HILLARY'S EXPERIENCE IS AT SURVIVING
Jo
By Dick Morris
Will be published on TheHill.com on April 25, 2007.
Polls suggest that the leading attribute attracting voters to
Hillary's presidential candidacy is her "experience," a virtue which
contrasts, presumably, with the lack of it in Senator Barack Obama,
her chief rival. But a close examination of her record as first lady
and as New York Senator suggests that her experience is largely in the
avoidance of death by scandal. Were it to be captured in a television
series, it would certainly not rise to the level of "Commander In
Chief" and probably not even to that of "West Wing." It would find
its televised metaphor in the reality series "Survivor."
Consider what her experience has been. She burst forth on the
national stage with two tasks in her husband's administration: The
selection of the nation's first female Attorney General and the design
and adoption of a comprehensive program of health care reform. Her
efforts to designate an Attorney General hamstrung the new
Administration for months as two nominees, in succession, had to
withdraw their names from consideration. Finally, at the eleventh
hour, she urged her husband to appoint Florida's Janet Reno, a
selection Bill Clinton would come to describe as "my worst mistake."
In the bargain, she suggested the appointment of Lani Guanier as head
of the civil rights division, a job she was shortly forced to
relinquish when her radical views became known, another embarrassment
for the new Administration. Her other selections for the Justice
Department, the White House staff and the Treasury were her three law
partners: Web Hubbell, Vince Foster, and William Kennedy, appointments
which culminated in one imprisonment, one suicide, and one forced
resignation.
Her other assignment, health care reform, collapsed in such a debacle
that it cost her party control of both houses of Congress, a fate from
which it took twelve years to recover.
Beyond these initial tasks, her main focus in the Administration was
scandal defense. From Jennifer Flowers to Whitewater to the FBI file
affair to the travel office firings to her Commodities Market winnings
to the missing Rose Law Firm billing records to the Paula Jones
scandal, she orchestrated the Administration's defense against scandal
allegations. In the process, she almost got herself indicted for
perjury and obstruction of justice.
And her advice in handling these matters was uniformly bad. It was
Hillary who counseled Bill not to settle the Paula Jones lawsuit even
when the plaintiffs called for neither an apology nor payment and she
who stonewalled the release of Whitewater documents even when it led
to the appointment of a special prosecutor. When the prosecutor whose
appointment she had caused heard about the depositions in the Paula
Jones case she had refused to settle, the Monica Lewinsky scandal
eventuated.
During the period of 1995-1997, the period of the Clinton
Administration's greatest achievements, she was nowhere to be seen,
focusing instead on writing It Takes A Village, and on dodging
criminal inquiry. She did not participate in the formulation of a
balanced budget, nor in welfare reform legislation, nor in the
reduction of crime that stemmed from the 1994 anti-crime bill.
Her experience continued when her race for the Senate and its
aftermath became, in turn, mired in scandal. The pardon of the FALN
terrorists to get Latino support in New York, that of the New Square
Hassidim to get Hillary Jewish support, and the clemency shown toward
Hillary's brothers' clients to get them financial support caused her
ratings to plunge to their lowest level in March of 2001 as she took
her Senate seat. The theft of White House gifts, almost $200,000 of
which had to be returned, did nothing to endear her to the electorate.
Since then, Hillary has done nothing of note in the Senate except to
vote for the Iraq War, a position she has since disavowed, and to win
the applause of her colleagues for not being partisan and obstinate.
Her main efforts have been directed at raising massive sums of money
for herself and her colleagues and making a lot writing and selling
her memoirs. Her efforts on behalf of New York after 9-11 have been
exposed as largely derivative of those of her colleague, the more
effective Chuck Schumer.
She has passed no important legislation, except for twenty bills
renaming post offices and courthouses and congratulating Alexander
Hamilton, Shirley Chisolm, Harriet Tubman, the American Republic, and
the Syracuse men's and women's Lacrosse team on their respective
accomplishments.
If this the experience upon which her candidacy is based? Did I
leave anything out?
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***Copyright Eileen McGann and Dick Morris 2007***