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Carl Bernstein: Hillary’s Politics from 1968 to 2008

By Jon Wiener, Truthdig. Posted August 22, 2007.


A conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein on Hillary Clinton's journey from Republican to radical to White House hopeful.

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The Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post reporter on Watergate has recently published "A Woman in Charge," a biography of Hillary Clinton, for which he interviewed almost 100 of her friends and enemies. Carl Bernstein spoke recently with Truthdig's Jon Wiener about the first former first lady to make a bid for the presidency.

Jon Wiener: When Hillary arrived at Wellesley as a freshman in 1965, she was a Goldwater Republican. What happened then?

Carl Bernstein: Like many rather sheltered Midwestern kids who came of age in the '60s, 1968 was especially significant for her: that was the year of the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, and the escalation of the war. Hillary moved from being a Goldwater Republican to becoming an antiwar Democrat.

Wiener: She went to New Hampshire in 1968 to work in the Eugene McCarthy primary challenge to LBJ.

Bernstein: She also went to the Republican convention that year--to work for Nelson Rockefeller. But by that time she was really a closet Democrat, and was hoping to see McCarthy elected.

Wiener: What did young Hillary think of Nixon at this point?

Bernstein: She always really despised Nixon. She made no bones about it.

Wiener: This was an era when antiwar students were seizing administration buildings and confronting the police. Was this Hillary's world?

Bernstein: This was not. Hillary's way, especially at Wellesley, was to be a student leader with one foot firmly planted in the establishment camp, with good relations with the administration of the school. She was eager to find ways of protest that did not anger the administration, like teach-ins. She did not join many street demonstrations elsewhere in New England, except occasionally. It was a very cautious course.

Wiener: Yet her senior thesis at Wellesley dealt with radicalism.

Bernstein: She's always been fascinated by radicalism. She wrote her senior thesis on a great radical organizer of poor people, Saul Alinsky of Chicago. Though when she was offered a job by Alinsky, after she wrote about him, and she turned him down--because she didn't think he was effective enough. She said to her boyfriend at that time, to be in politics you have to win. And it didn't look to her like Alinsky was winning enough of his battles. She came to question his methodology and concluded in her thesis that larger government programs and funding were needed, not just community action at the grass roots.

Wiener: How were you able to see her senior thesis? I thought Wellesley had it locked up ever since she became first lady.

Bernstein: I finally got it. She did have it locked up, obviously because she feared it would paint her not only as someone fascinated by radicalism, but perhaps worse--as someone who had called for large government funding programs. This was during that first campaign of 1992, when she and Bill Clinton were being criticized for being "tax-and-spend liberals."

Wiener: Her college years ended with an article about her in Life magazine.

Bernstein: She was the commencement speaker at Wellesley in 1969, chosen by her fellow students--there had never been a student commencement speaker there before. The scheduled speaker was Sen. Edward Brooke of Massachusetts, who Hillary had campaigned for, a Republican, the first black to be a member of the U.S. Senate in a hundred years. In his remarks he was patronizing, Hillary thought. He seemed to defend the Nixon administration's conduct of the war, and didn't mention the wrenching events of 68. When he finished, Hillary got up and extemporaneously excoriated him. As a result of that speech, she was featured in Life magazine as exemplary of this new generation of student leaders. They ran a picture of her in pedal pushers and her Coke-bottle glasses. That article made her well known in the student movement in the U.S.

Wiener: Then she went to Yale Law School in 1969. Would you say her connection to radical politics deepened at Yale?

Bernstein: She chose Yale because, unlike Harvard, where she had also been accepted, it was an activist school that very much believed in the use of the law as an instrument for social change--in the mold of Thurgood Marshall. When she arrived, her reputation preceded her. It was perhaps greater than her real accomplishments. She was becoming a generational spokesperson, anointed by others. That's when she met Bill; at that point she was much more famous that he was. This was the year of the Black Panther trial in New Haven. She monitored the trial to see if there were any abuses of the rights of the Panthers on trial, and helped schedule the monitors. Her reports were turned over to the ACLU.

Wiener: And then there was her summer job in California.

Bernstein: That summer she went to work at the most important radical law firm in America at that point: Truehaft, Walker and Bernstein in Oakland. They defended the Panthers. Two of their partners were members of the Communist Party--including Bob Truehaft, who was married to Jessica Mitford. I talked to Bob Truehaft not long before he died, and he said he was certain that Hillary came there because she subscribed to some of the kind of law they practiced and the kind of clients they defended. In her so-called autobiography, "Living History," she put in a couple of sentences about living in Berkeley with Bill that summer and working at that law firm, but she makes it sound like their work focused on postal rate increases. There's not a word about radicals.


