and the American Civil Liberties Union advocated impeaching Reagan in 1987. The major media didn't thump the tub for impeachment, but did suggest forcefully that Reagan's actions were even worse than the Watergate offenses that got Richard Nixon impeached. For example, in the January 9, 1984 New York Times, then-Senior Editor John B. Oakes proclaimed: "President Reagan's consistent elevation of militarism over diplomacy creates a clear and present danger to the internal and external security of the United States. Presidents have been impeached for less." Oakes wasn't alone at the Times. On December 12, 1986, columnist Tom Wicker offered an echo: "Mr. Reagan probably won't be impeached or forced to resign - though the offenses resulting from his policy, or his somnolence on the job, are more serious than any charge the House Judiciary Committee approved against Mr. Nixon.".So where are these noble folks today? Have you noticed how the words "War Powers Act" haven't been invoked much by the liberal media in the last, oh, six years, now that a President they favor is lobbing the bombs? Where are the calls for impeachment from John Conyers and Jesse Jackson? Where are the charges of abuse of power from the editorial pages of The New York Times and The Washington Post? Nothing but silence. Stinking dead silence.."

http://www.alamo-girl.com/0281.htm

(July, '99) ''Osama!'' his son squealed excitedly. ''That's me!'' The boy, whose name was changed to Osama last year, is one of hundreds of Pakistani children named for bin Laden since Aug. 20, 1998 - the day the United States launched missile strikes against alleged terrorist camps run by the Saudi millionaire in eastern Afghanistan. The attack sparked outrage throughout the Muslim world. But the response was particularly heated in Pakistan, which sends thousands of Islamic guerrillas to similar training camps in Afghanistan. ''I love his bravery and gallantry,'' the boy's father, Niaz Ali Salar, said of bin Laden. ''He boosted the morale of Muslims throughout the world.'' The local leader of the radical Barelvi sect of Muslims, Salar said he hoped his son would ''live up to his name'' and lead the war against ''the enemies of Islam.'' In Mardan, a crumbling tobacco center 75 miles east of the Afghan border, Islamic priests deliver diatribes against ''evil America'' during Friday afternoon prayers.

In Pakistan, few buy Washington's vilification of bin Laden, whom it accuses of masterminding the Aug. 7, 1998, bombings of two US embassies in east Africa and several other terrorist attacks. ''He's a man on the run, whose only friends are the Taliban. How can he be a threat to the world's most powerful nation?'' said Sahib Zada Khalid Jan Binuri, head of Pakistan's most influential Islamic seminary. ''It's all spin control. If America tells me, `You are a terrorist,' what can I say?'' Link

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WHAT REALLY HAPPENED DURING THE CLINTON YEARS, #53.

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