Iconic Films

2 for 1 tickets to Singin' In The Rain, this coming Monday. Book now

Navigation - link to other main sections from here

From The Sunday Times

June 3, 2007

Hillary's other man

As Hillary Clinton emerges as frontrunner to be America’s next president, friends and former aides talk to her biographer about the tragedy that scarred her first years in the White House

Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein

Some people would later say that Vince Foster – tall, with impeccable manners and a formal mien – worshipped Hillary Clinton from the start, or that he had been awed by her from the time they met, or that he had never met a woman like her who was so whip-smart and almost sassy.

What is unquestionable is that he and Hillary grew incredibly close. For the next 20 years the relationship would confound Foster’s wife (but not Bill Clinton), their colleagues at the Rose law firm in Little Rock, Arkansas, and the White House, and women who had known Bill intimately and didn’t like his wife.

Other partners in the law firm were less enthusiastic about hiring Hillary when she joined in 1976. It took her a long time to feel at ease except with Vince and another young lawyer, Webb Hubbell – the Three Amigos, as they came to refer to themselves.

Foster and Hubbell poked fun at her intensity, tutored her in the traditions of Little Rock and looked out for her like a little sister. The three often went to lunch at the Lafayette hotel. Sometimes they watched lingerie shows there, a popular lunchtime entertainment of the era, in which models showed off nightgowns and their bodies. Hillary laughed at her two partners and told them what Neanderthals they were.

Vince was soft-spoken to the point of taciturnity. He and Bill Clinton, a friend from childhood, were as different in most aspects of character as Hillary could have imagined. But she and Vince were in many regards a natural fit. “Vince was just born middle-aged,” an acquaintance had observed. Hillary could identify. As Bill once said, “I was born at 16 and I’ll always feel I am 16. And Hillary was born at age 40.”

Foster had comparatively little interest in politics, exuded integrity, was meticulous in habit and dress, was conversant in every nuance of politesse, and spoke ill of almost no one. In the firm he was regarded as the soul of discretion, and it stood to reason that if ever Hillary would choose a confidant outside her marriage it would be someone of his mien and judgment.

Hillary found it easy to let her guard down with him. “I don’t think there was anyone closer to Hillary for 20 years,” said Hubbell. “But I don’t think it was sexual. I think it was, here are two people with like brilliance who enjoyed the same things, enjoyed each other’s company and had extreme confidence in each other. I mean, you love a friend more than you love a lover.”

At office retreats, Hillary and Vince often remained together while the others went off to play golf or tennis. They would stroll, talk earnestly over a glass of wine and laugh uproariously.

Those who knew them best doubted that they had had an affair. One friend wasn’t sure: “He loved Hillary. I hoped they had an affair. I think they both deserved it. They both had complicated spouses, complicated marriages.”

SEVERAL days after Bill Clinton was elected president in November 1992, Hillary talked by telephone to Dick Morris, their political adviser during the Arkansas years, about her formal role in the new administration.

Hillary noted that Time magazine had suggested she would make a good White House chief of staff. Morris said it was a terrible idea because a chief of staff, among other things, was the person who had to take the heat for the commander-in-chief.

“I said it’s like a baseball owner being able to fire the manager,” he remembered. “Something may not be the manager’s fault, but you have to be able to fire somebody at some point. And Clinton couldn’t fire her.”

Hillary then raised the possibility that she might make a good attorney-general or a reasonable secretary of education. Morris responded that “the better thing would be for her to assume a specific task, become the head of a taskforce that would deal with a discrete issue, which would be her issue, and develop her credibility like that”.

In the end Hillary chose Morris’s single-issue approach. She would oversee and shepherd through Congress something that had been the unattainable goal of Democrats for decades. The lack of universal healthcare was a defining failing that set the United States apart from other advanced democracies, and both Clintons were certain that an overwhelming majority of Americans favoured universal coverage, even yearned for it.

To their total surprise and consternation, among the jolts the Clintons endured in the flush of their victory was serious resistance to putting Hillary in charge of healthcare from the most experienced members of the incoming domestic and economic policy team: Senator Lloyd Bentsen, the treasury secretary–designate; Congressman Leon Panetta, to be the new director of the Office of Budget and Management; Alice Rivlin, to be his deputy; and Donna Shalala, who had been handpicked by Hillary to be secretary of health and human services.

“Mostly [these] people thought the idea – the whole system Hillary was setting up – was crazy,” said Shalala.

The foremost concern was that Hillary’s ideas for solving the healthcare problem were too ambitious. Hillary discounted and, according to Shalala, even resented the advice of the naysayers. To accept their judgment would have meant to controvert her most basic notion about herself: that given the responsibility and the power, she could solve virtually any problem she applied herself to by dint of sheer force of will, intellect, study and hard work.

Bill seemed troubled by the internal opposition, however. He kept delaying his announcement of his wife’s appointment. It would be five days after his inauguration when he finally made it.

“I suspect that there was a level at which he knew it was a really dangerous idea,” said a presidential deputy. “He was president in no small measure because she stood by him in the Gennifer Flowers mess. And he had to pay her back. This is what she wanted, and he couldn’t figure out how not to give it to her. And so he hoped for the best, and jumped over the side with her.”

The most vocal internal opponent of putting Hillary in charge of healthcare was Shalala, who knew Hillary far better than most new members of the president’s team, and so felt freer about speaking out.

Shalala, 4ft 11in tall, of Lebanese descent, an ardent feminist with both academic experience and sharp political skills, had known Hillary almost 20 years. And though she and the new first lady were friends, Shalala was certain that Hillary was ill-prepared for the job.

There was too much mythology about Hillary that stretched the facts, she felt. Shalala had always been made uncomfortable by hyperbolic statements from friends and acolytes of Hillary, as well as leaders in the women’s movement who didn’t know her personally, who put forth the notion that had she pursued her own political career and not deferred to Bill Clinton’s, she would have been a governor or senator in her own right by 1992.

“They assume that [just] being smart is enough,” Shalala said. “And it’s not enough. It’s judgment. It’s experience. It’s being strategic at the right points.” Shalala believed that Hillary often tried to do too many things at once – and later, as her personal and legal troubles accumulated, became distracted.

“She’s also someone who doesn’t do things in depth. Because Hillary’s so smart and well educated, I think people missed the fact [that] she has essentially been his supporter, and his support partner . . . She hadn’t really fully developed an identity until she came up here [to Washington].”

Shalala also noted that, in Little Rock, the Clintons “had always been big fish in a little pond”. Until they got to Washington in 1993 they “had never actually banged up against people as smart as they were. They’d spent all of their adult lives in which they were the smartest people in the room. These were two extremely able people who had not really been tested before. So they really had to learn their way.”

