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HenchPAC NewsTom Rhodes, New York
A POLL last week that put Hillary Clinton's support among New York's Jewish voters at only 54% showed how much ground she had to make up in her campaign for a Senate seat.The dispute that engulfed her yesterday over an anti-semitic remark she was alleged to have made 26 years ago is certain to impede her attempt to reach a traditional Democratic benchmark of 67%.
Clinton can be under no illusions about the importance of winning over New York's Jewish community, the largest in America. While Jewish people make up 9% of the state's population, they go to the polls in higher numbers than any other group, accounting for up to 30% of voters.
The accusation in a new book that she called one of her husband's aides a "Jew bastard" - a remark that she vehemently denies making - may shatter her hopes of opening up a clear lead over Rick Lazio, the Republican candidate, who is running neck-and-neck with her in opinion surveys.
"That a liberal Democratic candidate in New York can raise only 54% of the Jewish vote is not pretty," said Eric Alterman, a Jewish commentator. "This quote, accurate or not, is not going to help. Mrs Clinton's campaign is in a lot of trouble."
The claim that Clinton screamed abuse at the manager of her husband's unsuccessful bid for Congress in 1974 is made in State of a Union, to be published this week. Jerry Oppenheimer, the author, says that during a row at the end of the campaign in Arkansas in 1974, Clinton called Paul Fray "you f****** Jew bastard".
She describes the assertion as "an outrageous lie", saying she has worked all her life to promote tolerance. "This never happened," she said.
However, Fray's wife, Mary-Lee, stood by the account yesterday, saying: "It definitely happened."
Although a Baptist, Fray's father was Jewish. His wife said that good relations between the couples had been soured for ever after that night. "Hillary's just going to have to pay for the consequences of her actions," she said.
According to the book, Clinton's paternal grandmother was known for her vigorous antipathy towards Jews and Catholics. Her mother, Dorothy Rodham, is said to have held a life-long grudge against a Jewish family member she would regularly chastise.
The Jewish community in New York, already sceptical of Clinton because of her support for a Palestinian state, is bound to be angered by the alleged comment.
An early beneficiary could be Mark McMahon, 39, a British-educated doctor with a flourishing Manhattan practice who is expected to enter the Senate race this week as an insurgent Democratic candidate. He calls Clinton a carpetbagger.
McMahon is a strong advocate of Israel who has already gained powerful backing from the local Jewish lobby.
"She has never realised how important Israel is to so many New Yorkers," he said. "But this could be devastating."
The orthopaedic surgeon seems an unlikely opponent. A political novice who learnt most of his tactics while studying government at the London School of Economics, he placed himself on the ballot last week to contest the Democratic nomination.
His late entry to the race has provoked speculation that he may undermine her chances of defeating Lazio, 42, in November's election.
Although McMahon has little hope of unseating her in a planned primary contest in September, the ability of an unknown to rally support for his candidacy was seen as humiliating to a sleek $10m campaign that can count President Clinton as its chief adviser.
McMahon said Clinton had grandiose personal ambitions for the White House but no notion of the needs of the state's 4.9m Democrats.
"She's a carpetbagger and a dishonest one at that," said McMahon. "I'm a native New Yorker who cares deeply about the issues in this state and I don't have her litany of negative baggage."
McMahon can only benefit from the increasingly negative campaign surrounding Clinton.
"People in New York are not stupid," he said. "They understand when you say one thing and do another. That's why more than 50% of registered Democrats in this state don't think Hillary Clinton should be running here at all."
When questioned about McMahon, Clinton was non-committal: "We'll just have to wait and see what happens."
HENCH adds: Look for Hillary to drop her senate bid for ANYTHING else within the next month. They've spent nillions trying to enhance her image, and she stays right at 45% in the polls.
Ahhh. more from NewsMax...
Sunday July 16, 2000; 11:10 AM EDT
Time for Slur-Monger Hillary to Withdraw from Senate Race
Despite her denial that "this never happened," there can be absolutely no doubt that Hillary Clinton engaged in the most vile and vulgar anti-Semitic invective during a 1974 argument with campaign aides -- as well as on other occaisons.
