It’s the politics, stupid. It always is when it comes to Senator Hillary Clinton, author, potential presidential candidate and bête noire of those she once described as fomenting ‘a vast right-wing conspiracy’ to undermine the Clintonian political legacy.
A week that began with a premature and genuinely newsworthy leak of the former First Lady’s autobiography, Living History, in which she describes the moment her husband told her he had had an affair with Monica Lewinsky, ended in more familiar fashion – with Hillary’s political opponents and tormentors in the right-wing media accused accusing her of lying about her role in the scandal.
‘I could hardly breathe. Gulping for air, I started crying and yelling at him, ”What do you mean? What are you saying? Why did you lie to me?” I was furious and getting more so by the second. He just stood there saying over and over again, ”I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I was trying to protect you and Chelsea,”’ she wrote in a passage from the book first leaked by the Associated Press news agency and subsequently reported by newspapers around the world.
Within hours of the report doubts were being cast on Hillary Clinton’s truthfulness, with critics pointing out alleged discrepancies between her account of events and that given in two recent books about Bill Clinton’s presidency.
Washington Post journalist Peter Baker claims the former First Lady learnt of the Lewinsky affair not from her husband but from her lawyer, David Kendall.
Former Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal, whose bestselling The Clinton Wars was published last month, also appears to contradict her account that she and her husband were estranged for months after the revelation, writing that the couple were ‘still working as a team’ throughout the scandal.
The alleged discrepancies — rebuffed last week by Kendall, Blumenthal and Clinton — appear insignificant in themselves, but their airing is seen by supporters of the New York senator as an attempt to undermine her growing political credibility and popularity with the public.
Leading the critics’ charge are right-wing radio talk show hosts such as Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly, who fronts a daily show on Rupert Murdoch’s Fox TV. ‘This story is not important on its own. Who cares what goes on in the Clinton marriage? I don’t,’ O’Reilly said.
‘But remember that Senator Clinton testified she did not remember key elements of the Whitewater affair, yet she has enough recall to put out a 500-page book. By writing ”I could hardly breathe. Gulping for air, I start crying and yelling at him…”, Clinton is giving the impression she was totally in the dark. That is flat out impossible. So, once again, [we] must conclude that Clinton is not a truthful person… I know that I want the President of the United States, whoever it is, to be an honest person. And so should all Americans.’
Living History, for which Clinton was paid an $8-million advance by publishers Simon and Schuster, is being viewed as the latest staging post in her campaign to run as the Democratic presidential candidate in 2008.
She would be the overwhelming choice among Democrats as their candidate to run in the 2004 election, according to a new Gallup poll, although she remains a divisive figure with the wider public, with her approval/disapproval ratings both at 43%.
However, the poll provides less encouraging news for Clinton’s publishers, who have printed a million copies of Living History to go on sale at midnight today. Only 5% of the public say they are ‘eager’ to read it, according to Gallup, with 34% having no plans to read it and 21% declaring they ‘wouldn’t read it if someone paid them to’.
There are almost as many theories about how the book came to be leaked prematurely as there are book publishers in New York. After a week of competing conspiracies, among them that a sharp reporter spotted copies of book that had been accidentally put on display a week early by a bookshop assistant, the favourite — though unsubstantiated — theory is that it originated from within political sources. AP has declined to comment, except to say that Simon and Schuster does not have a strong case if it wants to sue.
Just about the only point of agreement among all involved is that the publicity generated by the leak will help to market the book. – Guardian Unlimited Â