Hillary had stayed in touch with Bernie Nussbaum, her mentor when she worked on the US Congress’s impeachment investigation of President Richard Nixon in 1974. Nussbaum had become a leading New York City lawyer specialising in corporate takeovers.

Less than two weeks before the inauguration, Susan Thomases, Hillary’s friend and troubleshooter, phoned him in Puerto Rico, where he was vacationing. She asked if, given a choice, would he rather be counsel to the president or deputy attorney-general. Counsel to the president, he said.

Thomases told him to be in Little Rock the next morning. Upon his arrival, Nussbaum was introduced to the man who had already been named deputy counsel to the president, Vince Foster. It was clear that Foster saw his primary job as being Hillary’s lawyer, representing her private and public concerns.

“What’s the worst thing they can say about you?” asked Nussbaum. “Some people claim I had an affair with Hillary,” replied Foster.

“Is it true?” “No, it’s not true,” said Foster. It is remarkable how many of the contradictions of the Clinton presidency and its two principals were on display at the new administration’s difficult birthing: the faultless intentions, the reckless fundraising, the seriousness, the infatuation with Hollywood, the idealism, the physical exhaustion, the sensitivity to matters of race, the boomer sensibility, the surprising naïveté, the intense religiosity of the new president and first lady, their folksy grandiosity, her disregard for the rituals of Washington and disdain for the press, the rivalry between Hillary and Vice-President Al Gore, her sense of enti-tlement and the shading of the truth, her protective instincts toward her husband, her confusing relationship to feminism, her occasional tin ear, her lack of sophistication, her misreading of the voters’ healthcare mandate, the propensity of their enemies to hammer them for conduct that other presidents and their wives had got away with routinely.

Less visible was the first fraying of the disintegrating and doomed relationship between Vince Foster and Hillary.

The Clintons, from their first days after the inauguration, felt they were living in a bell jar. They inherited a personal staff of dozens – maids, butlers, housekeepers, telephone operators, cooks, ushers, stewards – and were under the constant supervision of the secret service.

Hillary complained to Foster that some of the agents seemed abrupt and unfriendly. Their constant presence was intrusive. She became especially concerned about the number of functionaries who hung by doorways, and the agents who were always stationed in the long living area that stretched east-west on the second floor, within listening distance of conversations.

Harry Thomason, a close friend and adviser of the Clintons who was living part-time in the White House during early 1993, came back one night from a dinner attended by some reporters. He told the Clintons that particulars about the first family’s personal life in the White House were being leaked to the press by some of the agents. He urged replacement of the whole White House secret service detail.

The problem was deemed serious enough for Hillary to tell Foster to solve it, and that she wanted new agents assigned who were more inclined to be sympathetic.

Among the things Hillary valued most about Foster’s judgment were his caution and calm, his ability to look beyond the immediate, to see the big picture. He was now worried that precipitous replacement of the White House secret service contingent, or even a few agents, would inevitably leak to the press and would produce a public backlash.

He met David Watkins, another Arkansan who was assistant to the president for management and administration. It was agreed that they should watch the situation but do nothing for the moment.

Days later, vivid evidence of the problem showed up in the Chicago Sun-Times, which reported, without attribution, that Hillary had smashed a lamp during a fierce argument with Bill in the family quarters.

Other mainstream media outlets picked up the story, some embellishing it. Hillary was livid. When the secret service failed to issue a formal denial, she became even angrier.

She was also harsh in her response to Foster. If she had ever previously had a really cross word with him, no one had ever heard about it. Their relationship had always reflected a solicitous mutual caring and a deep understanding of the vulnerabilities beneath the surface of each.

In this instance, she seemed to draw no distinction between Watkins and Foster, reprimanding them at the same time. Both were subordinates who had failed to take action when she had expressed her urgent concerns. The two of them were “too naive and too nice, being from Arkansas”, Hillary said, making a strange connection.

Watkins seemed to take her rebuke in stride, but Vince was clearly devastated. Thereafter he referred to Hillary as “the client”.

Vince had come to Washington with high hopes. He was not a political animal. His allegiance was personal – to the president, but even more so to Hillary. His wife, Lisa, had told him, when he was asked to join the administration, “I’m afraid if you don’t do it you’ll always be sorry”. Now he was beginning to have doubts, according to fellow Arkansans who also made the trip.

He had a family back home to support. The price of living in Washington was generally shocking to him. Real estate, food, going to the movies – he could see that he would not be able to live nearly as well as he had in Little Rock, no matter how exalted his position.

Foster appeared to internalise the blame for the item in the Sun-Times, as if he had failed to protect Hillary and the president. She was right, he told Nussbaum. He had not been forceful enough. TO develop the specifics of her healthcare proposal, Hillary established a presidential taskforce comprising 500 consultant-experts who were expected to debate the issues, present a set of recommendations and then defend their conclusions.

Their duties seemed overly complex – not to mention impossible to complete within the 100-day deadline set by the president. Many were working six and seven-day weeks, often for 18 hours a day. The scene inside the Executive Office Building, where they met, always seemed on the brink of chaos.

The White House, meanwhile, refused inquiries from the press and interested organisations to identify her 500 consultants, or provide any details of what they were working on. This made practical sense. There was no precedent for presidential administrations drafting legislation in public; and, even in secret, the process was disorderly. Advance release of partially developed ideas might encourage premature debate, divert energy from formulating final recommendations and hamper the work generally.

But healthcare reform was one of the most charged public policy issues of the day. Republicans, ideological opponents of government controls, and important segments of the healthcare industry that stood to lose money in a revamped system complained immediately that they had been cut out of the process.

The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons and new organisations formed specifically to fight Hillary’s healthcare plan now filed a lawsuit demanding that the secret deliberations of the taskforce be outlawed; that its meetings be ordered open to press and public; and that the names of the 500 experts be released.

Hillary charged that her opponents had used an “obscure law” to undermine the orderly process of developing her plan. She told Vince Foster to fix it.

In effect, Hillary burdened Foster with much of the weight of her hopes for healthcare. If they lost in court, she was not sure her healthcare initiative could ever be put back together again.

“I think the beginning of Vince’s downturn was when the healthcare taskforce was sued,” said Hubbell, whom Foster enlisted to help him.

Hubbell had always known Foster to be cool, methodical, imperturb-able. Not now. “‘Fix it, Vince!’ he said she had hissed. It hurt him deeply. The stress was getting to us all . . . She was the boss. And when she says, ‘Win the litigation’, you’re feeling pressure from the boss. Not only the boss, but a very good friend, who’s under a lot of stress, and taking a lot of heat for this . . . He was feeling the pressure, and it was a different relationship.”

The efforts of Foster, Nussbaum, Hubbell and an army of Justice Department lawyers came to virtually naught. A judge ruled that the healthcare taskforce would have to meet in public when gathering facts.

