Whitewater
& Clinton Scandal Clips
from The Progressive Review
Part 1: February 1992 - February 1994 Words to live by
If Ken Starr is a credible prosecutor he will bring this to a conclusion and the Clintons will be exonerated -- Eleanor Clift of Newsweek on the McLaughlin Group, February, 1996
There is no evidence here, as there was in the Nixon era, of a premeditated attempt to subject the democratic process and the operation of government agencies for narrow partisan gain. No one suggests that Mr. Clinton has committed anything approaching an impeachable offense here. - R. W. Apple of the New York Times on the White House use of FBI files of political enemies.
If we could be one-hundredth as great as you and Hillary Rodham Clinton have been in the White House, we'd take it right now and walk away winners . . . Thank you very much and tell Mrs. Clinton we respect her and we're pulling for her." -- Dan Rather, talking with the Clintons via satellite at a CBS affiliates meeting
Roger Clinton's life is in some ways the story of any younger sibling clobbered by the spectacular success of the one who came before . . . If your brother is Christ, you have a choice: become a disciple, or become an anti-Christ, or find yourself caught somewhere between the two -- Laura Blumenfeld, Washington Post
In the midst of redesigning America's health care system and replacing Madonna as our leading cult figure, the new First Lady has already begun working on her next project, far more metaphysical and uplifting.... She is both impersonal and poignant -- with much more depth, intellect and spirituality than we are used to in a politician . . . She has goals, but they appear to be so huge and far off -- grand and noble things twinkling in the distance -- that it's hard to see what she sees. -- Martha Sherrill, Washington Post
The most interesting part of the story will come when the media have to acknowledge that there is nothing there . . . Shall we write on our various blackboard 1000 times, 'The Clintons did nothing wrong?' -- Columnist Molly IvIns
Ridiculous -- NPR's Diana Rehm on suggested similarities between Whitewater and Watergate
FEBRUARY 1992
As we went to press the vaunted electability of Bill Clinton had become very much in doubt. The establishment media was working overtime to rescue their favorite Democrat, even to extent of not letting their readers peruse the Flowers phone tapes despite the fact that Clinton hadn't denied that it was his voice on the other end of the line. Editorialists spoke highly of Clinton's mushy responses on 60 Minutes, and even that normally hard-hitting program failed to ask the governor about the tapes. If he and Ms. Flowers weren't talking about an affair on those tapes, what misconduct was being discussed?
The media's protection of Clinton, of course, dates far before the current matter. He has long been the Washington elite's designated alternative to Bush . . .
Having not told us about Clinton's public record, the media, at press time, was busily explaining why we shouldn't know about his private record either. This became more difficult after the Star, a sleazy and unreliable grocery store tabloid (as opposed to your average sleazy and unreliable metropolitan daily), reported the Gennifer Flowers story.
Forget about the sex; the phone tapes (the most recent allegedly made Jan. 16) are the critical point -- although many of the early stories we read failed even to mention them. After they were played at a news conference, media corporations like CNN and the Washington Post kept the contents secret, with the Post claiming that "segments of the excerpts could support either Flowers' version of events or Clinton's."
This grossly misleading précis ignored the discussion of a cover-up of something. Further, it failed to note important segments that dealt with matters other than the affair.
For example, when Flowers spoke of getting a job with the state government, the voice she alleged to be Clinton's says, "If they ever ask if you've talked to me about it, you can say no."
The male voice also describes Mario Cuomo as being a "mean son of a bitch" and when Flowers says, "I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't have some Mafioso connections," the reply is: "Well, he acts like one," followed by a chuckle.
Speaking of the press, the voice tells Flowers: "If they ever hit you with it, just say no and go on. There's nothing they can do. I expected them to look into it and come interview you. But if everybody is on record denying it, no problem." Richard Nixon couldn't have said it better.
By last week in January, neither the media nor the public had the facts to decide whether Flowers' story is true. If it is true, Clinton comes off as pretty seedy. The first Star piece and the tapes depicted not just an affair, but an attitude towards women and forthrightness that might be of more than passing interest to the voters. It also suggests criminal activity on the part of some of Clinton's enemies: Flowers claims her apartment was broken into and rifled.
