Hillary Clinton in Hillary's Choice
On Principles & Values:
“Vast right wing conspiracy”
[On the Today show in Jan. 1998, one week into the Monica Lewinsky scandal] Mrs. Clinton said, “.the President has denied these allegations on all counts, unequivocally.... The real story here, for anybody willing to tell it and write about it and
explain it, is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president. When all this is put into context... some folks are going to have a lot to answer for.”
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p. 5 & 8
Dec 9, 1999
On Principles & Values:
Stands by her man despite “pain in marriage”
[On the Today show in Jan. 1998] Q: You said in 1992 regarding Gennifer Flowers, “I’m not some Tammy Wynette standing by my man.” In the same interview, your husband admitted that he had “caused pain in your marriage.” Six
years later you are still standing by this man. Do you think he would admit that he again has caused pain in this marriage?
A: With utter certainty, Hillary declares that she and her husband “know everything there is to know about each other.”
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p. 9
Dec 9, 1999
On Welfare & Poverty:
Community involvement helps, but only in short term
In Hillary’s Wellesley thesis, “Aspect of the War on Poverty,” she observed that, as the black community on Chicago’s South Side began to get organized, the white ethnics, who had already been activated, began to fight for the same poverty dollars.
In reality, Hillary told her thesis adviser, people rise to positions of leadership within the poor community and then clash with one another. Her adviser characterizes her conclusions: “The bottom line of her thinking was that community
action programs [a Kennedy Administration program] could have short-term effects, but to have any long-term impact on the core problems you needed to have structure,
organization, and a middle class willing to get involved. She was able to take a liberal program and analyze it pragmatically to determine whether it worked.“
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p. 67
Dec 9, 1999
On Families & Children:
Treat kids as “child citizens” not “minors” under the law
Her work with Marian Wright Edelman she now calls a “personal turning point.” Hillary spent the summer of 1970 in Washington working on behalf of poor families, some of them in migrant labor camps. Under the tutelage of Edelman, Hillary published
her first scholarly article“ Children Under the Law.” At the time, children had almost no legal rights. Hillary argued that “categorizing everyone under 18 or 21 as a minor is artificial and simplistic; it obscures the dramatic differences among children
of different ages and the striking similarities between older children and adults.“ She advocated abolishing the legal status of ”minor,“ and with it the presumption that children are legally incompetent. Instead, she argued for
a new concept of children as ”child citizens“ who should have all the procedural rights granted adults under the Constitution. This was the turning point at which Hillary declared, ”I want to be a voice for America’s children.“
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p. 86
Dec 9, 1999
On Homeland Security:
Nixon should have been impeached for bombing Cambodia
In Hillary’s opinion, Nixon was “evil.” [An office-mate during her time on the Watergate Committee] says that she believed that Nixon should be prosecuted or impeached not just over Watergate but over his conduct during the Vietnam War, specifically his
order for the secret bombing in Cambodia, which she saw as immoral and even criminal. She argued forcefully for a broader definition of the legal justification for impeachment--a position that would come back to haunt her [with Bill Clinton].
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p. 90
Dec 9, 1999
On Education:
Arkansas project: broaden experiences for children
Her pet project as Arkansas’ First Lady was educational reform, which was to grow into the signature of the entire Clinton reign. “We’ve got some really bright, talented students in this state; we’ve just got to build their self-esteem,” she said at the
time. While teaching at the state university, Hillary had been saddened by how limited the students’ experiences were. To “offer them more classes & broader exposure,” Hillary launched a summer program for gifted high school juniors.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.130-131
Dec 9, 1999
On Education:
Pushed teacher testing in Arkansas
[In 1983, while chairing a committee to improve Arkansas’ education system, then ranked 50th in the nation], Hillary snapped up the idea of higher standards for teachers which conservatives in the legislature were pushing. “Why don’t we have a test
for teachers and fire the ones that fail?” she suggested.
Hillary spearheaded a requirement for a onetime teacher examination. She pushed on to introduce a consumer rights approach to education, and he concept of continuing education for educators.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.152-153
Dec 9, 1999
On Education:
AR ed reform: mandate kindergarten, no social promotion
Hillary outlined her legislative recommendations:- mandatory full-day kindergarten
- a 20-to-1 pupil-to-teacher ratio
- testing students before they could be promoted
- more math and science units
- recommended that extracurricular activities
not interrupt the school day: “When you play, you should play hard. And when you work, you should work hard. But you shouldn’t confuse the two.”
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.153
Dec 9, 1999
On Principles & Values:
Decried 1980s materialism & excesses of corporate America
In 1987, Hillary expressed a fervent concern that corporate America was running amok and subverting bedrock American values. She cited a rogue’s gallery of corporate raiders--Ivan Boesky, Carl Icahn, and T. Boone Pickens--and bemoaned environmental
degradation caused by companies [such as at] Three Mile Island and Love Canal. Foreshadowing her later fascination with “the politics of meaning,” she talked about the excesses of yuppie materialism, hyper-individualism, and narcissism that were
overshadowing concern for the public good.