Technically the decision was not a total loss: the judge ruled that the taskforce could meet privately when creating policy proposals for the president. But perception was the most important consideration of all, and it was clear that the judge had delivered a stinging rebuke to the first lady and the president.

Hillary had put enormous pressure on Foster and he had failed.

Bill Clinton, no matter how fiercely embattled or frustrated in those first six months of his presidency, woke up every day thrilled and enthusiastic about the task ahead. “I love this stuff,” he often said. An optimist by nature, he had confidence in his vision and his ability to move past the obstacles.

“The difference between their temperaments is very simple as far as I’m concerned,” said Bob Boorstin, Hillary’s deputy for press and communications on the healthcare taskforce. “He gets angry, and he gets over it. She gets angry, and she remembers it for ever.”

A White House aide who saw Hillary almost daily observed, “Some mornings she would wake up pissed off, and some mornings it would be okay. Sometimes it would be a glorious day. She has the capacity for epiphanous, spiritual awakenings.”

Unfortunately, those days on which the spiritual equation was wrong-sided could be brutal for others. One of the most senior White House officials, who was often at her (and her husband’s) side during the many critical events of the 1992 presidential campaign and the White House years, raised in a conversation towards the end of the Clinton presidency the question of whether Hillary had ever been by nature a genuinely happy or even contented person.

This deputy maintained that perhaps the most essential thing to understand about Hillary was that (from what he had learnt and observed) she must have been an unhappy person for most of her adult life. And a very angry one at that, in his view, often in a state of agitated discontent in the years he worked with her, sometimes icy cold and embittered, though obviously capable of fun and laughter and warm friendship (though rarely of irony).

After five months in the White House she was under constant strain. More than Bill, she was physically exhausted; she lacked his stamina and was losing weight.

There is a photograph taken by one of the White House photographers in mid-May 1993 and never publicly released that speaks volumes. Hillary, Foster and Bill Clinton could look no glummer.

“The Travel Office is spinning out of control. They’re already acting like the presidency is over,” said one of their assistants in the room with them, aware of his own hyperbole. “But that’s how she was taking it in ’93. ‘Why can’t you people bring this under control? Why are we being treated like this? Why are these stories continuing? Why are these stories dominating the news? Why can’t we stop them?’”

The most distressed-looking person in the picture is Hillary. Foster is gaunt, sad, empty. Bill looks like he just doesn’t want to be there.

The question of what exactly transpired in regard to the firings of seven employees of the White House Travel Office preoccupied the special prosecutor for more than seven years, despite its relative insignificance. The “Travel Office problem” came to acquire huge symbolic importance, not least because of what George Stephanopoulos, the White House communications director, came to describe to some of his colleagues as Hillary’s “Jesuitical lying”.

The Travel Office difficulties for the Clintons could be traced to Bill’s authorisation of their friend Harry Thomason to be given a White House pass, an office in the East Wing and a vague charter to continue shaping the public images of the president and first lady.

Thomason and other Arkansans in the White House claimed that the Travel Office, which handled the multi-million-dollar business of arranging flights and hotels for members of the White House press corps, was haphazardly managed and more than likely a semi-legiti-mate operation in which fraud or embezzlement might be occurring.

Because the Travel Office served the press corps directly, Hillary – inspired by Thomason’s assurance, according to her aides – became convinced that a spate of favourable stories would result from the disclosure that it was operated dishonestly, its employees fired, and new procedures and people put in place.

In urging these changes, Hillary had failed to take into account the close relationship between Travel Office employees and members of the press who travelled with the president. The Travel Office performed numerous favours for reporters, including making it easy for them to clear customs and ship gifts back home.

Without any opportunity for Travel Office employees to defend themselves, all seven were fired. There had been moments when some officials – including, perhaps, Foster – had wondered whether Hillary wasn’t moving too fast. But they had felt her ire before and were disinclined to be reprimanded by her again.

Neither Hillary nor Bill was prepared for the firestorm of press fury that struck the White House. Many reporters concluded that the firings were a cover-up for the Clintons’ cronyism, especially after the White House confirmed that the beneficiaries of the firings might include Thomason.

For the last month of Vince Foster’s life, Hillary spoke to him at most once – and then for hardly a second. No one has ever presented convincing evidence that Vince and Hillary were lovers. But they had been, in some ways, closer than lovers, absent the rancour and messy business that usually attends a love affair. By all accounts, Hillary was totally unguarded in his presence, and, until they got to Washington, he in hers, at least as far as his restrained self would permit.

Perhaps even more than Bill Clinton, Vince understood Hillary’s good intentions in everything he had ever seen her do. And because he knew her so well, he understood her grey areas, the shadings, complexions and context that would never be nearly so apparent to someone else.

In four months in Washington, Foster had come to understand the harshness of the place. The political combat that had come to define the capital and demean the practice of governance was something far removed from anything he’d observed in Arkansas. He had been completely unprepared for the sheer brutality of the place, and he was out of his league.

A first-rate litigator, a wise counsellor, a gentle soul, his rapid immersion into the Washington cauldron, feet first, was far different than that experienced by, say, a congressman, who gradually got used to the place without the whole country watching his every move.

Though he had first known Bill when they were children, he had become a presence in his life again only after Hillary came to work at the Rose law firm. He knew more about Bill from Hillary than from Bill.

Vince had become a shoulder for her to lean on. Though insouciance was not the first word that many acquaintances would use to describe Hillary, Vince saw that in her and loved it. He shared a side of himself with her as she shared a piece of her life that she could not with Bill. There was nothing threatening to Bill about their closeness, nothing illicit, and he, too, had great appreciation for Vince’s qualities of discretion, wisdom, legal skill and – something Bill often lacked – decorum.

Foster believed that he had personally failed Hillary and the president on the Travel Office matter. He told Hubbell he feared his office phone was being bugged by the secret service or Republican loyalists at the White House.

Foster’s wife suggested he put his frustrations on paper as a kind of therapy. “I made mistakes from ignorance, inexperience and overwork,” he wrote. “I was not meant for the job or the spotlight of public life in Washington. Here ruining people is considered sport.”

He told Susan Thomases he feared Hillary would be blamed and dragged through the mud. At the same time it was increasingly hard for Foster to keep fighting tooth and nail for Hillary’s interests when their own relationship had degenerated, said Hubbell.

“Vince had her heart, he did,” said a close friend of Foster. “In the end I think they both were broken hearted. He couldn’t serve her, he couldn’t do enough for her, once she became the first lady. And, she couldn’t allow him to be her real friend, like he’d been, because she wasn’t herself.”

When he had left Arkansas for Washington, he had expected the relationship with Hillary to remain as deep as ever. The last thing he had expected is that it would turn upside down. Some days he was a flunky, some days he was a legal counsellor, other days a fixer, but no longer was he her intimate.

