European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 2, 2007, Darmstadt, Hesse                                July 2007 stars and stripes Page 17 opinion Hillary covets secrecy like Cheney do i spent last weekend Reading a woman in Carl bernsteins biography of Hillary Clinton i know in late while being simultaneously bombarded with fresh evidence of Trad Huff ton ministrations pathological obsession with be historians will be de bating for decades what the worst element of the current Bush White House was but at the Root of the entire cancerous Struc Ture is George Bush and Dick Cheney shared fixation on be their Mutual contempt for the Public right to know knows no witness the ups absurd attempt to escape oversight by claiming Hes not part of the executive or the end less Legal mane vering to keep the administrations abuse of detainees hidden from As a its pretty Safe to say the Cen trial question facing democratic voters in the presidential primaries is which Candi Date will be most effective at rolling Back the Bush years on Issue after the democratic contenders Are doing every thing they can to highlight their differences with but when it comes to the Issue of secrecy and an administration operating in the Shad theres an argument to be made that the candidate least Likely to turn on the lights is Hillary her lifelong commitment to secrecy is one of the main themes of Bern steins Hillary Rodham Clinton has always had a difficult relationship with the writes she has often chosen to omit and it is an understate ment by now that she has been known to apprehend truths about herself and the events of her life that others do not exactly As Bernstein summed it up on the today this is a woman who led a camouflaged life and continues its not just that Shes a private there Are plenty of Public servants who Are zealous about guarding their personal lives and equally zealous about keeping their pub Lic lives and Public policies trans Par like Bush and Clinton seems devoted to secrecy for its own As Bernstein what was most Shock ing about her handling of the healthcare Fias co during her husbands presidency want that she kept the plan secret from but that she kept it secret from those who would have been champions of the this passion for concealment is a pattern As Bernstein has been repeated throughout Clinton it was there in the head scratching decision to hide her College thesis from Public View because it was about Radical organizer Saul it was there in her refusal for 30 years to admit that she had failed the bar exam the first time she took it was there in the Way she glossed Over in her Memoir her summer internship at the Law firm of Walker and Burnstein one of the most renowned left Wing Law firms in the it was there in the Way she handled the White water and travel Gate As Bernstein told ended up unnecessarily prolonging Bernstein quotes Clinton lawyer Mark Fabiani As saying of Hillary and Whitewater she would do anything to get out of the Situ and if that involved not being Forth coming in releasing documents and other she herself would i have a reason for not being and he reports that the White House adviser George Steph Nopoulos described Hillary responses to the various scandals of the Clin ton presidency As Jesuit Cal and it has been there in the Way Hillary Camp has attacked bernsteins among other is it possible to be quoted yawning and deriding it As old news nothing More than Cash for this assessment stands in Stark contrast to the majority of including the one in the los Angeles times by Ron who called it a Model of contemporary political biography an excellent Book judicious and deeply Hillary Clinton and her advisers apparently dont want people to know her real Carl Bernstein told that is particularly sad because the authentic picture of her life is so much More compelling than the airbrushed and sanitized version they keep serving up and the campaigns official response to a woman in charge even before they had seen the Book is the kind of thing i would have expected from the Nixon White House or the Bush White i found bernsteins Book to be a very humanizing portrait of which is Why her Camps reaction struck me As excessive and its As if Hillary and those around her have such an idealized View of her they feel the need to vanquish anything that contradicts the faultless on the Campaign Clinton talks a lot about her experience in the White House clearly were meant to Factor those eight years in when evaluating her fitness to re but Reading the Bernstein Book made me feel like she has taken away All the wrong lessons about being in her ten Dency to hide and obfuscate appears to be a Learned so the question facing democrats the country is whether we want another presidency cloaked in deception and i attack Edwards on not his grief Ann Coulter the Edwards Campaign is apparently still running Low on so last week they went Back to their top fundraiser i doubled the ratings of the lowest rated Cable news show on tuesday by agreeing to go on for a