NYT on How Hillary “Grappled” with Bill Clinton’s Infidelities: Destroy the Accusers
The New York Times Sunday headline reads: “How Hillary Clinton Grappled With Bill Clinton’s Infidelity, and His Accusers.” But if you read the article, it turns out that “grappling” with this uncomfortable topic meant “trying to destroy the accusers.”
Confronting a spouse’s unfaithfulness is painful under any circumstance. For Mrs. Clinton, it happened repeatedly and in the most public of ways, unfolding at the dawn of the 24/7 news cycle, and later in impeachment proceedings that convulsed the nation.
Outwardly, she remained stoic and defiant, defending her husband while a progression of women and well-funded conservative operatives accused Mr. Clinton of behavior unbecoming the leader of the free world.
But privately, she embraced the Clinton campaign’s aggressive strategy of counterattack: Women who claimed to have had sexual encounters with Mr. Clinton would become targets of digging and discrediting — tactics that women’s rights advocates frequently denounce.
The campaign hired a private investigator with a bare-knuckles reputation who embarked on a mission, as he put it in a memo, to impugn Ms. Flowers’s “character and veracity until she is destroyed beyond all recognition.”
A campaign aide said that Hillary Clinton participated in the decision to hire Jack Palladino, “a private investigator known for tactics such as making surreptitious recordings and deploying attractive women to extract information”:
An aide to the campaign, who declined to be publicly identified because the aide had not been authorized to speak for the Clintons, said Mrs. Clinton was among those who had discussed and approved the hiring, which shifted the campaign to a more aggressive posture.
. . . .
“Every acquaintance, employer, and past lover should be located and interviewed,” Mr. Palladino wrote. “She is now a shining icon — telling lies that so far have proved all benefit and no cost — for any other opportunist who may be considering making Clinton a target.”
Challenge Bill and this is what will happen to you. Nasty stuff, and Hillary was fully on board. And it wasn’t just Gennifer Flowers whom she helped to attack:
[T]heir first taste of trouble came in a Penthouse magazine story by a rock groupie named Connie Hamzy, who claimed Mr. Clinton had once propositioned her at a hotel in Little Rock, Ark.
Mr. Clinton brushed off the story, saying that Ms. Hamzy had made a sexual advance toward him, George Stephanopoulos, the communications director of the 1992 campaign, recalled in his book, “All Too Human.”
But Mrs. Clinton demanded action.
“We have to destroy her story,” she said, according to Mr. Stephanopoulos.
There’s much more they could have delved into. If Donald Trump’s tax returns from 1995 are news in 2016 — and they are — then certainly Hillary Clinton’s treatment of her husband’s accusers in the late 90s is relevant too.
[Cross posted at RedState.]
Greenfield:
DNF (ffe548) — 10/3/2016 @ 9:48 amThe Left’s riposte to Bubba’s rapes, “Bill isn’t the candidate!”
Oh, but his enabling Harpy sought to dispatch the wounded. That is Ok?
DNF (ffe548) — 10/3/2016 @ 9:51 ambut through it all she was loyal to Bill
she loved him and refused to take anyone else into her bed
by God she was HIS woman, whatever his flaws
happyfeet (28a91b) — 10/3/2016 @ 9:52 amThe MSM is awash with stories claiming Trump had the worst campaign week evah.
Notes on JEF’s week absent:
DNF (ffe548) — 10/3/2016 @ 9:58 amDC:
DNF (ffe548) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:02 amMiscellany:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-3774157/Welcome-granite-town-bizarre-65ft-tall-rock-formations-just-discovered-Siberia-haven-t-reviewed-TripAdvisor-yet.html
DNF (ffe548) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:05 amThat will cost her.
DNF (ffe548) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:09 amIf she lives that long.
https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1fUO-pWZFzs/V9X9iJqCZBI/AAAAAAABB-g/lE7Wn4l8GfYIHObc9g-UM2Tn6PyfkAqNwCLcB/s640/1%2B11ninetymiles2iRLG1qzm7u9o1_540.jpg
Rev. Hoagie® (785e38) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:12 amWhat a waste, yowza!
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:13 amYou guys are the lawyers but can one be pardoned for crimes they have not yet been found guilty of?