“We are experiencing a crisis of meaning and a spiritual crisis,” she said, describing “the hurt, emptiness, confusion, and loss of meaning that characterize much of our society.” She wound up laying
primary blame at the doorstep of corporate America. Its obsession with short-term profit was a major source of the subversion of democratic, family, moral, and spiritual values in America.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.173
Dec 9, 1999
On Health Care:
Health care reform is key to a “new politics of meaning”
[In 1993, in her first speech following her father’s funeral], Hillary grappled with questions raised by medical technology: When does life start? When does life end? Who makes those decisions? Moving into policy questions: How do we get rid of
regulation & bureaucracy, and substitute instead human caring, concern & love? She cast health care reform as critical to a broader search for a “new politics of meaning” in a society she said had failed to confront technological change & spiritual decay
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.234
Dec 9, 1999
On Health Care:
Universal coverage, cost containment, & managed competition
In 1993, Hillary’s Health Care Task Force was running into major obstacles. The first one was self-inflicted. Given Hillary’s penchant for secrecy, doctors were shut out of the task force’s deliberations, as were lobbyists and journalists. Behind closed
doors, Hillary began working toward her vision: universal coverage, cost containment, more primary care physicians, managed competition, and global budgeting. In effect, Hillary was attempting to reform a system larger than the entire economy of Italy.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.235
Dec 9, 1999
On Health Care:
Proposed Natl Health Board to oversee employee cooperatives
Hillary’s 1993 plan for managed competition would band employers and employees into huge cooperatives with the bargaining power to challenge the insurance industry. It would force doctors, hospitals, and insurers to form partnerships in order to
compete in offering the highest-quality health care at the lowest cost. The new competitive health marketplace would be overseen by a National Health Board.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.240-241
Dec 9, 1999
On Principles & Values:
Hillary’s choice: Co-president or White House wife?
In 1995, Hillary spoke at the dedication of Eleanor Roosevelt College. The focal point was choice: “Eleanor Roosevelt understood that every one of us every day has choices to make about the kind of person we are and what we wish to become. You can decide
to be someone who brings people together, or you can fall prey to those who wish to divide us. You can be someone who educates yourself, or you can believe that being negative is clever and being cynical is fashionable. You have a choice.”It sounded
like her own internal debate. What would be Hillary’s choice? Who to be? Hillary Rodham, co-president? Hillary Clinton, White House wife? Or Hillary Roosevelt? Her core vision of herself as a policy maker had been shaken by the outright rejection of her
health care reform plan. Hillary consoled herself with her favorite quote from ER: “To undo mistakes is always harder than not to create them, but we seldom have foresight. Therefore, we have no choice but to try to correct our past mistakes.”
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.261-262
Dec 9, 1999
On Families & Children:
No dividing line between government vs. parents & children
[While writing “It Takes a Village”, Hillary saw that] what happens between parents and children is not separate from what happens between government and governed. There is no dividing line between foreign policy and women’s and children’s issues, no
hard and soft issues. Her book was meant to encourage broad support within communities for raising a child. Hillary knew how vital it was to have teachers and mentors as a counterforce to the limitations a child might be unable to escape at home.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.272
Dec 9, 1999
On Foreign Policy:
China: criticized authoritarianism with women & children
Could the First Lady of the US go to China and criticize its government for authoritarian practices in dealing with women, children, and political activists? The very thought made traditionalists in the White House and the State Department
shudder. Her chief of staff said, “More people thought she should not go. Hillary felt strongly she should.”[At the conference], the First Lady lambasted China’s Communist government for suppressing free speech and the right
to assemble at the grassroots women’s forum [of the UN Conference]. She inspired the women there to make their voices heard against selling girls into prostitution, against rape
as a tactic of war, against forced abortion or sterilization. “Human rights are women’s rights. And women’s rights are human rights, once and for all.”
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.275-277
Dec 9, 1999
On Civil Rights:
Women’s rights are human rights
At the 1995 UN World Conference on Women, held in China:“Women comprise more than half the world’s population. Women are 70% of the world’s poor and illiterate. Much of the work we do is not valued--not by economists, not by historians,
not by popular culture, not by government leaders. We need to understand that there is not one formula for how women should lead their lives. We must respect the choices that each woman makes for herself and her family. Every woman deserves the chance
to realize her God-given potential.“The First Lady lambasted China’s Communist government for suppressing free speech and the right to assemble at the grassroots women’s forum [of the UN Conference]. She inspired the women there to make
their voices heard against selling girls into prostitution, against rape as a tactic of war, against forced abortion or sterilization. ”Human rights are women’s rights. And women’s rights are human rights, once and for all.“
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.277
Dec 9, 1999
On Families & Children:
Community support is key to valuing families
The theme of her book, [“It Takes a Village”, is] community support. She [illustrates with] a personal story: “There I was, trying to breast-feed my baby [Chelsea], and all of a sudden she starts foaming at the nose. The nurse surveyed the scene and
said, ‘Mrs. Clinton, it would help if you lifted her head up.’ All those years of education, all those degrees, it was no help. For all the talk about family values in this country, we do so little to value families.”
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.288
Dec 9, 1999
On Principles & Values:
Never left Bill because they were a team
[During the Monica scandal,] the obsessive question in the national conversation was: “Why doesn’t she leave him?” The most practical answer was that if she left him then, she would have been blamed, along with Monica, for bringing down his
presidency. Bill and Hillary Clinton were a team; this was their legacy; her self-interest did not lie in further tarnishing the record they had built together. The more pretinent question from her perspective was: How could she leave the White
House after all she’s endured to get there? Her life strategy, decided long ago, was to take the raw material of this brilliant, emotionally battered child with a good heart and a desperate ambition and shape him into a political star to which she could
hitch her wagon full of dreams for changing the world. It took Hillary to raise a president. Said a White House lawyer, “Hillary’s made a clear decision. She’s going to rise or fall with him. So she’s going to stand with him.”
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.302-303
Dec 9, 1999
On War & Peace:
Urged president to bomb Serbians
On March 21, 1999, Hillary expressed her views by phone to the President: “I urged him to bomb.” The Clintons argued the issue over the next few days. [The President expressed] what-ifs: What if bombing promoted more executions? What if it took apart the
NATO alliance? Hillary responded, “You cannot let this go on at the end of a century that has seen the major holocaust of our time. What do we have NATO for if not to defend our way of life?” The next day the President declared that force was necessary.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.345
Dec 9, 1999