Hillary (& Bill) Clinton

excerpts from the Iowa Daily Report

official draft Hillary website:

May 2003

… Chicago Sun-Times online headline – “Hillary in ’08, or sooner?” Political columnist Robert Novak reported yesterday – “It is not merely the ranting of radio talk show hosts and their callers. It is not just daydreaming by political junkies. It’s still a long shot, but it really could happen. Hillary in ’04! No, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York is not about to announce her candidacy for president in 2004, joining the jostling pack of Democratic candidates elbowing each other and participating in their first debate this weekend in South Carolina. Her reputation for keeping secrets is well-known, but everybody believes she is planning to sit out 2004 and aiming for the 2008 election to run for president. Nevertheless, Hillary could be propelled, without her volition, into next year’s presidential election. The prospect of another Bush-Clinton race – with a younger Bush and a female Clinton – generates hope and fear among Democrats and Republicans alike. Democrats hope that Mrs. Clinton can duplicate her letter-perfect 2000 campaign for the U. S. Senate but fear she could bring on one of the periodic Democratic washouts, in the mode of George McGovern and Walter Mondale. Republicans hope her premature presidential candidacy could mean ridding themselves of the Clintons at long last, but are frightened by her masterful performance in New York.” (5/5/2003)

Best headline of the Mother’s Day weekend honors go to OpinionJournal.com for “Hillary the Hawk …Sen. Clinton goes to war.” Fred Barnes writes, an excerpt: “A week after the start of the war in Iraq, Donald Rumsfeld gave a briefing to the Senate Armed Services Committee. At the time, the advance of American troops toward Baghdad supposedly was bogged down – it turned out it really wasn’t – and the Bush administration was facing stiff criticism. But the defense secretary got strong support from an unexpected source, the newest member of the committee, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York. Alluding to her own experience in an administration under fire, she indicated she understood Secretary Rumsfeld’s situation. Then Sen. Clinton assured him the committee was behind him 100% and would provide anything needed. The key is to win the war, she said. The war effort should not be shortchanged in any way. This new side to Sen. Clinton – the national-security side – may surprise both fans and foes as she emerges in greater public view this spring. She attracted attention last week when she stridently attacked President Bush’s domestic policies. Next month, she’ll draw a lot more when her memoir of her White House years, ‘Living History,’ is published. The book is lucrative (advance: $8 million) but it may be unhelpful politically, raising new questions about Sen. Clinton’s truthfulness, ethics and relationship with her husband …[Political consultant Dick] Morris argues she’s electable in 2008. That sounds farfetched, but then it struck many as preposterous when she was first mentioned as a possible Senate candidate in New York. She proceeded to conduct a flawless campaign in 2000, shed her image as a carpetbagger, emerge from her husband’s shadow, and won in a landslide. At the moment, the idea of Sen. Clinton as the 21st-century equivalent of a Cold War liberal seems contrived and unconvincing. But in 2008, who knows?” (5/12/2003)

Another indication that Hillary – the nation’s foremost expert (as noted above) and proponent of national health care – will not fade gently into the political or literary sunset. “Maverick Matt” Drudge reported last night that the TV networks are battling for the first interview with Hillary after publication of her “Living History” book in early June – with “ABC star Diane Sawyer emerging as the frontrunner after questions were raised about journalistic standards surrounding any Hillary interview with CBSNEWS, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.” The first problem: Drudge reported that Hillary’s publisher, Simon and Schuster, had sought a CBS “60 Minutes” exclusive, but “immediate questions” were raised because of husband Bill’s contract with the program. The second problem: Concern about “journalistic fallout” because the publishing company and CBS are both owned by VIACOM. More from Drudge – “no deal” had been reached as of 6 p.m. Monday (EDT) in NY and interviewer-in-chief Barbara Walters was “not even considered for the exclusive – because of her historic Monica Lewinsky interview.” (5/13/2003)