In the end, as so often with political sex stories, it is not the affair that matters; it's what happens afterwards.
MARCH 1992
The major media blacked out a second alleged sex scandal involving Bill Clinton that broke in a supermarket tabloid just days before the New Hampshire primary. The story, in the Globe, charged that Clinton had a relationship with a woman who claimed that Clinton was the father of her child. The woman also told of supposed group sex sessions with Clinton.
The story had been circulating in Washington well before the Globe piece appeared, as have other tales of Clinton's sexual eclecticism. According to Cindy Adams of the New York Post, that paper has received numerous letters from women with stories about Clinton the paper is checking out. Yet thanks to the selective priggishness of the media, that portion of the public not inclined towards checkout counter voyeurism has been given the impression that charges of Clinton's sexual escapades have revolved around a single affair.
The irony of this is now that the Clinton sex story has been driven underground, the only thing that will disappear will be the facts. The tales will still circulate and be far more subject to distortion than if the media had overcome its self-righteousness and treated the matter the way journalists would have before they became secular theologians. Having made the decision that the story is not relevant, the mainstream media will offer us no assistance in evaluating it. For example, Clinton's latest accuser is said to have passed a lie detector test. Is this true? Who gave the test? Why did she come forward now?
As it is, the story will simply bypass the mainstream media, cropping up perhaps (if Clinton is nominated) in GOP campaign ad innuendo and carefully targeted direct mail pieces the press won't even find out about. It's hard to see how this is better way of doing things.
Meanwhile, the Washington Times notes correctly that Clinton's first sex scandal got dramatically kinder treatment from the media than similar stories involving others.
The Clinton story was handled gingerly and sparsely by such major papers as the New York Times and the Washington Post, neither of which ran the revealing transcript of the phone tapes between Clinton and Gennifer Flowers. Within a week, the story virtually disappeared from the mainstream press.
In contrast, the 1980 story about Dan Quayle sharing a Florida cottage with Paula Parkinson and several other members of Congress was the topic of 11 stories in the New York Times and 16 in the Washington Post all in one week. During the same period, the major networks ran 13 stories.
When John Tower was nominated to be Secretary of Defense, the networks ran 32 stories concerning Towers' alleged sexual improprieties. The Washington Post ran a story by Bob Woodward that accused Tower of having "appeared to be drunk" during two visits to a Texas Air Force base and having fondled two women. The source for this story was a former Air Force sergeant, who was presumably more reliable than, say, a former cabaret singer.
During the 9 days before the Senate voted to confirm Clarence Thomas, the networks ran 99 stories about Anita Hill's allegations, the New York Times ran 63 and the Post 61.
Clinton's troubles are not limited to the draft and diddling. Alexander Cockburn, in the February 24 Nation, described in detail a Contra-related operation with ties right to the Arkansas governor's mansion.
Too complex to describe here, suffice it to say that Clinton's chief of security, Buddy Young, is a far more interesting story than Gennifer Flowers. That's not to say they're not related. Another Contra aficionado, Larry Nichols, was also on the governor's payroll. This is the guy who initially blew the whistle on the Clinton-Flowers affair. The fact that he was fired has been mentioned in the mainstream press; what hasn't been mentioned is why. He was fired only after a reporter discovered his Contra connection. According to Cockburn, Nichols recanted his Flowers story one night before Clinton's appearance on Sixty Minutes -- after a strong-arming phone call from Buddy Young.
Clinton's Contra connection is a must for any self-respecting metropolitan daily. It is also further warning to the so-called professionals in the Democratic Party that if they continue to hitch their wagon to the Clinton star they could be in big trouble.
MAY 1992
Clinton's problems are compounding; each new scandal and revelation adds to the pile. At latest count he would have to give about a dozen 'Checkers' speeches to talk his way out of them . . . .
From the Pine Bluff Commercial: "It's very difficult to catch Bill Clinton in a flat lie. His specialty is a lengthy disingenuousness."