“He was completely out of his game, and the work kept piling up,” Foster’s friend recalled. “And Hillary does not like things not happening when she wants them to happen. And trails were leading back toward her.”

Each day Foster came back to his drab office. He had no pictures on the walls, just a few in a bookcase. There were still boxes everywhere. He couldn’t really confide in his friends about much more than the workload.

On Tuesday, July 20, 1993, Foster left the office around 1pm. Five hours later police found him shot dead at Fort Marcy Park in northern Virginia, outside Washington. A bullet had been fired into his mouth. A revolver was in his hand.

Hillary stayed up all night after getting the news, calling friends and crying. “Of a thousand people, of those who might commit suicide, I would never pick Vince,” she said.

Foster’s suicide, the president later told friends, had “destroyed” Hillary. “I think she just bled deep inside,” a close friend of Foster observed. “I don’t think she ever really quite recovered from that.”

© Carl Bernstein 2007

Extracted from A Woman in Charge: The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton, by Carl Bernstein, to be published on Tuesday by Hutchinson at £25. It will be available for £23 including postage from The Sunday Times Books-First on 0870 165 8585

Too bad the Healthcare issue has never been resolved as the Clintons intended, but I suppose you can't force something onto people that they don't want.
"Freedom at any price" is the message you often get in the States, a view I find terribly misguided.

Mike, Malaga, Spain

RAZORBACK, In your recipe for a Democrat victory in '08, you left
out a key ingredient; NUTS. It takes a lot of NUTS of all varieties
to fabricate a "Democrat Victory Tort"

Peter Price, San Diego, Ca. USA

RAZORBACK,
You left the NUTS out of your recipe.
It takes a varied lot nuts to fashion a

Peter Price, San Diego, Ca. USA

RAZORBACK, In your recipe for a Democrat victory in '08, you left
out a key ingredient; NUTS. It takes a lot of NUTS of all varieties
to fabricate a "Democrat Victory Tort"

Peter Price, SanDiego, Ca. USA

I'm definitely voting for Hilary in the primaries. For the general election, I'll vote the Democratic ticket. Hilary is a complex woman in world that only appreciates men. I think she's just what this country needs, especially after the Shrub years we've been forced to endure.

Michelline, Jacksonville, FL, US

Tell me. Do the presidents to be or the past president ever rest in the times when you reporters chase them every where everyday in every corner in the name of human rights or the equal speeches
Her other man
As Hillary Clinton emerges as frontrunner to be America’s next president, friends and former aides talk to her biographer about the tragedy that scarred her first years in the White HouseWatergate reporter Carl Bernstein

Firozali A.Mulla MBA PhD, Dar-Es-Salaam, Tmzania

I totally agree with Howie!

Hillary is with out a doubt one of the most ambitiously and personally unbalanced people ever to seek the presidency.

Imagine her getting word of a global crisis and then launching a lamp throwing fit within reach of the nuclear trigger. I shudder to think of it.

Michael, Turlock, USA/CA

When this woman becomes President, and she surely will, as the Republican presidential hopefuls trample each other placing distance between themselves and Bush, she will be able to put her visions into practice. We will have the healthcare that she wanted. The country will no longer spend money and lives foolishly on an unwinable war in Iraq. She will end the scandals that have plagued the current administration (the Clinton's scandals pale when compared to Bush the Younger) and were brought on by Bush'e arrogance and cowboy approach. She will develop a sound immigration policy as the present version is doomed to failure since no one except Bush likes it. The good news for you Clinton haters is that you will have Hillary to "kick around" for 8 years.

LeRoy O, Olney, MD

I think it's hilarious Carl Bernstein has "Watergate reporter" under his name. As though this is supposed to illicit awe and remind us this is the reporter who was part of that story. Get over it.

William, Tucson, AZ

Carl's just trying to smooth over this Arkancide for Hillary prior to the big push for the Whitehouse, possibly preempting an upcoming conspiracy book about Vince Foster's murder.

Ted, Los Angeles, CA

I vagely remember the Vince Foster case being handled by the park police and not the regular police department. Also that there was a holdup or a delay in reporting. The loss of a close friendship can be devestating and for Vince Foster to have a close business relationship where he failed Hillary must have been humiliating and personally tormenting. Still, the gun in the wrong hand, where the body was found and the position it was in and the cleaning out of Vince Foster's office speaks volumes about the things we will never know!
Hillary is not suitable for the presidency because of her temper. We need a well spoken statesmen in the White House. A man or women who will garner respect in foreign policy.

Jane, Enterprise, USA Florida

the comments here are very subjective. that is difficult to understand how the people here comment on other topics rather than comment on the excerpt.

chris, Chicago, IL

Hillary, our next President.

No! Hell, no!

Vic, Greenville, SC

Americans are both conservative and liberal. Americans are on scales with which way they'll lean, it depends on the subject. Because of this you can meber blanketly say that Americans are conservative or liberal, there is a mixture of both in each voter, depending on the subject.

Some lean more one way than the other because that party represents most of their desires. No party repsresents all of their desires.

The liberals did not win congress because Americans are now staunch liberals. We do a Vote the bums out when they disappoint and show no improvement on issues that concrn us at that time. The Republicans lost because at the time lack of focus on domestic issues and because of the war going on longer, not because Americans turned liberal in one election period.

The swing and undecided votes grow larger each year, they can go either or depending on what the sides are offering.

You can not box the voter. Decades ago, yes; Today, no. We get smarter each election.

JustIn, Knoxvilles,

Hey, you late-comers! It's all in Gary Aldrich's book, "Unlimited Access," a best-seller published about 10 years ago. Gary was an FBI agent who's tour of duty was in the white house (note lower case). All of these comments about Hilarity (and Good Ole Boy Bill) were common gossip in Arkansas back when he was "gov". Just ask the state troopers of those days and those who rubbed shoulders with the Clintons. I woulnd't have voted for him for governor, let alone president. When both happened (shudder!), I almost joined a Trappist Monastery, (but not quite!).

"Clayt". Clayton, Harrison, AR

You know, I am not the biggest fan of Hillary Clinton, but I am constantly amazed at the vitriol the right always spews about her. Why does she frighten people so much? She's a classic middle of the road Democrat, who's going to be friendly with big business and the military industrial complex. She'll support everything Israel does without question and all the other standard US positions. She won't likely urinate all over the constitution and the rest of the world as badly as Bush/Cheney, but I think right wingers ought to be voting for her. Things will get bad in the US in the next few years no matter who is elected, but if she wins, then right wingers can blame her for everything. Heck, they still blame her husband for all of Bush's screw ups, or the classic "Clinton did it too!"