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Jon Wiener is a history professor at the University of California, Irvine. His most recent book is Historians in Trouble: Plagiarism, Fraud and Politics in the Ivory Tower (New Press).

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View:
Hillary is not an idealogue
Posted by: Col. Jackleg on Aug 22, 2007 2:57 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Wow, I am shaken to utter disappointment. Perhaps that revelation helps explain her ongoing support of Bush's war without pretext in Iraq, i.e.: eliminate weapons of mass destruction (ah, not quite); assassinate Saddam (er, that's a crime); operation Iraqi freedom (democracy at gunpoint, a unique idea); war against terror (um, who dat in Iraq?); combatting global terrorism (huh, he's called Osama and his bro is W's business partner); making Umerikur safer (than wot?); its gonna take a long time, so lets pull together and spend a generation or ten monitoring a civil war we started in Iraq (when I asked my doggie about that one, she said "woof" but I knew she was confused so I asked her again and this time she got it right-"arf" or was that barf?). You want her, you got her.......but I hope to hell that we have enough "idealogues" in Umerikur to follow the wisdom of noted idealogue, Nancy Reagan, and just say NO!!!!!

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» Dennis Kucinich Posted by: Col. Jackleg
Okey Alternet, another Hillary article, when will you give a real progressive a shot?
Posted by: johngary66 on Aug 22, 2007 4:20 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Perhaps Kucinich for example. After all this is suppose to be a progressive blog isn"t it?

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Go figure
Posted by: kepstein7777 on Aug 22, 2007 4:45 AM   
Current rating: 4    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Hillary's two-faced politics and opportunism go way back. And so is her willingness to be with a cheater. If the presidency thing doesn't work out, she could always write country songs.

I had always thought she was the typical Baby Boomer: starting out as a young college idealist, then blending into the establishment for career reasons and to stay with the herd. It turns out she was all over the place from day one.

To be honest, a lot of us were confused in college, and still are today. As the saying goes, most of the evil in this world is caused by people who know exactly what they're doing. But I wouldn't defend Hillary as confused, because for her I think it's always been less about confusion, and more about keeping her options open.

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What a cruddy say nothing article!
Posted by: logansafi on Aug 22, 2007 8:10 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
So Hillary was a Goldwater Republican when young. So what? Today she is a Clinton Republican and that means more of the same.

The US Left has failed to establish any break away from the corporate 2-party con. Why? Simply because the Left/liberal intellectual leaders are too busy still playing the same old lesser of 2 evil game, that's why. It's all very sad.

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I Will NEVER Vote for This Woman
Posted by: Ricki on Aug 22, 2007 8:52 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
First reason is that Hillary is member of the corporate bought and paid for elite.

Second reason is that for 15 years she has been a member of an under the radar conservative politician's prayer club (led by Doug Coe - friend to John Ashcroft and Ed Meese among others ) called the Fellowship. This group includes Sam Brownback, Rick Santorum, James Inhofe, Tom Coburn and (formerly) George (Macaca) Allen, Mark Pryor and Joe Lieberman among others. This little group also had as past members such lovlies as General Suharto, General Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, and other dictators and death squad generals.

Thirdly she has obviously been influenced by the scum she prays with since she co-sponsored the Workplace Religious Freedom Act, she has backed federal funding of faith-based social services and she supported the Defense of Marriage Act.

For more complete information check out "Hillary's Secret Prayer Pals" in the Sept./Oct. Mother Jones.

.

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Will Hillary's years on the Wal-Mart board be featured next?
Posted by: sausage on Aug 22, 2007 8:58 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I hadn't planned on reading Carl Bernstein's tome on Hillary Clinton but with the above interview we are given a glimpse of the "radical Hill." Such bourgeoise nonsense.

Like so many of her generation Hillary was interested in radicalism because it was, as is now Ron Paul's quixotic presidential bid, all the rage among the anti-Vietman War intellectual crowd on college campuses. Of course radicalism as a lifestyle and a political movement was more widespread cultural phenomenon than is the current flirtation with the anti-Iraq war Paul and its effects on American culture as a whole were at best ephemeral.