Time magazine has joined Newsweek in a major new form of journalistic sleaze: the unsubstantiated exoneration. You may recall Newsweek's misleading acquittal of the Reagan-Bush administration's involvement in the October Surprise. Now Time has produced a truly weird article on Terry Reed, the Contra veteran mentioned in this and the last issue in our Arkansas coverage. The piece, entitled Anatomy of a Smear, raises, and then rebuts, allegations about Clinton we have seen nowhere else, and certainly not -- as implied -- in the writings of Alexander Cockburn (although Time gave Cockburn his brother's name, Andrew). Thus if these are lies, only Time is spreading them broadly. Time goes on to suggest that Reed's suit against Clinton's security chief, Buddy Young, is without foundation, never mentioning the judge's view that a possible conspiracy existed. Finally, Time whitewashes Clinton's see-no-evil approach to the Mena drug operations in a manner that sounds like it came straight from Jim Carville's mouth. Perhaps Time was so busy working on its new layout that it didn't have the opportunity to get the facts straight.
JUNE 1992
We note that Bill Clinton is still running into questions about his evasion of the draft. Perhaps he should have quoted British scholar Heathcote William Gerard, who when criticized for failing to participate in the Great War said: "I am the civilization they are fighting to defend."
AUGUST 1992
Money magazine reports that Clinton annually receives about $1.4 million in admissions tickets to the state-regulated Oaklawn racetrack to hand out to campaign contributors and others. Money could find not another major racing state that allows such payoffs and quotes an authority on government ethics as saying "It creates appearances of impropriety," which is the preferred euphemism for a payoff in establishment circles these days. Yet even the expert had to admit, "I'm stunned frankly at the amount. It's a staggering amount." The Clinton campaign's reaction to the story came from a flack who said the passes, which have gone to the state's governor since the 1950s, are a "great nuisance," adding that "I guess the potential is there for a conflict of interest, but we never let it be a conflict." Trust us.
The practice is not a fluke. According to Brooks Jackson of CNN, the commission that regulates Arkansas's only greyhound track meets several times a year at the track's exclusive Kennel Club, with the Southland Greyhound Park paying for the commissioners' food and booze.
NOVEMBER 1992
Add to the list of Clinton stories buried by the major media: a Washington Times report of Clinton's friends removing his ROTC files in 1974, when he was about to run for Congress.
One of the most interesting, if not the most significant, stories of the campaign got only minor mention in the major media. By the time it broke, journalists had all but elected Clinton president and were busy positioning themselves as responsible analysts of President Clinton, a task which involves, among other things, avoiding anything in conflict with the seminal mythology of the Clinton era.
When a candidate for president is merely that, there are few stories that are off-limits. But let the candidate actually become president (or appear to be headed that way) and responsible Washington journalists know better than to bite the hand that will be feeding them over the next four years.
Thus Gennifer Flowers, whose initial tale inspired considerable if often uninformative media attention when Clinton was merely a presidential hopeful, found herself blacked out when she provided details of her affair with Clinton -- not to mention considerable photographic detail of herself -- in the December issue of Penthouse.
It was not that official Washington was bored with the story. Newsstands were inundated with requests, and copies were faxed along the campaign trail. But with a few exceptions -- such as the conservative Washington Times -- the story got little further.
Why should a story of such interest to official Washington be deemed not suitable for the average American reader? Aside from the Clinton biases of the press (documented as early as last February when a survey of campaign reporters found that 90% favored the Arkansas governor), aside from standard pre-administration awe, aside from a there-but-the-grace-of-God-go-I cautiousness on the part of a press that wouldn't want public note of its own escapades on the campaign trail, aside from an inconsistent and inchoate sense of journalistic priggishness in such matters, there is the argument that the Flowers story didn't make it on standard journalistic grounds. It was, to use the favorite journalistic patois, unsubstantiated.
This, for example, was the implication of the earlier Washington Post coverage despite tape recorded conversations between Flowers and Clinton (the contents of which the Post kept from its readers). While the tapes released at that time did not clearly indicate that Clinton and Flowers had engaged in an affair, they did explicitly indicate that Flowers and Clinton were trying to cover up something and the tapes certainly did not increase one's confidence in Clinton's behavior in a pinch.