David D., Birmingham, Alabama

Recipe for 2008 Democrat Presidential Nominee:
Start with two pounds of novelty; add six cups of Nixon paranoia; add twelve fistfulls of anger; add three shovels of entitlement, a pinch of incredibly poor memory and a dash of victimhood, and mix well with Bill Clinton's political machine. Simmer for 18 months in oversized pant suits and serve using the mainstream media. Oh Yeah!!!

Razorback, Washington, DC

Vince Foster would no more know how to find Ft. Marcy park than he would Ft. Courage on F Troop. I've lived in DC most of my life, and until Vince Foster showed up dead in Ft. Marcy park, neither I, nor most Washingtonians, had ever heard of the place. It's a small exit, with a small 2 ft sign that says "Ft. Marcy Park next righ." off the George Washington Parkway in Virgina. Even if you noticed it, you don't have time to make the turn into it. You need to know about it to find it and I doubt, Vince knew about it. But then we don't know what else was on his list of thing he had written down because the breif case had be rifled through before the police could investigate. Oh well, I Hillary wins, we can look forward to more of the same drama. ( YOU GO GIRL)

David Meisner, Washington DC, United States

I don't believe we've ever heard the REAL story of the Clintons. I beleive there's more - lots more. Maybe someday........

W Green, Englewood, FL

Let Hillary be elected President, I am old and it no longer matters, I won't be around to see the results. But to those of you who will be, I will be laughing from my grave because you deserve everything you get if this woman becomes the Chief Executive. And by then it will be too late. Too bad.

Richard, Bullhead City, AZ, USA

Hmm....why does a man who is left-handed shoot himself with his right hand? How does someone trek all the way into a park and not have any grime on his shoes? How is it that he showed no indication of depression? Or that there were rug hairs all over him? Maybe Carl Bernstein would like to write about that..........

Dave, Los Angeles,

USA economy is flying because of what Europe, India and China are doing. Trade imbalance is around $900 billion. GM and Ford are close to going over a cliff and the dollar is so weak against other currencies it's amazing. Read the paper folks ..... sub-prime mess, housing bubble, major corps. laying off thousands a day, CEO's in jail ... prisons full... you blinder wearing pro-life, small government, tax-cut, gun toting, red state .... stay the course conservatives are just amazing to watch with your empty rhetoric and devil may care attitudes. And I should know, because I'm one of you to. Where's Lincoln and Reagan when you need em.

Lazlo, Tampa, FLA

People have complained for eight years about Bush. And now it seems this country is supid enough to elect Hillary, yet another polarizing figure that would do little more than cause inept political bickering to continue. Why can't we seem to get off this distructive path?

Bob Westcott, Modesto, USA Ca

I like the opening sentence, (As Hillary Clinton emerges as frontrunner to be America’s next president). It shows your spin early.

Polls show heads up Rudy dominates Hillary.

Maybe the frontrunner for the Dem party would be more accurate.

Richard, W-S, NC

The overall most important question here is....is this woman the best qualified person in the U.S. to be president?? I think the answer is overwhelmingly NO !!

Denise Packard, McDonough, USA/GA

What in heavens name have we come to in this country that H.C. would even be mentioned in the same breath as election to the most important role in our country and the world. By ANY standard she would be a disaster.

peg harris , tallahasse, fl. , USA/FL

I agree that she is now and never has been happy. I certainly don't enjoy being yelled to whenever she speechifies. Her outer layer is too thin and brittle to be called a facade, it's more like a crackled veneer. One lives in hopes that she just fades away, quietly, but alas, I fear she won't.

Carol Densmore, Findlay, Ohio

In response to DB Ashton, Kinsale, Ireland and all othr who cite the " mess made ver the past 8 years and how long it will take to clean it up " I will gladly point out that Iraq hasn't gone swimmingly, we let too many people from other countries just waltz int the U.S without apropriate screening and yes, even refused entry. HOWEVER..in the post 9-11 America wen all of theso-called experts who claimed our economy might never ecver, othat giving accross the oard tax cuts would blow the economy to shreds, we have full employment, soarig GDP and a stock market that is smashing all time records. America's " poor " are doing better than most people around the world andwe are still the most generous nation on earth. In other words, Under this " incompetent rube " of a President, we haven't been attacked since 9-11and even afer all we went through, our economy is stronger than every one of our critics around t world ( I dare say ) including Ireland my friend.

David Arnold, Upland, CA

Hillary Clinton will in all likelihood be the next president. The US population overwhelmingly supports the liberal domestic agenda. The only reason Republicans win on the national level is because the US populice thinks Democrats are too soft when it comes to foriegn affair matters. Since the majority of Americans oppose the war in Iraq, this means the next president will be Hillary.

I on the other hand am a hawk on foreign policy. I suupport the war in Iraq. I think it will be a disaster if we leave Iraq. And I just hope Bush destroys Iran's nuclear ambitions before he leaves office, because the Democrats won't.

Whatever ill-effects might arise from our destroying Iran's nuclear capability will not compare to the deleterious consequences
of Iran becoming a nuclear power.

Pete Moss, miami, florida

May The Lord God spare us an angry woman in the White House. The last angry woman that killed the Prphets was Jezebel. But the dogs ended up licking her blood.

Barbara White, Minneapolis,

You notice the one thing Carl leaves out in his description of the "new administration’s difficult birthing" Their outright hate of the military and the disrespect the White House staff showed for it. I would guess that would not be something any fellow traveler would want to point out during her rush to the White House.

S Charters, Phoenix, AZ,

Two observations on an important homicide investigation: 1. Why were only Polaroid pictures taken of the crime scene? and 2. Why was the individual assigned a green inexperienced investigator?

Al Hranicka, Glen Burnie, Maryland

To Emma from Ottawa Good grief, her healthcare
idea is a good one.? Have you tried your healthcare
sysem lately?
You best try it before you say Hillary could do it and not
fall on her face. Americans are not as under the thumb of
government as Canada is, they like the free practice of
medicine.. It has worked for them.
I am trouble seeing a Canadian thinking well of Hillary,
get your head out of the sand, she is a tyrant, liar and
It is not her time, it is the time of a strong man who has
some character.
Bet you are a liberal ! Don't ever attribute any of your
ideas to anyone but yourself, please.

Carole, Calgary, Canada

It is interesting that people who are tone deaf (listen to the recording of her singing the National Anthem at a poliltical event a couple of months ago) often have "tin ears" and miss the nuances of political dealings and infighting. The combination of her fiery ambition, extreme sense of entitlement and a tin ear will surely get in her way over the next few months.

Susan, Jackson, Wyoming

Bernstein tries to imply that Bill , Hillary and Vince were shocked at how brutal Washington politics could be, while ignoring how brutal and cunning they had been in Arkansas politics. Bernstein can't help playing the violin when he describes Hillary's reaction to Vince's death. Is this done to keep the doors opened in the White House in case Hillary makes it to the Presidency. Bernstein is no fool, he wants his cake and he wants to eat it too. That is why he sticks a knife in Hillary's back and then pulls it out very slowly. Bernstein, like Hillary, knows the art of brutality.