This is not a case of "he said, she said." Five people once close to the first lady have now come forward to substantiate the charge.
Clinton campaign aide Neill McDonald now confirms to the New York Daily News that Mrs. Clinton called fellow aide Paul Fray a "F - - - king Jew Bastard" during an election night outburst following her husband's 1974 losing bid for Congress.
Both Fray and his wife Mary Lee, who also was present, have corroborated the ugly incident to both the News and the New York Post.
The revelation about Hillary's 1974 anti-Semitic outburst follows September's report by NewsMax.com on former Clinton bodyguard Larry Patterson, who was part of the Clintons' security detail from 1986 to 1993, and who says it was "quite common" even during those more recent times for Mrs. Clinton to use terms like "Jew Bastard" while angry.
And former Clinton insider Dick Morris, upon hearing Patterson's story in November, stepped forward with his own revelation; that Mrs. Clinton once attacked him with a derogatory Jewish stereotype when he asked for a pay hike. "That's all you people think about is money," Hillary told him -- or, to use Morris' word, "exploded."
With five witnesses fingering the first lady in this most outrageous and repulsive behavior, her allies have little choice but to defend against these charges by arguing that her public record betrays not a hint of anti-Semitism.
Sorry, but that won't wash -- nor should it.
Pat Buchanan, once the most formidable conservative candidate on the political horizon, was marginalized by the media, even before he bolted for the Reform Party, over his use of phrases like "Amen Corner" -- Buchanan's allusion to pro-Israeli congressmen who supported the Gulf War.
Dozens of Buchanan's colleagues stepped forward to attest that he had not an anti-Semitic bone is his body -- as Mrs. Clinton friends are now doing on her behalf.
But all the testimonials made no difference. The mainstream press went into apoplexy over Buchanan's remark, which by anyone's measure is less toxic by light years than Mrs. Clinton's "Jew Bastard" slur.
Ditto Rev. Jesse Jackson, who referred to New York City as "Hymietown" in an off-the-record comment to a Washington Post reporter in 1984. Jackson was excoriated by the press and allowed back into the the party's fold only after he delivered an abject apology to the Democratic convention that year.
House Majority leader Dick Armey's 1995 slip of the tongue -- where he referred to Rep. Barney Frank as "Barney Fag" in a TV interview -- was followed by a quick correction and an apology. But that didn't stop the New York Times from calling for his head in an editorial the next day, even though the videotape clearly showed Armey's slip was inadvertent.
The list of public figures whose careers have been ruined over offenses that don't come close to Hillary's "Jew Bastard" slur is lengthy. Ford Agriculture Secretary Earl Butz, Reagan Energy Secretary James Watt, sports commentator Jimmy the Greek, to name a few, were all forced to resign after various remarks journalists interpreted as ethnic slurs came to light.
Most recently, Altanta Braves pitcher John Rocker was so demonized by the press over an Archie Bunker-like rant against certain New York subway riders -- that he had to be assigned extra security on his next trip to the city.
Surely Rocker's comments won't win him any brotherhood awards. But nothing he said remotely approached Hillary Clinton's "Jew Bastard" tirade.
Given the obvious truthfulness of her accusers on this point, the first lady has but one option left to her.
Hillary Clinton needs to come clean about what she said, apologize to America's Jewish community -- and then announce her immediate withdrawal from New York's U.S. Senate race.
And anyone in the media who pretends she can do otherwise has forfeited his or her credentials as a responsible journalist.
AND....The B!tch tries to deny it here in an AP story....
Here's the AP story:
BETH J. HARPAZ
Associated Press Writer
CHAPPAQUA (AP) - Angry, exasperated and emotional, Hillary Rodham Clinton on Sunday firmly denied allegations from a forthcoming book that she used an anti-Semitic slur 26 years ago.
''I wanted to unequivocally state it never happened,'' the first lady said after taking the unusual step of inviting reporters to the garden of her Westchester home for a hastily scheduled press conference to discuss the controversy.
The allegation comes from a book due out this week, ''State of a Union: Inside the Complex Marriage of Bill and Hillary Clinton,'' by former National Enquirer reporter Jerry Oppenheimer.