The Penthouse story does contain a large number of unsubstantiated comments by Flowers ranging from particular sexual positions allegedly used to the somewhat poignant admission that they rarely resulted, for her, in an orgasm. The Penthouse story also makes it difficult to develop a great deal of sympathy for Flowers; her mutuality with Clinton seeming to extend to a taste for personal manipulation.
The story by Art Harris is revealing and instructive, however, even if every statement of Flowers herself is ignored:
Harris found that Flowers' mother, ex-roommate and even a former boyfriend could confirm the existence of a relationship far beyond the casual acquaintanceship that the Clinton spinmeisters would have us believe. It should be noted that none of these people expressed fondness for Flowers' behavior.
Penthouse reports that the tapes --recorded by Flowers in 1990 and 1991 -- were authenticated by an independent forensic audio expert.
Here is a sample of Clinton on the tapes:
[From 1990: Flowers asks him if he is going to run for president]: I want to but I don't want to be blown out of the water with this. I don't see how they can hurt me so far. If they don't have pictures of me and *** if no one says anything. Or even if someone says something, they don't have much.
[From 1991: With Clinton running for president, the Flowers rumors are heating up again]: If they ever hit you with it, just say no and go on. There's nothing they can do... I just think if everyone's on record denying it, you got no problems.
FLOWERS: Why would they waste their money and time coming down here?
CLINTON: They're gonna try and run this. [But if] everybody kinda hangs tough, they're just not gonna do anything. They can't. They can't run a story like that unless somebody says, 'Yeah, I did it.'
Harris also reports that on "another tape they discuss how she might turn double agent and attempt to entrap the local Republicans who had approached her with a reported $50,000 to go public." She also phoned Clinton to ask him to help her get out of town before reporters began digging into how she got her state job. Clinton promised to help.
Clinton got her a $17,500-a-year job in the state government under circumstances arguable enough that the black woman passed over for the post filed a successful grievance in the matter.
Medical records indicate that Flowers became pregnant at the approximate time that she says Clinton made her so. She claims to have aborted the child.
Of course, the question is: does it matter? Back when the Gary Hart story broke, a public relations man suggested how he could have handled the scandal: put up billboards featuring photos of FDR, Eisenhower, JFK and Hart. Underneath would be the single phrase: HART: IN A GREAT TRADITION.
Still the Flowers story, and the way Clinton has handled it, goes directly to concerns about the man. There are times when Clinton's version of his past reminds you of the Raymond Chandler character: "smart, smooth and no good." Like the draft flap, it was not what he did but how he handled what he did that troubles. Tracking a Clinton explanation, whether of past actions or present policy, is like trying to dance on a floor covered with marbles. As Paul Greenberg of the Little Rock Democrat Gazette put it: "Bill Clinton IS a presidential debate."
Further, the media can't have it both ways. If it merely reported on the public actions of politicians there would be a strong argument for avoiding a story like Flowers'. But that it isn't the way it happens. The Washington media consistently panders to the mythmakers of the White House, regardless of administration, creating a halcyon, virtuous, lovable and false image of our top leaders. Only an incident as rare and extraordinary as Watergate, or a touch as bumbling as that of Dan Quayle can force a break with this tradition. If the recipe for Barbara Bush's or Hillary Clinton's chocolate chip cookies is important, then at least equally true the tale of Gennifer Flowers. If it's okay for the children of a politician to be up on the nationally televised stage, why not the politician's mistress as well?
It is probable that the media, deep down, does not believe that the American people are wise enough to be trusted with the truth that their leaders are often not what they would seem. The result is an expurgated version of politics which creates the very sort of lie the media claims to be protecting us from -- s.s.
FEBRUARY 1993
When Clinton was inaugurated, Arkansas Governor Jim Guy Tucker came to Washington to see his old boss sworn in. That left the state under the control of the president pro tem of the senate, Little Rock dentist Jerry Jewell.
Jewell used his power as acting governor to issue a number of pardons, one of them for a convicted drug dealer, Tommy McIntosh.