Tony Anthony, Houston, USA/Tx

We don't want to relive the Clintons again. This is a bitter and confused woman.

Ron J, tucson,

Bernstein has to twist himself into a pretzel in order to explain away the Clinton Shenanigans. Hillary hired Vince Foster in Little Rock with the explicit task of undermining all the women accusers who came forward. Bernstein speaks of pain caused by Gennifer Flowers. Well, the Clintons trashed Ms Flowers only to admit in court - 6 years later - that she was telling the truth. The Clintons were a disaster. The economy was a fake propped up by dot coms and corporate thieves like Enron. Clinton let Al Qaeda grow into our biggest enemy while he was in office but did nothing. He chased interns instead of terrorists.

Tom Galvin, New York,, NY

The Clinton's had, have, and always will have, too much drama, that in a normal set of circumstances makes a good story.
Unfortunately the Presidency would be pouring on glowing embers the jet fuel of Washinton politics and media attention. Whatever their intentions, events, and initiatives; the story of a Hillary Clinton presidency would be the Clinton's.

P Ashley, Boulder, CO

Thank God Emma H. is from Canada

Howie, jville, Florida

While behavior can change, personality never does. The lack of character is a fatal flaw in any politician. It is sad that such lack of character might be necessary for political "success".

Unhappy, violent (lamp-smashing), self-absorbed, narcissistic hurtful people are only "successful" in politics and in show business. In the meantime, they hurt many people to achieve their personal power at the expense of those around them.

There is nothing surprising in this story. In fact, the segment sugar coats the frankly disturbing, anti-social behavior that Hillary Rodham has shown throughout her life toward her family, her friends, and pretty much everyone else in society. I guess one can afford to buy whatever friends they need when they are wealthy and intelligent.

One wonders if it had been Bill who had been violent what the press would have done?

When (not if) she wins the presidency, people will quickly forget the many similar failings of George W. Bush.

Robert, Pittsburgh, PA

Not to worry, Hillary will NEVER to President of the USA. She will likely win the nomination in a brokered convention with Obama becoming a shoe-in for VP. The loony lefties and Move-on.org crowd, will see this as the "Dream Team" and a certain winner.

They couldn't be more wrong, this country simply won't elect an embittered woman and a black man with questionable Muslim associations in his background.

Lefties, dream on, it "ain't gonna happen"!

Jim Warren, Dallas, TX

What Hillary seems to represent is that she is human, political and as well or better qualified than any man seeking the job of chief executive. Someone has to break the emotional prejudice of our male dominated society at the highest level and she is obviously the best qualified to come along in our nation's history.

Many nations traditionally oriented to male dominance in their society seem to have had no problem with adjusting to female leadership at the head of government. No one seems to question such fairly common occurrences elsewhere. Ours is a country so related to dominance by the corporate world, where female leadership only came into limited vogue in recent years for reasons that are often less than true acceptance of ability. Prejudice remains strong against women in the corporate world and consequently other business related enterprize that tend to set our notion of individual worth, removed from an individuals true worth in a social sense. It's Hills time.

Bill Gould, Oriental, USA/NC

I beg the Times pardon but don't put the slime ball Hillary in the White House yet.

She is not, in fact, the "frontrunner to be America's next president."

Frontrunner for the Democrats, yes! Frontrunner in it's entirety no!.

GOD save the America, Hillary is the country's worst nightmare.

http://www.liberallyconservative.com

Don, Chicago, IL

Why was the gun still in his hand? A fatal shot would have thrown his head back and his hand would have loosend the grip on the pistol. Also, no bullet was found, and there was not the amount of blood at the scene consistent with the fatal shot having taken place at Ft Marcy Park.

He had to have been murdered elsewhere and his body place in the park.

CSB, Amarlillo, Texas

Not exactly an unbiased presenation from a media Democrat!

JohnW, Fort Worth,

Mr. Berstein is a newspaper reporter, not an historian.

Biff, Tucson,

Carl writes that a revolver was found in Foster's hand? Check the facts of that statement.

Don Cary, Mayhill, NM, USA

Pathetic piece of apologist propaganda... so this is how they're going to handle her abysmal White House record. OK. But they're fooling no one just because Bernstein wrote it. Clinton fingerprints are all over this.

L Larsen, Rock Hill,

Bill and Hill read and believed their own press clippings about being so smart but proved that they were not smart but naricsstic. Smart people do no waste opportunities to lead the free world by compulsive sex acts in the White House or compulsive political hacks in the travel office and medical care. Smart people have self control and neither of these folks have that quality.

Gary R Sweeten, Cincinnati, OH

Carl really does not say why Vince was murdered. Only hints. Guess this will always be a mystery.

Carl E Mayo, Rogers , AR

Verrrrry eeenteresting as the LAUGH IN fellow in the helmet wouid say... After wading through Herr Bernsteins tiptoe-ing words in his new book we find that Hillarys high principled, gentlemanly friend and confidant Vince Foster was devastated when his old friend became obsessed with her new power, even turning her rage onto him, her old Arkansas buddy when he didn't join in the merriment of not only firing all the Travel Office employees but falsely accusing them of criminal conduct. His sad last hand written words "Here ruining people is
considered a blood sport" says it all. Witnesses to his body
in the park say he lay at attention, with gun in hand suggesting he was carried from somewhere else.after shooting himself in the mouth.

Al Smith, Shelby, Ohio

Hillary is no different than any other ambitious person. Ambition arises from self loathing. Ambitious persons are cruel. Men are better at masking it, hence the glass ceiling.

Douglas Wessebago, Washington, The District

I believe that, if elected President, Hillary would eventually develope Nixonian problems that would bring her down.

Bingo, Hal.

You are the $64,000 Winner !!

At some point in time, I can see her rolling those 3 steel balls in her hand at the court hearing asking "Where are the strawberries?".

Can you say Humphrey Bogart !!

However, what will probably happen is:

"I can't recall."

"I have no recollection of that specific event."

"I don't remember."

Ron M, Winter Haven, FL

Those who refuse to die:

(A) The self-righteous voyeurs who are STILL erect over their Hillary-Vince fantasies, evidence be damned...

(B) The conspiracy theorists who STILL can’t accept a Foster suicide, motivated by an utterly believable depression, dislocation and disgust -- evidence be damned.

My view is that Hillary would be a much healthier woman, and a better leader, if she actually had a fully realized, nurturing extramarital relationship to enhance her self-worth and empower her natural, feminine side. Of course, ever the victim, it would have cost her the guilt card she plays so effectively and have released Bill from his debt.