Rev. Hoagie® (785e38) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:13 amLooks like the Wikileaks docodrop is back on, announcement due tomorrow:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-10-03/october-surprise-back-wikileaks-assange-confirms-tuesday-video-appearance
DNF (ffe548) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:14 amHappy Feet has been smokin’ the wacky tabaky again–loved him and refused to take anyone else into her bed. Well maybe in Dream Land. Billy Jeff has been quoted as saying that Hillary has eaten more p@ssie than he has.
There’s mud on Princess Pan Suit.
Skeptical Voter (1d5c8b) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:17 amSorry–make that mud on Prevaricating Princess Pantsuit.
Skeptical Voter (1d5c8b) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:18 am@Rev Hoagie:You guys are the lawyers but can one be pardoned for crimes they have not yet been found guilty of?
I don’t know what it means legally, but Ford pardoned Nixon and Nixon of course was never convicted of anything.
Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:32 amYou know, if H actually had Assange knocked off before his big announcement, I would actually have a shred of respect for her.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:40 amYes. Or even accused of. Clean slate. But only federal crimes and it does not apply to impeachment. A pardoned criminal can still be impeached.
nk (dbc370) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:44 am@nk:A pardoned criminal can still be impeached.
Right, impeachment is a political process. What you can be impeached for is fundamentally up to Congress.
Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:49 amWhat really got me mad during the Clinton hearings was the leadership of the National Organization of Woman coming out en masse in support of Clinton. They should have changed their name to the National Organization of Liberal Women or, maybe, the National Organization to Protect to Protect men that rape and Abuse Women.
Michael Keohane (947544) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:54 am“The President, Vice President, and all civil Officers of the United States shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other High Crimes and Misdemeanors.”
So the substantive offense is not up to Congress although the procedure is.
The standard for judges is different — “good behavior”. The first judge to be impeached drank too much and used profanity on the bench.
nk (dbc370) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:55 am@nk:High Crimes and Misdemeanors.
Yes, so, what are those exactly? Andrew Johnson was impeached for the Tenure of Office Act so I think that Congress DOES get to decide what offenses are ground for impeachment. Johnson had not committed any sort of a crime.
“Because the Tenure of Office Act did permit the President to suspend such officials when Congress was out of session, when Johnson failed to obtain Stanton’s resignation he instead suspended Stanton on August 5, 1867, which gave him the opportunity to appoint General Ulysses S. Grant, then serving as Commanding General of the Army, Secretary of War ad interim. Johnson and Grant would later disagree on an understanding between the two of them. If the Senate later failed to concur with Johnson’s removal of Stanton, the President claimed that Grant agreed to either remain in office or pre-notify Johnson that he would resign so that Johnson could replace him. Johnson’s purpose was to create a court case to test the constitutionality of the Tenure Act. Grant later claimed there was no such agreement.
On January 7, 1868, the Senate passed a resolution (35-to-6) of non-concurrence with Stanton’s dismissal. Grant wrote his resignation letter that same day and vacated the office, but did not notify Johnson. Consequently, Stanton re-occupied the office of the Secretary of War. At a cabinet meeting the following day, Grant made stammering, unintelligible excuses for failing to pre-notify Johnson. Believing the Tenure of Office Act unconstitutional, Johnson ignored the Senate’s reinstatement of Stanton until, on January 28, he offered the post to Lorenzo Thomas, who first turned it down, saying that he would like to stay in office as Adjutant General until his retirement. (The President originally wanted the position for General William Tecumseh Sherman, who was an enemy of Stanton’s, but Sherman turned the President down saying he hated politics). Johnson later convinced Thomas to help him make a test case, however, and on February 21, 1868, the President appointed Lorenzo Thomas Secretary of War and ordered the removal of Stanton from office. Thomas personally delivered the President’s dismissal notice to Stanton, but the Secretary refused to accept its legitimacy or to vacate the premises. Instead, Stanton had barricaded himself in his office and ordered Thomas arrested for violating the Tenure of Office Act.
Thomas asked if he could be brought to the White House to let the president know that he had been placed under arrest. When Stanton realized, however, that the arrest would allow the courts to review the law, he had the charges dropped. Stanton then claimed that Johnson had broken the recently instituted Tenure of Office Act by removing a Cabinet member without Senate approval.”
Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:06 amMalfeasance of office.
nk (dbc370) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:09 amIt use to be a crime. Along with misfeasance and nonfesance. “Mal, mis, and non” for short.
nk (dbc370) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:10 amSince 1386, the English parliament had used the term “high crimes and misdemeanors” to describe one of the grounds to impeach officials of the crown. Officials accused of “high crimes and misdemeanors” were accused of offenses as varied as misappropriating government funds, appointing unfit subordinates, not prosecuting cases, not spending money allocated by Parliament, promoting themselves ahead of more deserving candidates, threatening a grand jury, disobeying an order from Parliament, arresting a man to keep him from running for Parliament, losing a ship by neglecting to moor it, helping “suppress petitions to the King to call a Parliament,” granting warrants without cause, and bribery. Some of these charges were crimes. Others were not. The one common denominator in all these accusations was that the official had somehow abused the power of his office and was unfit to serve.
Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:11 amClinton was perjury. What was Nixon? Obstruction of justice?
nk (dbc370) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:11 amWith the Trump nomination, I don’t understand how conservatives could ever claim credibility on any political matter ever again. I don’t know what conservatives were like a generation ago, but ever since you let the religious fanatics take over you’ve been utterly useless. If it weren’t for drooling conservatives just giving blank checks to the exact same conmen over and over again, we’d be in a golden age.
This dude that clearly wants to bang his own daughter gets the family values crowd? How can anything they say ever be taken seriously again?
Levi (4bdee5) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:13 am@nk: Quickly looking up mal-, mis-, and non-feasance it appears that these do not necessarily involve actual crimes and not necessarily punished as crimes.
Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:15 amOh for f*ck’s sake. This is like a biblical plague of trolls.
Leviticus (9d0fa2) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:16 am@nk:Clinton was perjury. What was Nixon? Obstruction of justice?
When you ask me that question, I’m just going to use the Google to answer it–you could use the Google yourself if you want to know.
In his conduct of the office of President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his consitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has prevented, obstructed, and impeded the administration of justice, in that:
On June 17, 1972, and prior thereto, agents of the Committee for the Re-election of the President committed unlawful entry of the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in Washington, District of Columbia, for the purpose of securing political intelligence. Subsequent thereto, Richard M. Nixon, using the powers of his high office, engaged personally and through his close subordinates and agents, in a course of conduct or plan designed to delay, impede, and obstruct the investigation of such illegal entry; to cover up, conceal and protect those responsible; and to conceal the existence and scope of other unlawful covert activities.
Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:16 amThey call it Abuse of Office in Texas (that was what Perry was indicted for).
nk (dbc370) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:17 amBest comment of the day so far, Leviticus.
Rev. Hoagie® (785e38) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:23 am@nk: Justice Story on impeachment (1833) for context. It seems to be another of those cases when in 1789 everyone was on the same page and no one felt it necessary to spell it out. He explicitly says impeachment is not only for crimes but for wrongdoing that cannot be defined as crimes, which would seem to leave it Congress.
Not but that crimes of a strictly legal character fall within the scope of the power; but that it has a more enlarged operation, and reaches, what are aptly termed political offenses, growing out of personal misconduct or gross neglect, or usurpation, or habitual disregard of the public interests, various in their character, and so indefinable in their actual involutions, that it is almost impossible to provide systematically for them by positive law They must be examined upon very broad and comprehensive principles of public policy and duty. They must be judged of by the habits and rules and principles of diplomacy, or departmental operations and arrangements, of parliamentary practice, of executive customs and negotiations of foreign as well as domestic political movements; and in short, by a great variety of circumstances, as well those which aggravate as those which extenuate or justify the offensive acts which do not properly belong to the judicial character in the ordinary administration of justice, and are far removed from the reach of municipal jurisprudence.
Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:24 amFocusing back on Hillary, the House could impeach her for a number of things she did as SecState. The probability of conviction by the Senate is however low enough to make it nothing more than a fruitless gesture. Like all the times the House voted to kill Obamacare while knowing the bill would go nowhere in the Senate.
Kishnevi (4a5f25) — 10/3/2016 @ 11:34 amyeah like gormless romney buttboy paul ryan is gonna impeach a pickle much less an honest to god stinkypig
happyfeet (28a91b) — 10/3/2016 @ 12:02 pmMaudie “grappled”…???