The pardons were a big subject of controversy in Arkansas and not the least of the questions was: how did McIntosh get included?
Enter Robert "Say" McIntosh, father of Tommy, and a colorful political activist. According to the Washington Times, many in the state "say it was a political payoff, offered in exchange for dirty tricks Mr. McIntosh played on Clinton political opponents during the presidential campaign, or as a payoff for stopping his attacks on Mr. Clinton."
It seems that the elder McIntosh had worked for Clinton in his last state campaign and, according to McIntosh in a 1991 lawsuit, had agreed not only to pay him $25,000 but to help him market his recipe for sweet potato pie and to pardon his son. He also alleged that Clinton expected McIntosh's help in covering up a trail of sexual indiscretions.
McIntosh dropped his lawsuit a month after Clinton was elected president and, he claims, after the president-elect agreed to get his son out of jail.
The alleged deal has provoked considerable discussion in Arkansas. Democrat-Gazette columnist John Robert Starr wrote that even his own brother believes in the plot: "I don't agree with Joe's conspiracy theory, but given that there has been no other explanation forthcoming, it's as good as any."
The younger McIntosh was released 18 years before he was eligible for parole.
As Clinton was fumbling around trying to find an attorney general, the Justice Department was under the watchful, albeit highly unofficial, eye of Webb Hubbell, Hillary Clinton's former law partner. Hubbell is also a close buddy of Clinton's. Back when Clinton decided it was time for a state ethics commission, he appointed Hubbell to it. After the state house of representatives passed strong ethics legislation, it got hung up in the state senate. Thereupon, according to the New York Times last spring, Clinton, Hubbell and others rewrote the legislation to exempt the governor from some of its most rigorous provisions. Clinton says he did this to make sure the legislation was approved.
Hubbell also was the lawyer for Park on Meter, a parking meter manufacturer in Russellville, Arkansas, which received the first industrial development loan (for $2.75 million) from the Arkansas Development Finance Authority in 1985. It has been suspected that POM was doing a lot more than making parking meters -- specifically that it had secret federal contracts to make components of chemical and biological weapons and devices to carry them on C-130s for the Contras. The company denies the Contra connection although it now admits having secret military contracts. Right next to POM, on land previously owned by it, is an Army reserve chemical warfare company.
Hubbell's name surfaced as a potential nominee for deputy attorney general but he told friends he did not want that job or, according to Time, "to take any other position that involves Senate confirmation -- perhaps to avoid fishing expeditions into the law firm's confidential business."
February 1994
Covering up for Clinton
The Wall Street Journal wouldn't touch it, the New York Times spent its investigative efforts discrediting those who brought the bad news and the Washington Post omitted basic details while publishing an Outlook article that suggested that most married men did it, so what's the big deal? Thus much of the capital's establishment and others living in Shuttle Alley remain unfamiliar with the latest accounts of the Clintonian lifestyle as provided by four Arkansas state troopers to the American Spectator, an eastern conservative monthly, and the LA Times, a western establishment daily. The tawdry and revelatory specifics of the main story -- now known as Fornigate -- were quickly lost in these parts amongst journalistic reflections on the character of the messengers, philosophical cud-chewing about the need to discuss such matters as all, and faithful transmittal of the White House spin that the story was fading anyway.
While there was probably an element of jealousy in the priggish response of the eastern journalistic junta, it seems more likely propelled by the deep reluctance of such papers to admit that the man ruling the system they so mightily revere may well be a deceptive, power-abusing, immature, woman-exploiting sex addict.
This in essence is what the Fornigate stories depicted. In response we were told by self-righteous and spun-dry preceptors of the press that:
It wasn't news. Wrong. The stories are as revealing of the nature of both Clintons as a month's worth of White House journalistic thumbsuckers. The tales are far more than a high level replay of that country song, Living Here, Loving There and Lying in Between -- particularly because of the obsessive and reckless behavior they describe.
