Ed Wood "The Right Stuff" Published June 18, 2003

I have a question for Sen. Clinton


What did she know, and when did she know it?

That seems to be the central question surrounding Hillary's new book, Living History. Have I read her book? No. But like most of you, I have read the "juicier" excerpts as leaked by AP and Time magazine. Am I going to read her book? At $28 per copy, probably not. But publishers Simon and Schuster have to recover their $8.5 million somehow.

But Hillary does finally answer the question we have all been waiting for. "What did she know, and when did she know it?" She says she didn't know Bill was having an affair with Monica until two days before he told the truth - well, sort of - to the federal grand jury on Aug. 14.

Now that's strange. I had known about Monica for months. You had known about Monica for months. So we are to believe that everybody with a TV set knew about Monica, except Hillary.

Well, I guess that's the way it is. The wife is always the last to know. I would have thought that Hillary, reported to be the smartest woman in the whole world, must have at least seen a few indications that Ol' Bill might be straying just a bit. Indications like the testimonies of Paula Jones, Kathleen Willy, Gennifer Flowers, Juanita Broaddrick, et al. And she must have had some suspicions when she organized the "bimbo eruption" patrol during the presidential campaign to shut up as many of Bill's female acquaintances as possible. But, as they say, love is blind.

In other interesting tidbits, she said her forgiveness of Bill was inspired by Nelson Mandella's forgiveness of his white jailers. But even Nelson didn't forgive his wife, Winnie. He kicked her out!

In her interview with friend Barbara Walters, Clinton said the impeachment hearings of her husband had been her "most difficult days." But in previous interviews she had used these same words to describe the Lewinski affair, the Paula Jones mess, the Gennifer Flowers tapes, and her health care fiasco. Bless her heart; she must have had a lot of "difficult days."

But she did redeem herself by saying that through all her trials and tribulations, even the attacks she and Bill had suffered at the hands of the "vast right-wing conspiracy," the thing that has "broken my heart" is the mess George W. Bush has made of the very same economy the Clinton administration "turned around" and got back on track.

Obviously a true romantic, clear to the end. But the one word Hillary left out of all her interviews, and perhaps her book as well, is "love."

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Ed Wood is a resident of Sparta, TN. His column is published each Wednesday in the Crossville Chronicle. He can be contacted at edwd@blomand.net