Hilary is typical of the feminists of her age, who misinterpret and misapply male characteristics that produce dominance and suppress feminine characteristics that are their natural advantages -- alienating potential supporters of both sexes.

At any rate, the electorate is going to be looking for someone who is quietly competent and non-threatening to clean up the extraordinary mess of the previous eight years. Hillary is not the one -- we know too much about her, or think we do; too much baggage...

DB Ashton, Kinsale, Ireland

I do not think Hillary has the temperment to become the President
of the USA. She has a bad temper, little respect for the opinion of
others and thinks she is always correct.She is just not tempermentally suitable for such a position. She is far too angry
to be in such a sensitive position. She needs to learn to be much more diplomatic,patient and understanding of others view points.
Just being smart and educated is not enough and she seems to be very bossy! She needs to develop many other communication and people skills.

Elinor Scotton, Diamondhead, Mississippi

America has Iraq it doesn't need Hillary. Even the United States is not big enough for both of them.

Tom Hall, Syracuse, New York

I am a Democrat. Always have been, always will be. But if this woman is nominated for President, I will vote for whoever the Repubs put up.

Kevin Bailey, Fort Worth, TX

Oh, PLEASE! George Bush the Minor has permanently lowered the bar as far as Presidential qualifications. I'm no Hillary fan (I'd vote for Obama), but she's vastly more qualified than the present dunderhead who occupies the White House.

Mark Parsons, Los Angeles,

Carl Bernstein is an excellent writer and tells a compelling story. There is nothing in this excerpt not already reported or whispered years ago. The misstake is thinking people want to hear about this AGAIN. Don't people learn from their past experiences? Where is the connection to now? Other reporters are sure to pick up on this and I suppose that means we can expect a lot of followups. It is another tabloid style media story but go take a poll and then tell me the American people who will vote in the next election care about this, not the pundits. Is anyone listening to the voters? I do not believe this changes any minds, only adds to the growing frustration of people who want hard facts (no9 adjectives). If I have to live through all this mediocrity then someone has to get me a giant screen TV and a handful of idiot pills.

Andrea, Tarzaba, CA

Bernstein, ever the master of spin, fails to address several key mysteries. For one, how can be explained the approximately 100 trips to Switzerland made by Vince Foster, registered in his passport, which began with Clinton's tenure as Arkansas governor. Foster was not a pure little lamb. Rather, looking ahead to forthcoming statements made under oath, as an attorney with at least some innate goodness, he feared entanglement the perjury trap.

Carismar, Alexandria, US/VA

Thanks for the article.Made me feel even stronger that we don't need this unbalanced woman in the White House,ever.

peter eros, seattle, WA

Why is it that anything Mrs. Clinton touches requires somebody to spin her out? One day it will be one spin too many. Here author tells us that she never recovered after Mr. Foster's death. And based on what evidence are we to believe that Mrs. Clinton was different before, in earlier scandals? The article sounds like an expensive trailer of a bad romantic movie with poor acting in lead female role. But there were some convincing minor roles. Like that of Anita Broderick. She is alive. Ask about it Mrs. Clinton's 40 years old feminine self and that of her 16 years old optimist.

George Shimanovich, Freehold, US/NJ

This story only serves to confirm that Hillary Rodhan Clintion is, in no way, professionally or temprementaly qualified to serve as President of The United States of America.

Jonathon , Jupiter, FLORIDA

If Hillary Clinton is truly capable of turning against someone like Vince Foster who was so loyal and dear to the former First Lady for so many years. God help us all when she becomes president. Especially after she begins her 2nd term.

Will, Hbg., PA/USA

This account almost makes Hillary sound human.

Laars, Norfolk, VA

There are a lot of people like Vince Foster, who seems to put all their worth in pleasing someone else. This is a very sad story but the first time I feel like I heard it.

When you consider how the world today seems to love scandel not only in Hollywood or the life of a rock star, I was thinking about Hillary long before I read this article.

Bill Clinton has "rock star" status around the world. Anna Nicole Smith ruled the media for weeks and today it is Paris Hilton & Lindsey Lohan - this may be the type of story to motivate Bill's fans to put him back in the white house.

Hillary does not have a clue what it is like to have to cook, do the laundry, grocery shop, and drive kids to school while her husband is cheating on her. Most of us are only a story she reads about.

I don't believe enough people will vote to put Hillary, Bill & their old baggage back in the White house.

When does she take a vacation? How often does she take a day off - this concerns me most.

Patricia Robertson, Atlanta, USA/Georgia

I'm sorry, but Berbstein's take on Foster's suicide motive just doesn't work for me. While I don't think Foster was murdered or that he died someplace else, I can't help that an important chunk of the Foster-Hillary story is not here.
That said, this chilling story of a smart but rattled, complicated, naive female in way over her head does not paint a picture of someone I want to see covet the American presidency.

Louie Geiser, Stillwater, OK

You have to laugh at how Bernstein makes it sound like Poor Hillary and Vince were surprised at how tough Washington could be. These are the same two people who intimidated and threatened to destroy anyone who got in their way or her husband's on the way to the White House. What is evident is what a cold, blameful person Hillary is. No wonder Vince felt so down. Anyone who gets near Hillary Clinton should be wary. She's clearly not as accomplished as some of her supporters claim her to be.

JR, NYC, USA/NY

I think it must have odten been tortuous to be in the White House during the Clinton years, but I fail to see how Mrs. Clinton was less happy than, say, many authors and journalists who write unflattering profiles for personal gain. I think of the great things Mrs. Clinton attempted (ie medicare for all) and will no doubt accomplish if she wins the race for president. I think of how the world will benefit. Happiness indeed!

Emma H. , Ottawa, CAN

This is a hard lesson to treat those we love with care and respect and not take advantage of them. We sometimes know less about people we've known longer because we can't see real flaws.

hoam ada, townba, California

I believe that, if elected President, Hillary would eventually develope Nixonian problems that would bring her down.

Hal, Jacksonville, US/FL

I find it difficult to imagine that any right-minded, well-ordered person of the Military could, by any stretch, be comfortable in giving Hilliary a salute as Commander-in-Chief of our beloved USA. Mrs. Clinton, as President of the United States would have catastrophic consequences. If it happens, then this country may be witness to the first military coup d'etat in the history of our country. God have mercy on us all!!!

John T., Clinton Twp., Michigan

I would still like to see the rquisition slips for the day they canged the carpet in Foster's office.

DRP, South Salem, NY

These are dangerous people who need to be defeated!!!!!

Jack Kennedy, Panama City Beach, USA

To Maccabee in Rome his name means steel in Russian.
As regards the relationship between Foster and Hillary I read the entire artical and was amazed to find that never did the agust author mention that until they got to Washington Foster and Hillary were always on the same level. In many ways Foster was the mentor. They get to Washington and now Hillary is the BOSS. Foster never met the REAL Hillary before this change of positions.