It was old news. The logical conflict between this argument and the previous one passes unnoticed. In any case, the last time such stories floated about, the media suppressed them with great effectiveness. Thus while stories circulated within the closed circuits of the campaign and among the press, the public was excluded. As far as the ordinary reader is concerned, news that is spiked hardly counts as news.
Even more significant is the fact that the stories allege acts by Clinton after he and his wife assured the public that their marriage problems were over. The LA Times reported that the troopers contended that Clinton continued his affair with one woman as late as January 1993. One trooper reported bringing a woman to the governor's mansion in the pre-dawn hours at Clinton's orders on three occasions after the election.
Well then, these stories were discredited during the campaign. What really happened is that most of the press didn't want to find out about these matters, others found out and wouldn't tell and still others went looking but came up short. There is, however, a world of difference between not discovering or reporting a story and discrediting it.
Okay, but the president is entitled to privacy. There is merit to this argument and we may some day have a president who enjoys, practices, and therefore deserves, privacy. Clinton is not one. Clinton's whole life has been built around publicity, a manic drive to be seen and heard. As he told one of his troopers, "You know, I'm going to have to stay in politics now, because I'm too old to be a movie star."
Clinton naturally wishes to control the nature of that publicity while simultaneously ensuring its steady flow. It is a foolish and arrogant wish and, indeed, the Arkansas stories describe a man flirting with public exposure -- is there a touch of self-destruction here? -- in a manner that, if nothing else, raises questions about his general prudence.
The press covered up for JFK. Indeed it did, and partially because of the ensuing mythology, it has taken us three decades to begin to get a realistic notion of what sort of man and president Kennedy really was. Things go better in a democracy if you can size up your politicians while they're still alive.
The troopers who told the stories have lied in the past. Wrong. Only two troopers are accused in cheating on an auto insurance claim. The impression has been widely given that only these troopers provided the accounts. There were actually four -- two on, and two off, the record.
For example, the original LA Times story began:
Four Arkansas state troopers have revived allegations and offered new details about extramarital affairs that caused a crisis in Bill Clinton's campaign for the presidency.
But by December 24, the number of troopers had been cut in half by Michael Wines of the New York Times:
For almost a week two Arkansas state troopers have held the attention of the White House and much of the national press by saying they had firsthand knowledge that the President is a power-happy philanderer.
Wines then went on to attempt to discredit the two on-the-record troopers. Only in the fourteenth paragraph of the story did Wines refer obliquely to "interviews with other unnamed witnesses to some events."
It should be noted, if police had to rely on the pure character of witnesses they would never solve most crimes. Further, while the false insurance claim clearly raises a doubt about two of the troopers, how many documented lies, evasions and half-truths can also be credited to the subject of the stories?
On the notorious Sixty Minutes show, for example, Clinton was asked about Gennifer Flowers' allegation that she had a 12-year-affair with him. Clinton replied, "That allegation is false." It now appears that Clinton lied. Why doesn't that matter? Does Bill Clinton have some sort of immunity from being called to account for his prevarication? Is he to believed simply because he is president?
The stories lack corroboration: Wrong. Even if one dismisses the testimony of the four state troopers, one is still left the following from the LA Times, an aspect obscured or downplayed by the New York Times and other papers:
A review of thousand of pages of state telephone records and other bills show numerous calls by Clinton to [one of the women]. The state records are incomplete and after the spring of 1990 few cellular phone bills were placed in the public file. The records, which cover only a portion of the telephone calls made on Clinton's car phone and from his hotel rooms between 1989 and 1991 -- show 59 calls to the woman's home and to her office extension during that period.
On one day alone, July 16, 1989, the records show 11 calls to the woman's home from Clinton's cellular phone.
Two months later, when Clinton was on a state-paid trip to Charlottesville, Va., the bill for his hotel room showed a call placed to the woman's home was made at 1:23 am. It lasted 94 minutes, according to Clinton's hotel billing statement. At 7:45 am the same day, according to the hotel record, the same number was called again and [the call] lasted 18 minutes.