Under the subhead “Driving Ms. Hillary,” Paul Bedard reported in his “Washington Whispers” column in U.S. News & World Report: “Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is a lot of things, but Dale Earnhardt Jr. she’s not. Clinton last week attended the Capitol Hill rollout of General Motors’ hydrogen-fueled prototype. But unlike other lawmakers, she begged off an invitation to drive the minivan. It seems odd that she’d pass up some environmentally correct TV exposure, until GM Veep Beth Lowery told us why: The former first lady fessed up that it’s been at least seven years since she last drove and this wasn’t the time to start.”(5/14/2003)

Iowa Pres Watch first spotted Susan Estrich’s commentary about the Clintons’ overshadowing the Dem presidential field during the weekend, but for purposes of this report, we’ll rely on the insights and literary talents of Greg Pierce in yesterday’s Washington Times. In his “Inside Politics” column, Pierce wrote: “’Could someone please tell these people to shut up?’ liberal columnist Susan Estrich writes, referring to Bill Clinton, his wife, Hillary, and former Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal. ‘The Democrats might have a chance of electing a new president if they could get the last one, and his defenders, to clear the stage. It doesn’t matter if they’re right or wrong. They should be history,’ Miss Estrich wrote in her syndicated column. ‘The Clintons suck up every bit of the available air. Nothing is left for anyone else. They are big, too big. That’s the problem. The 2004 candidates need a chance to get some attention, to rise to Clinton’s level, which they’ll never do so long as the likes of Sidney Blumenthal are playing into the hands of conservatives in insisting on debating the scandals of the 1990s.’ Miss Estrich added: ‘If the issue is ethics, no one has less than Sidney Blumenthal. He used to call me, during the Dukakis campaign, which I was running and he was supposed to be covering, to offer covert advice, which if I accepted might result in better coverage. Much later, when I criticized him, he tried to get me in trouble with my editors. All the while, I was defending his boss. That’s Sidney. He’s Hillary’s best friend. No wonder Republicans are delighted to see his return to the spotlight. It raises money for their causes.” (Iowa Pres Watch Note: While Hillary attempts to dominate the stage in the Senate and Bill is distorting world reality for recent college grads in Mississippi, Blumenthal has a new book that Estrich noted is due out – ironically – on 5/20. That’s right, that’s today.) (5/20/2003)

When the Senate voted Tuesday night (7:24 p.m. EDT) – by a 51-43 margin – to end a 10-year ban on research and development of low-yield nuclear weapons, only one of the Dem presidential candidates was present and voting: Lieberman. The other three Senate wannabes – Edwards, Graham and Kerry – were among six senators recorded as not voting. Lieberman (along with Harkin and Hillary) voted for a Democratic amendment to keep the ban. Grassley joined with Republicans and a couple Dems to end the 10-year restriction on nuclear arms R&D. Quote worth quoting: Ted Kennedy – “This issue is as clear as any issue ever gets. You’re either for nuclear war or you’re not. Either you want to make it easier to start using nuclear weapons or you don’t…If we build it, we’ll use it.” (5/22/2003

In the U.S. News & World Report’s “Washington Whispers” column this week, Paul Bedard reports that the “silence from Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s office is driving the White House nuts. The former first lady is what they call ‘the unknown’ in the upcoming re-election bid by President Bush. ‘She been awfully quiet,’ says one. The worry: Will she or won’t she make an 11th-hour jump into the Democratic presidential primaries? She says no, but most expect her to try in 2008. Skeptical Bushies say they’ll be watching how much of a boost Clinton gets during her upcoming book tour to gauge her threat to the president.” (5/26/2003)

The DRUDGE REPORT said last night that Hillary needed three professional writers to finish her “Living History” autobiography about her White House years. Under the headline “IT TAKES A VILLAGE: HILLARY HAD THREE WRITERS FOR AUTOBIOGRAPHY,” Drudge wrote: “In her new book, LIVING HISTORY, Hillary Rodham Clinton acknowledges – in opening pages – three women for their assistance and contributions to the project…LIVING HISTORY is being held in strict embargo by publishers SIMON AND SCHUSTER for a June 9 release.”(5/28/2003)

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