Oppenheimer quotes Paul Fray, who worked for Bill Clinton's unsuccessful Congressional campaign in Arkansas in 1974, as claiming that Mrs. Clinton called him a ''Jew b-------'' after Bill Clinton lost the election. Fray's wife said she witnessed the incident, and a third person, Neil McDonald, claimed to have heard the obscenity as he stood outside the room.
On Sunday, the Clinton Senate campaign released copies of a handwritten letter from Paul Fray to Hillary Clinton, dated July 1, 1997, in which he states: ''I have wronged you. I ask for your forgiveness because I did say things against you, and called you names, not only to your face - but behind your back ... names that are unmentionable.''
Fray adds: ''At one time in my life, I would say things without thinking, without factual foundation ... I beg your forgiveness.''
Clinton said she was releasing the letter to show that ''there's a history of these kinds of charges coming from the people in question. They've been false in the past. They're false now.''
The Clinton campaign also released a statement from President Clinton in which he said: ''I was there on election night in 1974 and this charge is simply not true. It did not happen. My wife has stood for social justice and tolerance and against racial and religious hatred and bigotry for as long as I have known her. It's unfortunate that people would try to exploit false charges like this in an election rather than look at what she has done for her entire life.''
Mrs. Clinton characterized the controversy as ''a continuation of the politics of personal destruction that I think is so bad for our country.''
Before her news conference, the allegation had not been widely reported outside of weekend stories in the New York Post and the New York Daily News.
She indicated that her advisers had debated the best way to respond, saying: ''We had a lot of difficult conversations about it, because my policy for the last eight years has largely been just to absorb whatever insult, whatever charge, whatever accusation anybody says, and not respond because they are so outrageous and so unfair.''
Referring to the suicide of her friend Vincent Foster, she added: ''I've been accused of everything, from complicity in murder to you name it.''
But she decided to issue a full-force denial in this case to ensure that ''anyone who tries to get someone else to believe this will at least have to say, 'Well, she says it's not true.'''
Her voice filled with exhaustion and exasperation as she added: ''You're darn right it's not true. It's absolutely false. I'm just sick and tired of this kind of politics.''
A moment later, her voice broke with emotion and she appeared to be swallowing a sob as she said: ''I'm very angry. But you know, I learned a long time ago that the people who generate this kind of stuff are really hoping to divert attention from what's important in a campaign or what any of us are trying to do.''
Rep. Nita Lowey, D-Westchester, who is Jewish, stood next to Clinton during the press conference and told reporters she came to offer support because ''there's no way Hillary could make a statement like that.''
This was only the third time reporters have been invited on the Clinton property since she moved there in January.
Mrs. Clinton's Republican opponent in the New York Senate race, Rep. Rick Lazio, was repeatedly asked by reporters to speak about the controversy during two public appearances Sunday.
''I think it's best if I don't comment on it,'' he told reporters in upstate Norwich.
Oppenheimer, the author, defended his claim, telling CNN Sunday that his research also showed that ''Mrs. Clinton, who says she's never used such language, heard that kind of language while growing up.''
AP-ES-07-16-00 1810EDT
And here's the ABC story....
July 16 — An emotional Hillary Rodham Clinton today denied published
reports that she used an anti-Semitic slur in 1974.
“It’s absolutely false,” said Mrs. Clinton of the allegation, adding that
she was “very angry.”
Addressing reporters outside her home in Chappaqua this afternoon, Mrs. Clinton, her voice
shaking at times, said the reported incident “could not and did not happen,” and
that she was speaking out because she wanted people to know it was false.
According to the forthcoming book State of the Union: Inside the Complex Marriage of Bill
and Hillary Clinton, by Jerry Oppenheimer, Mrs. Clinton called Paul Fray, the manager of
President Clinton’s unsuccessful 1974 campaign for Congress, a “Jew
bastard” during a heated argument.
“I have never used ethnic, racial, anti-Semitic, bigoted, discriminatory, prejudiced
accusations against anybody,” added the first lady.
Mrs. Clinton also produced a copy of a letter sent to her by Fray, dated July 1, 1997, in
which Fray states that statements attributed to him in other books about the Clintons are
not correct.