Of course, those critical of Fornigate coverage may not be all that interested in corroboration anyway. After all, by the time Clinton was inaugurated, Art Harris had reported in Penthouse that Gennifer Flowers' mother, ex-roommate and even a former boyfriend confirmed the existence of a relationship with Clinton far beyond the casual acquaintanceship. None of these people, incidentally, were fond of Flowers' behavior. Harris' story was ignored by major media.
Now -- again widely unreported -- the Arkansas state troopers have provided further substantiation of the Flowers story. Three of the troopers say that Clinton maintained a long relationship with Flowers despite his denials during the 1992 campaign. The troopers said they handled hundred of phone calls from Flowers to Clinton, and that they drove Clinton to her apartment for assignations. One of the troopers also claims hearing Clinton discussing a state job for Flowers. She was later hired in a move criticized by a state grievance panel that found she had received preferential treatment despite ranking only 9th among 11 outside candidates for the job.
It should also be noted that this story has better corroboration than the Clarence Thomas, John Tower, or (so far as is known) allegations in the Senator Packwood case.
Okay, but there has been no corroboration from any women involved. Wrong. Three women, including Flowers, have told the media of affairs with Clinton. They include a former Miss Arkansas who told the Sally Jesse Rafael Show in July 1992 of having an affair with Clinton. And another woman reported being approached by a Clinton aide by a hotel pool in 1984 who then arranged a sexual encounter with the governor.
The troopers are just doing it for money. There is no doubt that there is plenty of money hanging around this story and the troopers may get a piece of it via a book or movie or whatever. But it is also true that reporters capitalize financially on such stories whenever they can. And, one might ask, is Katherine Graham publishing the Washington Post pro bono? Further, how are we to evaluate Colin Powell's book given that he was paid $6 million to write it? There is something faintly absurd about the powerful and the well-heeled attacking low level whistleblowers for having the potential of a book contract.
Well then it doesn't have any bearing on affairs of state. The best way to handle this is to leave the matter to the readers and run the story. If you wish to make you own judgment, get hold of the January issue of the American Spectator. In it you will find an account of a man who, according to four close witnesses, regularly abused the privileges of public office, showed so little respect for the women he chased that he used state troopers as procurers, and who showed such a consistent willingness to deceive that he cheated on both his wife and his mistress at the same time. You will also find an account of Hillary Clinton disturbingly at odds with the syrupy version being used, say, to hawk the president's healthcare plan. Sleazy, yes, sad, yes, but irrelevant, absolutely not.
Consider, for example, Clinton's temper which once propelled an apple from the back seat of the state car to the front windshield. Or the cellular phone smashed on the pavement. Or the contents of a desk swept to the floor.
Consider this man of diversity who not only links Mario Cuomo to the Mafia, but is said to have referred to Dukakis as that "little Greek motherfucker" and jokes about Ted Kennedy not being able to "get a whore across a bridge."
Consider this man who speaks about personal responsibility who is accused of using state police officers to do opposition research for his campaigns.
Consider the possibility that Hillary Rodham Clinton is not the charming paragon we have been consistently presented by the media but frequently foul-mouthed and calculatingly ambitious. And consider that she is alleged to have had an affair with Vince Foster, whose subsequent suicide -- and Ms. Clinton's reaction to it -- is now inextricably linked with the whole Whitewater Development affair. Even Fornigate prudes admit that has news relevance.
Consider finally a father who, according to the troopers, had oral sex with a woman in a car on the playground of his daughter's elementary school.
In sum, what the LA Times and the Spectator have done is to challenge with four eyewitness accounts as well as telephone records the carefully massaged image of the First Persons that has been so uncritically accepted by much of the media. They have done it because this is not Oz but America. This is not a movie but real life.
It is professionally hypocritical and democratically dangerous for the media to repeatedly present saccharine images of the private Clintons that mislead and lull the public while concealing facts that directly contradict these images. If we must watch loving pictures of Hillary Clinton handing out chocolate cookies, it is only fair that we also know that she has the mouth of a Arkansas state trooper and that she and her husband are far from being model of the family values they have taken to chattering so unctuously about. And if Bill Clinton is to demand "personal responsibility" from a generation of struggling welfare mothers, why should we expect less from him? -- Sam Smith