THE MEANING OF ‘HILLARY!'
Tuesday,November 7,2000
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CAN we all agree on two simple propositions?
First: Hillary would not have moved to New York state if there were no Senate vacancy here.
Second: Hillary would not be running for the Senate if her husband were not the president.
No matter for whom one plans to vote, it seems to me that these simple statements are self-evident.
Hillary would have moved to the moon if there were a Senate seat to be had there. She chose New York because its atmosphere is friendly to liberals, Democrats and women.
Her choices were somewhat limited. She could have moved to Florida, Nebraska, Nevada or a handful of other states with vacant Senate seats - none is particularly hospitable to a Clinton. Still, that she chose New York has nothing whatever to do with New York. It has only to do with the fact that Pat Moynihan chose this year to retire.
There is no earthly way that a woman from Arkansas who never held public office before and had no exalted private credential could have moved to New York, won the Democratic nomination without a significant primary and had a shot at winning a seat in the Senate unless her husband was the president.
These two propositions make it clear just how fraudulent Hillary's candidacy is.
One cannot simply allocate to her all that her husband has done. In my time at the White House, Hillary played no significant role in any domestic or international policy decision of which I was aware. Her credentials are as derivative as her last name.
Indeed, she is running on a name that is not her own, citing a record that she didn't earn, in a state about which she could care less.
Equally phony is her supposed commitment to the nation of Israel. The clear fact is that if Hillary were not seeking office in a state with a lot of Jews, she would be no more committed to Israel than to India, Pakistan or Australia. It would be just another nation to her.
In the first two years of the Clinton administration, Hillary made a serious effort to acquire independent credentials she might cite in the future when she struck out on her own in politics. She briefly considered serving as chief of staff, attorney general or secretary of education, but learned that an anti-nepotism law precluded such appointments.
So she decided to carve out health care as her field of focus. But when her efforts in this area led to catastrophe, she retreated behind the pink curtain of the first lady's office, never again to emerge. She had little policy role and confined herself to making speeches and working with ghostwriters on her book.
Indeed, Hillary's only real role in the Clinton White House after the failure of health-care reform was her stewardship of scandal defense. Unquestionably, it was Hillary Rodham Clinton who ran the impeachment defense and orchestrated the attacks on the women who had implicated her husband.
Now she runs for Senate for only one reason: She wants to be president. From the beginning, the subtext of the Clinton political operation was clear: She will follow him, just as the Kennedy brothers were to follow one another in order of seniority. She sought her husband's election to facilitate her own career and she runs for the Senate to lay the basis for a presidential run.
But all Clintons are not created equal. He is a genius. Her intellect is ordinary. He is creative. Her next original idea will be her first one. He has an empathy with people. She has learned about their problems in a book. He brings passion to his work. She brings only ambition and a rote memorized advocacy and a school marm's preaching.
Does she have the credentials for service in the Senate? Has she ever done anything on her own? Does she have the qualifications apart from arrogation of her husband's record? Do we really want to set her on her way to the White House?
These are the questions for New Yorkers to ponder.
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Tuesday,November 7,2000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CAN we all agree on two simple propositions?
First: Hillary would not have moved to New York state if there were no Senate vacancy here.
Second: Hillary would not be running for the Senate if her husband were not the president.
No matter for whom one plans to vote, it seems to me that these simple statements are self-evident.
Hillary would have moved to the moon if there were a Senate seat to be had there. She chose New York because its atmosphere is friendly to liberals, Democrats and women.
Her choices were somewhat limited. She could have moved to Florida, Nebraska, Nevada or a handful of other states with vacant Senate seats - none is particularly hospitable to a Clinton. Still, that she chose New York has nothing whatever to do with New York. It has only to do with the fact that Pat Moynihan chose this year to retire.
There is no earthly way that a woman from Arkansas who never held public office before and had no exalted private credential could have moved to New York, won the Democratic nomination without a significant primary and had a shot at winning a seat in the Senate unless her husband was the president.
These two propositions make it clear just how fraudulent Hillary's candidacy is.
One cannot simply allocate to her all that her husband has done. In my time at the White House, Hillary played no significant role in any domestic or international policy decision of which I was aware. Her credentials are as derivative as her last name.
Indeed, she is running on a name that is not her own, citing a record that she didn't earn, in a state about which she could care less.
Equally phony is her supposed commitment to the nation of Israel. The clear fact is that if Hillary were not seeking office in a state with a lot of Jews, she would be no more committed to Israel than to India, Pakistan or Australia. It would be just another nation to her.
In the first two years of the Clinton administration, Hillary made a serious effort to acquire independent credentials she might cite in the future when she struck out on her own in politics. She briefly considered serving as chief of staff, attorney general or secretary of education, but learned that an anti-nepotism law precluded such appointments.
So she decided to carve out health care as her field of focus. But when her efforts in this area led to catastrophe, she retreated behind the pink curtain of the first lady's office, never again to emerge. She had little policy role and confined herself to making speeches and working with ghostwriters on her book.
Indeed, Hillary's only real role in the Clinton White House after the failure of health-care reform was her stewardship of scandal defense. Unquestionably, it was Hillary Rodham Clinton who ran the impeachment defense and orchestrated the attacks on the women who had implicated her husband.
Now she runs for Senate for only one reason: She wants to be president. From the beginning, the subtext of the Clinton political operation was clear: She will follow him, just as the Kennedy brothers were to follow one another in order of seniority. She sought her husband's election to facilitate her own career and she runs for the Senate to lay the basis for a presidential run.
But all Clintons are not created equal. He is a genius. Her intellect is ordinary. He is creative. Her next original idea will be her first one. He has an empathy with people. She has learned about their problems in a book. He brings passion to his work. She brings only ambition and a rote memorized advocacy and a school marm's preaching.
Does she have the credentials for service in the Senate? Has she ever done anything on her own? Does she have the qualifications apart from arrogation of her husband's record? Do we really want to set her on her way to the White House?
These are the questions for New Yorkers to ponder.
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