She also said that President Clinton has “never heard me say such a thing,” and
added, “he knows I never said it.”
The press conference marked the first lady’s first public appearance since reports of
the alleged remark first surfaced on Friday. On Friday evening, Mrs. Clinton issued a
prepared statement calling the book’s account of the incident “an outrageous
lie.”
Democrats Rally Behind Hillary
The argument — which supposedly took place between Clinton, Mrs. Clinton, Fray, and
Fray’s wife Mary Lee — has been recounted previously in books about the
Clintons, but none of them have included the detail about the alleged slur.
The story was picked up in the New York newspapers over the weekend. Today’s New York
Daily News reports that in addition to Paul and Mary Lee Fray, Neill McDonald, a campaign
staffer in 1974 who overheard the argument, has confirmed that Mrs. Clinton made the
remark, although McDonald said it only came “in the heat of battle.”
At her press conference this afternoon, however, Mrs. Clinton said she does not even
remember McDonald. New York Democrats have quickly stepped forward in defense of the first
lady.
“I’ve known Hillary Clinton for eight years, and she doesn’t have an
anti-Semitic bone in her body,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer in a prepared statement.
A spokesman for Mrs. Clinton’s Republican opponent, Rep. Rick Lazio, declined to
address the matter.
“I don’t think we’re going to have any comment,” said Lazio’s
campaign spokesmen, Dan McLagan.
First Lady Needs Jewish Support
The allegation has come as Mrs. Clinton has struggled to maintain the high level of
support among the Jewish community usually held by New York Democrats.
Answering questions after giving a campaign speech Thursday, Mrs. Clinton again found
herself needing to explain why she did not immediately denounce inflammatory remarks made
by Suha Arafat, the wife of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, while visiting to the West
Bank last fall.
Mrs. Arafat claimed that Israel had used toxic gas to poison Palestinian women and
children. Mrs. Clinton has said repeatedly that she did not respond immediately in order
to avoid causing an international incident.
Explaining why she embraced Mrs. Arafat, the first lady also said Thursday that “a
kiss is a handshake” in the Middle East, and added that she is a “strong
supporter” of Israel.
Jewish voters make up from 10 to 15 percent of New York’s electorate.
AND IT JUST WON'T GO AWAY!.....
First Lady Hillary Clinton claimed to reporters gathered at her Chappaqua, New York home on Sunday that she never called a former campaign aide a "F - - king Jew Bastard."
"I have in the past certainly, maybe, called somebody a name. But I have never used ethnic, racial, anti-Semitic, bigoted, discriminatory or prejudiced accusations against anybody."
"I've never thought it," Mrs. Clinton added.
Oh really?
Leaving aside the accounts of five sources who say that Mrs. Clinton has indeed indulged in some very ugly anti-Jewish rhetoric in private over the years, whatever was she thinking when she used an anti-Italian slur against then-Senate candidate Al D'Amato in 1998?
"As a final testament to Hillary's chances, consider former U.S. Senator Alfonse D'Amato who, after a bruising year investigating the Clintons, was on the comeback trail in New York until he ran smack into Hillary," reported Barbara Olson in her best selling Hillary bio Hell to Pay. "She raised more than a million dollars for his victorious opponent and publicly ridiculed him as 'Senator Tomato.'"
Senator Tomato? Does anyone suspect this was anything other than a reference to D'Amato's Italian heritage?
The president himself weighed in Sunday night as a character witness for his Mrs. "In 29 years my wife has never uttered an ethnic or racial slur against anybody, ever. She's so straight on this she squeaks."
Well, well. She sure didn't squeak too loudly when her husband was caught on Gennifer Flowers' audiotapes slurring Governor Mario Cuomo.
"Boy, he is so aggresive," Clinton said of Cuomo, who at the time was his chief rival for the 1992 Democratic presidential nomination.
"Well, he seems like he could get real mean.... I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't have some mafioso major connections," responded Flowers.
Clinton's rejoinder? "Well, he acts like one."
For someone who professes a zero tolerance for even so much as a bigoted thought, Mrs. Clinton was strangely silent when her husband was caught on tape slurring America's most prominent Italian-American politican.