full hour to promote my new paperback version of godless a mis take i wont make As i was walk ing to the minutes before it was casually mentioned to me that Elizabeth de wife of demo cratic presidential candidate John de might Call for the first time in recorded the shows Host did not interrupt a but let Elizabeth Edwards ramble on and allow ing her to browbeat me for being mean to her did any to Host Ever Surprise Al fran Bill Maher or Arianna Huff ton with a Call by the wife of someone Treyve made Nasty remarks about How about a Call to John Edwards from the wife of a doctor he bankrupted with his Jun science lawsuits i think i May have tuned out at some so i can Only speak to the first 45 minutes of Elizabeth Edwards but it mostly consisted of utterly dishonest renditions of things i had said on my recent Good morn ing America interview and a column i wrote four years she claimed i had launched unprovoked attacks on the Edwards dead son and called for a terrorist at tack on her these Are boldfaced and the main Stream Media knows they Are yet they were repeated and nausea on wednesday by the associated the Al Popup Abc and stunningly the Host of the lowest rated Cable show who personally told me he knew the so for those of you who Haven read any of my five bestselling books liberals Are driven by satan and lie Here is my full sentence on Good morn ing which the Media deceptively referring to a joke i told about Edwards six months ago that made liberals cry but about the same you Bui Maher was not joking and saying he wished Dick Cheney had been killed in a terrorist at tack so Ive Learned my lesson if in going to say anything about John Edwards in the ill just wish he had been killed in a terrorist assassination the usual nut web Sites posted a zillion denunciations of my appearance on Good morning America immediately after i appeared monday but it didst occur prickly City by Scott Stantis to any of them to simply lie about what i had it took them nearly 36 hours to con coct a version of that quote that included the Edwards but not the Maher or what English language speakers Call the by tomorrow it will be Ann Coulter tried to kill John Edwards on Good morning America judging by his fundraising efforts so i gather most of you dont know who John Edwards is unless youre an overpriced hair Hes the trial lawyer who pretended in court to Channel the spirit of a Handi capped fetus in front of illiterate jurors to scam tens of millions of dollars off of inno cent according to the new York Edwards told one jury she Speaks to you through me and i have to Tell you right now i didst plan to talk about this right now i feel i feel her Shes inside and Shes talking to let me also quote from Campaign consult ant Bob shrubs Book no Kerry was even queaster about Edwards after they Edwards had told Kerry he was going to share a Story with him that hed never told anyone else that after his son Wade had been he climbed onto the slab at the funeral Laid there and hugged his and promised that hed do All he could to make life better for to live up to wades ideals of Kerry was not As he told me Edwards had recounted the same exact Story to almost in the exact same a year or two before and with the same that hed never shared the memory with anyone Kerry said he found it and he decided he  pick Edwards unless he met with him apparently every time Edwards began a Story about his dead son with Ive never told anyone this everyone on the Campaign could lip sync the Story with As a i bring facts like these to the attention of the american people in a Lively for in a column about the democratic candidates for presi Dent written in pointed out that the democrats refused to discuss the Economy or the but had recently discovered a Surprise Campaign Issue it turns out that several of them have had a death in the Fame among several examples of democrats talking about a death in the family on the Campaign Trail was this one John Edwards injects his sons fatal car Accident into his Campaign by demanding that everyone no Tice How he refuses to inject his sons fatal car Accident into his Edwards has talked about his sons death in a 1996 car Accident on Good morning in dozens of profiles and in his new he wears his sons outward bound pin on his suit he was going to Wear it on his until someone suggested that might be a Little too on the if you want Points for not using your sons death dont you have to take Down All those ask me about my sons death in a horrific car Accident bumper stickers Edwards is like a politician who keeps announcing that he will not use his opponents criminal record for partisan Politi Cal i was not making fun of their sons death i was making fun of John Edwards incredibly Creepy habit of invoking his sons tragic death to Advance his political in a Little tired of losers trying to raise Campaign Cash or to ratings off of my coat particularly when they use their afflictions or bereavement schedules to try to silence the from now in at tacking Only serious presidential like Dennis