What I am hoping is that Alternet.org and Truthdig.com will follow-up with whatever Bernstein's research uncovered concering Mrs. Clinton's tenure, 1986-1992, on the Wal-Mart board of directors. This was a period when Wal-Mart transformed itself from a regional, primarily rural, discount retail chain into the ubiquitous retail colossus we see today. It is rumored that Wal-Mart founder and family patriach, the late Sam Walton, referred to Clinton as "My little lady." What is known of Clinton's stay on the Wal-mart board is, while she championed the hiring of more women for management positions, she remained silent on Wal-Mart's longtime anti-union practices.

Clinton's anti-unionism really shouldn't come as a surprise. One of the interesting features of Vietnam-era campus radicalism was undercurrent of anti-union sentiment. Remember, back then, as now, the majority of college students were white, suburban whose parents, at least fathers, toiled in white collar fields. True a few of the unwashed, unlettered snuck in, but college campuses were for a large part pro-management despite all the talk of worker solidarity among the radically chic. For the most part union workers were suspected as being warmongering, Neanderthals and Nixon supporters, and the unfortunate Hard Hat riot of 1970 did little to dispel the image.

Hillary's is the quintessential biography of the journey of a suburban Goldwater kid through Vietnam radical chic back to suburban conservatism, either the hard Reagan-Republican variety or the soft Rockefeller-Republican/Clintonian-Democratic triangulation version. For Mrs. Clinton, and even her nemesis Karl Rove or president Bush, people like her of her generation are meant to lead the nation, not because of what they have accomplished or any new philosophy, because of where they are from and who they are: White and suburban.

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» Thank You... Posted by: CatDad
» RE: Let's face it... Posted by: jimidee
It's funny how she was against LBJ
Posted by: Iconoclast421 on Aug 22, 2007 2:05 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
And now she is LBJ. HA HA hA. Ok I guess that's not funny...

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Pure Opportunist
Posted by: jbetterl on Aug 22, 2007 2:46 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
New York State is a big state, with a big population. It has some of the most brilliant, creative, talented people in America. When New York needed a Senator, she brooded and probed and investigated, wondering just who might be the most superb talent to run for the Democrats. And - Gosh! - guess who she came up with? The President's wife!

I call that opportunism.

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» RE: Pure Opportunist Posted by: MindyB
Excellent article
Posted by: doinaheckuvajob on Aug 22, 2007 3:15 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
This really is a good portrayal of the history of Hillary's political moves and personal decisions. Just good, straight up info, no matter what one feels about her.

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Saddly, Hillary is a very bad choice
Posted by: MindyB on Aug 23, 2007 12:55 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
As a woman, it would have been wonderful to have seen a qualified woman presidential candidate, but Hillary does not fit those shoes, not in terms of honesty and integrity.
First, she is a political player and is as entrenched in political games as are the most seasoned republican politicians.
Second: She is as insencere as those currently in the white house.
Third: I believe she will keep the status quo and trully make no significant or possitive changes in policy.
Forth: She is owned by Corporate America, and therefore, will continue to apease big Corporate lobby, and quickly forget (if she ever thought of) the American people.
She is scary!!
She is a career and "experienced" politician--And look where we are as a country because we keep 'electing' "experienced politicians". This country needs a change away from that career criminal er. politician.

The only presidential candidate who has proven to have integrity, honesty and who is not owned by Corporate America is Obama. All the money he has raised for his campaign has been through donations from people, and not corporations.
Many say that he lacks the "experience" to be President of the US. Actually, he has a great deal of experience in public service, and thank goodness, its true he does not have much "political" experience, and that is one of his major pluses. This means that he is not corrupt, and does not engage in the political game all career politicians play.

Look what we've gotten as a result of "experienced" presidents!!!!

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» Dennis Kucinich Posted by: Col. Jackleg
Well, I guess it's obvious...
Posted by: opeluboy on Aug 23, 2007 5:01 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
... that Woodward and Bernstein have already done all the good they will ever do.

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Clinton's social policies
Posted by: Dianka on Aug 25, 2007 11:24 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I would like to hear more about Hillary Clinton's role in dismantling the social safety net (welfare "reform"). Bill Clinton likewise claimed to "have reservations", but sold out the poor to corporate/political interests regardless. Because this tangle of policies has had such a devastating impact on millions of citizens, as well as on the nation's economy (even if we try to ignore that fact), this merits deeper examination.

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