Hillary has also stayed silent lo these many years about this choice quote, captured on videotape when Arkansas state police had her brother-in-law Roger Clinton under surveillance for dealing cocaine in 1984:
"Some junior high n----r kicked Steve's ass while he was trying to help his brothers out; junior high or sophomore in high school. Whatever it was, Steve had the n----r down. However it was, it was Steve's fault. He had the n----r down, he let him up. The n----r blindsided him."
Former Clinton bodyguard Larry Patterson not only confirms Hillary's regular use of the epithet "Jew Bastard," but revealed last year that he heard Bill Clinton use the "N" word to refer to both Jesse Jackson and local Little Rock black leader Robert "Say" McIntosh.
And since he guarded the Clintons from 1986 to 1993, the vintage of Patterson's observations is much more recent than the 1974 charges the press has thus far focused on.
Longtime Clinton paramour Dolly Kyle Browning corroborates Patterson on Clinton's use of the "N" word. "Not only did he use the 'N' word, he called him a 'GDN,' if you catch my drift," Browning told Fox News last year.
So does former Clinton bodyguard L.D. Brown, who guarded the first family from 1982 to 1985 and who told NewsMax.com on Monday that Clinton would use derogatory terms for blacks behind their backs. (Brown did say he never heard Hillary slur Jews.)
Why do all these charges of bigoted language swirl around both Clintons? Is it because their eyewitness accusers -- Paul and Mary Lee Fray, Neill McDonald, Larry Patterson, L.D. Brown, Dolly Kyle Browning and Dick Morris -- all banded together in a "vast right wing conspiracy" to tarnish the Clintons' image for racial tolerance?
Can all these disparate people really be lying, while Bill and Hillary alone are telling the truth?
AND...(Oh my GOD, does this story have legs, or in Hillary's case, stumps!)
Surprise! You will not find in the following few hundred words a particular assertion on exactly what Hillary Rodham Clinton said a quarter century ago. I wasn't there; I'm reserving judgment. However, the Clinton reaction to the allegation that, in 1974, she called a campaign aide a "f---ing Jew bastard" is remarkably reminiscent of various scandals past.
Based on previous experience, it's pretty certain that the young Hillary probably lost it and started hurling profanity — to say nothing of a handy lampshade or two. Hillary has a temper — that's known. In fact, the recently-completed Travelgate scandal had its beginnings in the White House staff's fear that there would be "Hell to pay" if the First Lady's wishes were ignored. So Hillary's statement that the whole incident "never" happened sort of falls on its face. You know you're in serious trouble when the president's explanation — that the blow-up occurred, but there was no slur uttered — is more credible than your own.But, generally speaking, this incident has all the earmarks of a classic Clinton damage-control operation. Let's go down the line and see if anything seems familiar.
First, deny the accusation/slam the accuser. Hillary says the event never occurred. Furthermore, her campaign dismisses the source: Jerry Oppenheimer, author of the book, State of a Union, which reports the anecdote, is a National Enquirer writer. This information is spread by her camp, immediately trying to undermine the validity of the book.
Second, release "exculpatory" material, regardless of the legality of doing so. Hillary's campaign produced a letter from Paul Fray, apparently sent to Mrs. Clinton in 1997. The letter said, "I have wronged you. I ask for your forgiveness because I did say things against you, and called you names, not only to your face — but behind your back ... names that are unmentionable."
If this tactic seems familiar, it's because it sounds somewhat similar to the Kathleen Willey precedent. Willey announced on 60 Minutes that Bill Clinton had groped her in the Oval Office. Less than 24 hours later, the White House produced letters from Willey to the President that had been written after the groping incident. Willey signed the letters "fondly." Her credibility was immediately undermined. Of course, Willey may have had the last laugh — as the White House was found in violation of the Privacy Act earlier this year for releasing the Willey letters (which had been sent privately to Bill Clinton).
The question now is, if Fray had sent the letter to Hillary Clinton as a private citizen — but to the White House — did Hillary have the right to turn this letter over to her campaign for subsequent release to the media? Regardless, does this letter necessarily contradict the 1974 allegation? Perhaps not, but it creates enough doubt.