David, Harwinton, CT

Even Kenneth Starr ruled Vince Foster a suicide, so all you conspiracy theorists can move on to some other case.

jackdawson, palukaville,

A big-time lawyer with no history of depression, not long after moving to DC, kills himself because he's alone in a big city and feels like he didn't adequately represent Hillary's interests? I'm sorry, but if you believe that, I've got a bridge to sell you.

Rob, ny, usa

@ Mark Shea, Hamden, Connecticut, USA

My sentiment s exactly. I couldn't help but notice that dynamic. Very sad how it turned out.

I was also surprised they didn't do their research into life in the beltway. None of the things mentioned as a problem for them is new, they should have known things work that way at the national level.

Washington politics isn't a bed of roses, you need iron will at many levels. You have to know the game and get the partners to play it well. This article paints them as very unprepared, like fish out water, with trouble breathing the air. DC does require you to be think skinned and learn to let go and move forward at times.

JustIn, Knoxville's,

God help us if Hillary is elected president.

fay, rossville, USA/ga

Brilliant excerpt. Bob Woodward may be more prolific than his old friend Carl Bernstein, but man, can Bernstein write.
Outstanding journalism. The writer was not in the piece. All the details were lucid, senisitive, explained.
Would of loved the TimeOnline to excerpt the part about Foster's mysterious suicide, if that chapter even exists in Bernstein's book.
Well done.

Brent, Phoenix, AZ,

One must wonder just how vindictive a Hillary Presidency would be against her detractors or her opposition....The IRS, Justice Dept, or even Homeland Security might be compromised for any perceived slight against "Madame President's" wishes.

g lundb, Garner, USA/NC

What successes there were in the Clinton presidency were during times when Hillary was marginalized and pretty much out of the picture. She has little management experience and even today her campaign and Senate staffs are fighting like cats and dogs. All the PR aside, the presidency requires a modicum of talent for basic management. If Hillary is put in charge of this country's government, we will be in for a wild ride.

jake, Charleston, SC

h clinton terrifies me in that she is too self-centered and not militarily inclined. The world is a very sick place and we need a very strong and intelligent leader who would not be only able to concentrate on a few items. Worldwide diplomacy is crucial.

Ronald May, San Jose, USA/California

A British Historian, Lord Action said; "Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely". That a persons sence of morality lessens as his or her power increases. Hillary has shown that in order to be an effective and balanced leader in the pressure cooker of DC you must be a mature, self confident and at the same time humble, respectful and above have deep moral fiber. Hillary has none of these qualities to be a good leader. Hillary has shown to be a totally selfish person who cared for nothing else, but what she wants and was more than willing to sacrifce the best personal realtionship she ever had, in order to get things done for her personal agenda. Hillary's unwillingness to forgive; (get angry and never get over it), is a very comon problem among women in our society. Men, as Bill did, got over the anger and moved on. In the atmosphere of DC, if you do not have this qualities the place will destroy you. If Hillary becomes president she will not get better, but worse.

Daniel Henry Benson, St Louis, MO

A sensitive, sad article about how an old friendship can change through the passage of time. At one time, Vince Foster was the boss, with Hillary Clinton looking up to him for guidance. Years later--living in a brutal city--Hillary Clinton was the boss, barking out orders to her once close friend.

Whatever relationship they enjoyed in Little Rock was destroyed in Washington. Maybe pressure destroyed it; maybe the spotlight; maybe time constraints; maybe their role reversals--and maybe, just maybe, they simply grew apart. There are no villans here.

Mark Shea, Hamden, Connecticut, USA

So much astute brilliance in the first 3 comments that
mine would simply mirror theirs. If this hysterical woman
somehow insinuates herself into the Presidency
all will blatantly view firsthand her incompetent, ruthless, dishonest and grasping behaviors...and oh so much more.
Perhaps similar to the Pelosi scarf incident which bore
more than a passing resemblance to the pleading cat in Shrek.

Victoria, Richmond, Virginia

It's hard to believe that not a word is mentioned about the Clintons family history of addiction and alcoholism. Both of them belong in Al-anon and they're not. They tout themselves as the leaders for the 21st century but they more closely resemble Tom and Daisy Buchanon from "The Great Gatsby". To be clueless about mental health issues such as addiction and co-dependence was the standard in the 1920's but it's not the standard today. And don't get me started on Ted Kennedy's need for sobriety.

Bob Faust, St. Paul, Minnesota

Hillary Klinton as President of the United Stares? Very scary scenaio.

Garrobo, Morrow County, Ohio USA

Let us pray for our children that the Clinton's will go away. And become
speakers who charge a lot of money to talk about the past.
Bubba done shot the jukebox.Somebody with some (Class)come to the table.PLEASE.
These are nasty people. America ,wake-up....stop watching American
Idol...get a clue. Peace.

Chris, Nashville, TN

Vince Foster did not commit suicide. Ron Brown was not accidentally killed in the former Yugoslavia. The innumerable former police/bodyguards of Bill and Hillary in Arkansas - over 57 persons - did not die accidentally or by suicide as the Propaganda Press would have the world believe. If anyone reads this "view" being expressed at this time (June 3, 2007) by myself ask yourself and answer this question: How many of your good, personal friends and/or business associates have committed suicide and/or died accidentally? Over 50? Almost definitely not!

Thomas J. Coyne, Ph.D., Bath, USA/Ohio

Sounds like Vladimir Ulyanov. And because of these personal shortcomings, she would be a truly dangerous person in the office of the Presidency of the United States. These are unrealistic, idealistic, and obsessive rather than leadership qualities that will ultimately lead to a hysterical (forgive the sexual term) administration that will go nowhere in the heavily political environment of Washington, with its many formal and informal checks and balances. A president must lead and cannot just command. Bill Clinton leads. Hillary commands. If that is not a plausible condition, just consider the current occupant. His writ and influence does not carry that far and is diminishing daily. No FDR, Ike or JFK, he. Hillary is temperamentally unsuitable for the role.

John Treano, Manassas, Virginia

Perhaps only a few will notice the slender thread suggested by the words in this article used to describe Hillary...ambitious, intensity, strength of will, trying to accomplish too much in too short a time, trying to juggle too many things at once, not doing anything in enough depth, violent mood swings between epiphany and rage, overestimation of her own abilities, taking her best friends and supporters for granted.
Couple this with her disdain for individuality in favor of the needs of society, and one cannot help but think of not just any socialist, but of the most infamous socialist of the twentieth century. Please do not ask me his name. I will forbear in deference to the next person with a passing knowledge of history. If someone will answer this easy riddle, perhaps we will not be doomed to repeat history's mistakes.

Maccabee, Rome,