Oh my. What could that ‘imply?’
Use Trapperism: Panic? Rock climbing? Strap-ons?
“Everything is jake.” – ‘The Sting,’ – 1973
__________
If Donald Trump’s tax returns from 1995 are news in 2016 — and they are…
In fact, they’re not. Especially as they’re legal.
Who stole them and tossed them over the transom of the NYT’s dinghy; that’s the news here– and is illegal.
‘All the news that’s fit to print’ ?? – New York Times TM’d ‘credo’
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/3/2016 @ 12:59 pmthis campaign, and how the top men behaved shaped my perspective on the current events,
http://www.weaselzippers.us/298958-obama-sees-straight-line-from-sarah-palins-vp-announcement-to-rise-of-trump/
narciso (d1f714) — 10/3/2016 @ 2:39 pm‘Obama-sees-straight-line….’
Is it red or sandy?
‘What’s My Line?’ CBS TV 1950-1967
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/3/2016 @ 3:10 pmFrom the rumors I’ve heard, Barack hasn’t always seen things straight.
Cruz Supporter (102c9a) — 10/3/2016 @ 3:47 pmI don’t know about that, but he does have a deeply misogynist streak, which I think he picked up from Frank Marshall Davis, a mentor,
narciso (d1f714) — 10/3/2016 @ 3:55 pmnarciso, do some Googling of Frank Marshall Davis. There’s a lot of … rumors.
Cruz Supporter (102c9a) — 10/3/2016 @ 4:04 pmI understand that, but I think his stalinism and misogyny outranks the other part,
narciso (d1f714) — 10/3/2016 @ 4:05 pm35) the nastier part of the campaign were the rumors conjured out by the nutroot hatchery up there, that robert mccain uncovered, and the inkind contribution by larry flynt, she served as a cassandra, in that instance, and for a subsequent time, but I think the collateral damage she incurred, discouraged her from longterm projects,
narciso (d1f714) — 10/3/2016 @ 4:09 pmnarciso, oh, of course. Those things are much more important. I actually don’t care about the rumors. At the end of the day, that stuff doesn’t hurt anyone. But sympathies for Stalin and the PLO and so forth DO have terrible consequences.
Cruz Supporter (102c9a) — 10/3/2016 @ 4:10 pm38.I don’t know about that, but he does have a deeply misogynist streak, which I think he picked up from Frank Marshall Davis…
More likely Hugh Hefner.
“Here Comes Peter Cottontail” by Rollins/Nelson, 1949, popularized, 1950 by Gene Autry
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/3/2016 @ 5:42 pmI stick to the plausible and provable, with all candidates, he had a strong arabist inclination, which maybe have been encouraged through that lear flying prince, through khalidi, a frequent dinner guest, and other curious folk,
narciso (d1f714) — 10/3/2016 @ 5:45 pm31. RE: grounds for impeachment.
I once worded it.
I think I had it as:
It’s got to be wrong, it’s got to be generally recognized as wrong, it’s got to be serious.
Something like that. It’s value judgement. It doesn’t have anything to do with the criminal code, and some of these things would not be crimes.
they got into this criminal business at the time of the Nixon impeachment deliberations. Nixon qwas saying it had to be a crime, and taht a prewsident needed to be removed from office before he culd be prosecuted.
Which is not true.
It would be interesting to contemplate what would happen if Hillary Clinton is indicted between the election and the inauguration.
Her lawyers would go into court to dismiss the indictment on procedural grounds.
Sammy Finkelman (643dcd) — 10/5/2016 @ 11:16 amRev. Hoagie® (785e38) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:13 am
Nixon was. I didn’t quite like that. you’d want at least an indictment.
Sammy Finkelman (643dcd) — 10/5/2016 @ 11:19 amThe point of the article was this:
It was written to clear Hillary Clinton of the accusation of being in charge of countering bimbo eruptions, as Bill Clinton’s people had leaked twenty years ago or so. (I never believed it)
Now it was not. So Trump can’t say it, or fact checkers will point to this New York Times article.
That was Betsey Wright in 1987! That was James Carville in 1992! Not Hillary.
Sammy Finkelman (643dcd) — 10/5/2016 @ 11:25 am