Third, bring in the reinforcements to provide cover. Charles Schumer and Ed Koch immediately ran out to vouch that Hillary is not an anti-Semite. Even poor Nita Lowey — whose own Senate ambitions were kicked to the side in deference to the Arkansas/Illinois/D.C. transplant — was brought in to help out. But one thing the Clintons are learning: New York City is not Arkansas or D.C. The b.s. detectors are far stronger here. City Councilman Dov Hikind, who represents a heavily Jewish Brooklyn neighborhood, was having none of it. He immediately linked this story with the Suha Arafat story — which Hillary herself resurfaced just last week. She tried to re-explain why it took her days to say anything after Mrs. Arafat accused the Israeli Jews of intentionally poisoning Palestinian children. Hikind sounded like he thought the slur allegation was true.
Fourth, damage control takes priority over everything else. One would think that, after demanding that both Yasser Arafat and Ehud Barak come to Washington for a peace summit, nothing would be more important than seeing the negotiations to a successful goal. That would make sense. Yet, Bill Clinton apparently found enough time to call the New York Daily News twice this weekend — once to News publisher and chairman Mort Zuckerman — to vouch for his wife. It seems clear what has the highest priority in the president's mind.
The Clinton damage-control machine may yet extricate Hillary from this public-relations nightmare. However, the full-court press underscores how weak her candidacy truly is. The most recent Quinnipiac University poll showed her getting 54 percent of the Jewish vote against Rick Lazio. While that is one of the few groups with whom she is polling above 50 percent, it is still appallingly low; Democrat Chuck Schumer got 75 percent against Alfonse D'Amato, and Bill Clinton got 80 percent in his 1996 re-election. That she was barely getting half of the Jewish vote in overwhelmingly Democratic New York state — before this latest episode underscores exactly how precarious her position is.
7-20-00 MORE! The Saga Continues:
WHOOPS!
An e-mail message from an aide to Hillary Rodham Clinton urged supporters of her New York Senate campaign to call reporters for two Jewish newspapers to "let them know that you know Hillary and know she would never make" an antisemitic remark like the one that a new book accuses her of making 26 years ago.
"It is important that you do not say that you [are] calling because the campaign asked you to, but because you are outraged with what was said about her," said the message, which was addressed to "Jewish Advisory Group," with the subject line, "Rapid Response to charges of Anti-Semitism."
The campaign of Clinton's opponent, Rep. Rick Lazio (R-N.Y.), pounced. Dan McLagan, Lazio's communications director, said, "I think it's shocking and sad that Mrs. Clinton would ask her supporters to lie for her."
"Hillary Clinton said yesterday that she's clamming up about the anti-Semitic slur she allegedly uttered 26 years ago: "I've said all I'm going to say about this." Somehow we doubt it - though time will tell. Anyway, she's got people to do her talking for her.
Yesterday, Clinton campaign staffers committed to paper, and then faxed around town, a solicitation to dissemble on behalf of the first lady. In more formal circumstances, the memo might be termed subornation of perjury.
The memo urged members of the campaign's "Jewish Advisory Group" to call reporters at Jewish newspapers and "let them know that you know Hillary and you know that she would never make these kinds of anti-Semitic or racist comments. "Attached are Talking Points on this issue" - presumably to guide those who don't "know Hillary" as well as they might let on.
This is the sort of stuff not normally committed to paper, let alone faxed
around a town like New York. Clearly, the memo is the work of amateurs - albeit malign
amateurs:
"I would appreciate it if you would call these people as concerned citizens,"
wrote campaign aide Karen Adler. "It is important that you do not say that you [are]
calling because the [Hillary] campaign asked you to, but because you are outraged with
what was said about her." Spontaneity can seem so genuine, don't you know.
The memo bore the fax stamp "HRC for Senate, Inc.," so it will be tough for the campaign to fib its way out of responsibility for it. So look for the blame to be assigned to overanxious, very junior staff members.
The fact is, though, that it fits Clinton patterns and practices going way back. The first couple dissembles instinctively - and you know what? After all these years, they still aren't very good at it."
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