Except this:
Posted on 04/02/2006 4:21:23 PM PDT by RWR8189
Edited on 04/02/2006 4:48:26 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX APRIL 02, 2006 19:02:31 ET XXXXX
LAURA BUSH SAYS HILLARY KEPT BAD HOUSE; WEST WING DECORATIONS WERE GAUDY, OUTDATED
First Lady Laura Bush believes Hillary Clinton did not keep good house during her time as first lady, a new book will charge.
Ron Kessler, a former investigative reporter for the WASHINGTON POST and the WALL STREET JOURNAL, is set to unleash his account of Laura Bush.
On December 18, 2000, just after the Supreme Court ruled on the election, Hillary Clinton gave Laura Bush a tour of the White House. The incoming-First Lady was dismayed at what she saw: Not only were carpets and furnishings fraying and in disrepair in the West Wing and public areas, the Oval Office was done in loud colors—red, blue, and gold! The East Wing was cut up into small offices and had exposed electrical conduits. Many of the furnishings looked dated.
Laura Bush noted how the Lincoln Bedroom looked worn out.
MORE
Laura was appalled at the way the Clintons left the White House and Hillary Clinton's gaudy, outdated taste in decorating, reveals the new book, LAURA BUSH: AN INTIMATE PORTRAIT.
The book, which will be published by DOUBLEDAY on Tuesday, is the only book to be written about Laura Bush with White House cooperation.
MORE
Elsewhere in AN INTIMATE PORTRAIT: After NEWSWEEK ran a Periscope item claiming the U.S. military had flushed a Koran down a toilet, leading to rioting, Laura ordered: "I don't want NEWSWEEK around the house!"
Laura Bush became so disgusted with the media and their war against her husband that at one point, she told her public relations person Noelia Rodriguez she did not want to do any more media interviews. After about a month, she slowly resumed talking to the press.
A close friend of Laura's, Pamela Nelson, asks Laura how she's doing. Laura replies, "Well, it's the Kitty Kelly book and Dan Rather this week..."
Nancy Weiss, a Bush family intimate, told Kessler, "She torments herself by reading the WASHINGTON POST and the NEW YORK TIMES, " and added, "A Texas Monthly article (based on a book by a Washington Post reporter ) said she is a 'bad mom.' She handles it calmly but I can tell things like that do upset her."
Developing...
I've heard 5 seconds.
When I saw this on Drudge I knew there would be a thread. lol!
Remember?! Where are all those pictures of Kackie's 'work'?!!! lol! It was hideous!
Except this:
How often was Barbra Streisand there?
Another prediction is a speedy makeover of the upstairs rooms that were done up by the Clintons' decorator, Kaki Hockersmith of Little Rock, a figure at the time unknown to fellow professionals and followers of the design press. Referred to in some of the more churlish circles of the interiors world as "Tacky Kaki," Hockersmith has been criticized for her elaborate quasi-Victorian schemes in the Lincoln Sitting Room and Treaty Room. According to one White House source who requested anonymity, "Kaki's taste is horrible: mixed metaphors in everything. The new First Family will have to change the Lincoln Sitting Room because you just couldn't sit in it."
http://tinyurl.com/fvunh
I just knew you'd remember Kaki!
It certainly doesn't sound like any other statements she's made.
She's always careful to be gracious.
I'm gonna go ahead and doubt it, unless I get more evidence.
Of course, all the items about Hillary's house sound dead on, but I doubt Larua was the one to point it out.
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3a7e31bc68f5.htm
and
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3a7cb10137b3.htm
So you think Hillary's bad taste was to save money?
Ooookaaay.
If Laura said it, I believe it.
http://www.kakihockersmith.com/images/kaki.jpg
The Monday after the presidential election in November 1992, interior designer Kaki Hockersmith received a phone call that would change her life. Following her successful design of the Arkansas Governor's Mansion for the Clintons, would she be interested in designing at The White House.
