European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - February 12, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse Friday february 12, 1993 commentary the stars and stripes Page 15 in service Hurt Ellen Goodman when Zoe Baird streaked across the National sky from anonymity to Ignominy in two weeks i was one of her few defenders. 1 did no to think that hiring an undocumented Nanny was a career ending injury. Illegal child care is As common in the �?T90s As smoking dope was in the�?T60s. Well if Baird was judged and convicted of smoking without inhaling Kimba m. Wood was just found guilty of getting a Contact High. She did no to break any Law she was just standing around breathing in the atmospheric fumes. Back in 1986, when judge Wood and her husband a yes yes working hubbies Are too involved in these decisions a hired a Nanny from Trinidad whose papers had expired it was Legal for them to do so. They filed All the requisite papers and forms. If the judge committed any Misdemeanour at All it was thinking like a lawyer instead of a politician. When the Clinton teams asked if she had a a Zoe Baird problem the answer was technically no. But she had the whiff of it in her hair. The words a illegal alien Are now enough to make Strong men and women run screaming in horror. They transform the most sedate resume into a tabloid headline aliens invade earthling a destroying future the administration was damned if they did appoint her. Do a Zoe All Over again. And damned because they did no to. The judge got a bad rap and working mothers got a bad vibe. But we Are All now damned to another chapter in the Pursuit of perfection in Public life. Over the weekend the list of offenders began to grow. On the equal Opportunity circuit Charles . Ruff was apparently also disqualified on account of his household hiring. A squirming Ronald h. Brown admitted to paying taxes for his weekly cleaning lady As soon As he found out that he should last month. Stay tuned for More late breaking news. The search through the household help accounts is going to make the search through Henry a. Kissinger a trash cans look relatively you think there Are a lot of illegal alien nannies and housekeepers you should see How Many All american neighbors Ana relatives Are being paid off the of the Many things that makes me squeamish about All this is not just the Way child care has become the whipping girl of the moment. Its the Way we get the ethical blemish of the moment. We seem to Deal with character issues As if they were a grab bag. We reach in pull out the latest one in no particular order and use it to judge anybody in pub lie life. For a while its All that we see of that person. It blots out everything in a persons life. Consider what happened to Baird and Wood. In one Brief scaring moment Baird was reduced to one line she was the $500,000-a-Viar-lawyer-who-Hircd-illegal-aliens. It did no to matter whether she was capable of the Job or kind to her baby Sitter. When life becomes a och liner nobody reads Between the lines. Now Wood the judge who helped put Michael r. Milken in jail May go Down in history for her household hiring practices not to mention her Brief training As a Playboy Bunny. A career becomes a cartoon. Character becomes caricature. I think that private ethics Are important. How we behave in our personal lives should count in Public. It would be fascinating if we decided to judge Peoples character by How they treat those who work for them whether the worker were a Secretary a hamburger Flipper or a housekeeper. Whether the Issue was sexual harassment or economic exploitation. That a not really what a happening. Rather we lurch from one lethal a a sin to another. Wiping out one person after another. Every time we appear to come to some More balanced perspective of character and its flaws life and its complexity Clinton and infidelity something else comes out of the grab bag. On the night the judge withdrew her name from consideration i was not the Only one who found herself in the Middle of an informal Wood seminar. A klatch of Good friends with decent re sums and serious moral convictions went through a joking but real review of our own personal histories. We could find enough blemishes in our lives to make for a collective Case of acne. Not one of us would be thrilled to see videotapes of the three worst moments and four worst decisions of our lives. Is there a Zoe Baird problem you bet. Its the problem you hear when people think about Public service life and say a not its the problem when they think about the spotlight and say a a it a not Worth of by the Way. Dear Kimba i once played a hot Box girl in Guys and dolls. If the White House Ever Calls in a out. C tha Boston Glo Boit will be Tough to beat Kimba Wood s integrity three things to begin with the first is that i know Kimba m. Wood which is my Good Fortune. The second is that if i had to choose three words to describe her they would be these integrity decency and intelligence. And the third thing is that she does not have what is now known As a a Zoe Baird problem although she has been made to pay for Zoe Baird a sins. Insiders predicted that judge Wood who sits on the Federal Bench in new York and is Best known for sentencing Wall Street junk Bond King Michael r. Milken would be named the first female attorney general of the United states a she went Down to Washington and talked to the president and his wife who. Were very impressed. Most people Are. In the space of a half hour three lawyers referred to her As a perfect Choice. She is married to a journalist but this happens in the Best of families. A the judge made a second trip to Washington and leaks from administration sources had it that the Job was hers if the Security Check was clean. She took with her meticulous records of her tax payments and immigration documents for the person who has helped care for her son since Bis birth nearly seven years ago. When she was asked whether she had a Zoe Baird problem she answered no. She defined this As complying with the Laws the immigration Laws and the tax Laws a doing those things Baird was lambasted for not doing. She had hired a Sitter who was not an american citizen in March 1986, when the Law did not prohibit the hiring of undocumented workers. When the immigration Reform and control act passed later that year her Sitter was one of thousands who were permitted to continue working and who became eligible for amnesty under its provisions. And with her help the Sitter became a Legal resident in 1987. Taxes had been paid on her salary from Day one. I consulted three immigration lawyers about that scenario Al said it was proper and Legal. But obeying the Law was not what the Clinton people meant by a Zoe Baird problem. What they meant was a Public Anna Quindlen relations problem another week of people opining on radio Call in shows that the streets were crawling with american citizens dying to have the jobs we Yuppie witches from hell were handing Over to exploited foreigners. Three things to think about the streets Are not crawling with american citizens who want child care jobs. This is said to be because we All pay slave wages. Wood paid her Sitter about the same salary As a starting new York City schoolteacher As Well As providing room and Board which in new York is roughly equivalent to a trillion dollars. One reason the employment Pool May include so Many foreign workers is that in Many other countries the care of children is an honorable profession. In America it is treated like Cut work. The Clinton people had a candidate of Superb character who was proud that she had complied with the Law in a world in which Many professionals do not. But in seeking an attorney general in the Post Baird atmosphere the Law was not the first concern. Spin was. Maybe Wood should have volunteered the fact that her Sitter had once been an illegal alien. Maybe the last that she saw this As a matter of Law and not As talk show fodder attests to the difficulty she would have had playing politics. Maybe she should have anticipated that the administration would think the american people were too stupid to make distinctions. Maybe it is better that she not work with people who further justified their decision to Cut her Loose by adding their cheap shot concerns that she had once spent five Days training As a Playboy Bunny when she was at the London school of economics a lifetime ago around the time Young Bill Clinton was smoking dope at Oxford. Live by Larry King die by Larry King. Only the wrong person got killed off. This is our loss. Three things to end with. The next attorney general will Likely be a Man. When he is asked who took care of his children and he says a my wife a the first member of the judiciary committee who makes a smart remark should be hammered. No matter who the nominee is it will be difficult for me to believe that his character is Superior to that of Wood. C the my York Tifre