By the middle of the following week, Ms. Hockersmith had already toured The White House with Hillary Rodham Clinton as a guest of Barbara Bush and presented her initial designs to the President Elect in the governor's mansion in Little Rock that December. Since that time, she has designed, renovated and remodeled numerous public and private rooms in The White House including the Oval Office, Treaty Room, Family Dining Room, Solarium, Music Room, as well as many other family and reception areas. Acting on behalf of the Navy, Ms. Hockersmith also designed selected rooms at Camp David, including the President's Cabin "Aspen" and his dining hall and lodge "Laurel."
snip
Kaki Hockersmith lives in Little Rock with her husband, Max Mehlburger, in an Italian-style home she designed and built in the Edgehill neighborhood. She enjoys frequent entertaining in their elegant home for numerous fundraisers and personal gatherings. Her years of experience in design are reflected in the creative style of her parties.
http://www.kakihockersmith.com/
Kaki's national and worldwide connections help her remain current with industry products, and enable her to sense design trends before they are apparent to the public. This particularly benefits her Arkansas clients, since it gives them access to all major markets in this country. "Shopping at markets all over the country and in Europe helps us keep a fresh, unique perspective," she says. "Plus it makes finding exclusive items much easier." Kaki's Little Rock design center is overflowing with resources. Clients can come in and browse through samples to create a really custom look, rather like buying an unframed piece of art and framing it to suit your room."
Unlimited Access was a good book. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even though it sickened me, it was a very vivid portrayal of total corruption.
Free health care for everyone, you know!
A lotta Red Devil to bust through all of that.
And the library's crowning touch - figuratively if not literally - is the precise replica of the Oval Office as decorated by Kaki Hockersmith, Clinton's go-to interior designer. (Figurative, because the building's actual crown is a glass-box apartment where Clinton is expected to spend many a weekend in Little Rock. At press time, Hockersmith was still scratching her head over how to get the grand piano up there: The freight elevator stops at the fourth floor.)
http://tinyurl.com/pa9pf
Shoddy plumbing for a sink this expensive....
I'm sorry, what were we talking about??
The State rooms of the White House itself are off limits to the work of living artists, according to a policy set in 1964 by the Committee for the Preservation of the White House. The idea of contemporary art outside the White House was born the day after the inauguration, as Mrs. Clinton and her friend, designer Kaki Hockersmith from Little Rock, talked about bringing art into the living quarters and the Oval Office. "It was very clear we were both fans of contemporary art," recalls Hockersmith. "We went for a walk in the snow to check out the grounds—18 acres of lawn and trees. Hillary said, ‘I can’t believe there’s no sculpture on the grounds.’" Mrs. Clinton’s attention soon focused on the "First Ladies" Garden, conceived by Jacqueline Kennedy and designed for her by Mrs. Paul Mellon with Perry Wheeler, near the East entrance to the mansion. The 120-by-60-foot garden was a sculptural space in itself, with eight niches, like keyholes, in the shrubbery bordering a rectangular grassy lawn. "When I moved in here, and started wandering around the various parts of the house and yards and gardens, I kept coming back to that garden, which I found restful and private," says Mrs. Clinton. "I spent a lot of time there, sitting in the little trellised area, or out on one of the stone benches, and it just looked to me like a garden that should have some sculpture in it. It looked as though at some point someone had landscaped it with that in mind."
http://tinyurl.com/mr7m6
The complexity of the issue is illustrated by the fact that even Kaki Hockersmith Mehlburger, White House decorator for the Clintons and a member of the committee for the preservation of that august mansion, has succumbed to the teardown temptation. Last spring, she and her husband, attorney Max Mehlburger, paid $576,000 to buy a 1930s Dutch Colonial house in Little Rock’s toniest old Heights neighborhood. They plan to tear it down and put up a brand-new house. "I’m a preservationist," Kaki Mehlburger says, "but this is a classic example of a home, built in the 30s, that isn’t historically significant. We don’t know yet what kind of house we’re going to build, but we want one that will enhance the area. We want it to look like it’s been here forever. We hope that in a hundred years, the house we build will be considered historic."
******
In March, the Clinton Administration estimated that Mrs. Hockersmith's changes at the White House would cost $250,000. In June, the estimate was raised to $337,000. The White House attributed the difference in figures to "miscommunication" between the usher's office and Mrs. Hockersmith over labor costs, like overtime. Much of the renovation is being done on the weekends, which means that workers must be paid overtime. Usher's Office Denies Tension
http://tinyurl.com/h5a7d
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