-Caveat Lector-
August 1 1999
UNITED STATES
The London Sunday Times
Hillary Clinton: why I
stay married to Bill
Christopher Goodwin, Los Angeles
AMERICA'S first lady, Hillary Clinton, who
is also the country's most publicly betrayed
wife, has revealed for the first time why she
has stood by the president. She said his
infidelities were a "weakness" caused by the
psychological trauma of childhood abuse.
In an interview that gives an unprecedented
insight into their marriage, Hillary reveals
that she believes Bill Clinton's childhood
experiences set a pattern for his
philandering.
She also discloses that, until the scandal
broke over his affair with Monica Lewinsky,
she thought he had "conquered" his
unfaithfulness.
"Yes, he has weaknesses. Yes, he needs to
be more disciplined, but it is remarkable
given his background that he turned out to be
the kind of person he is, capable of such
leadership," she said.
"He was so young, barely four, when he was
scarred by abuse. There was terrible conflict
between his mother and grandmother. A
psychologist once told me that for a boy
being in the middle of a conflict between
two women is the worst possible situation.
There is always a desire to please each
one."
Ever since arriving in the governor's
mansion in Arkansas in 1978, Clinton was
known, in the parlance of the state, as a
"hard dog to keep on the porch". When he
became president in 1993 Betsey Wright, his
assistant, had to devote much of her time to
coping with "bimbo eruptions". But only
when the Lewinsky affair was exposed did
Hillary realise that her husband had not
changed.
"You have to be alert to it, vigilant in
helping. I thought this was resolved 10 years
ago. I thought he had conquered it; I thought
he understood it, but he didn't go deep
enough or work hard enough," she said.
Referring to the period after Clinton's affair
with Gennifer Flowers, the Arkansas beauty
queen who claimed a 12-year relationship,
Hillary said: "You know we did have a very
good stretch - years and years of nothing."
The interview, to be published this week in
Talk, a new magazine edited by Tina Brown,
former editor of The New Yorker, is the first
time Hillary has talked about her marriage
since her husband was impeached for lying
about his sexual relationship with Lewinsky,
the 21-year-old White House trainee.
Asked by Lucinda Franks, the interviewer,
whether their marriage would survive the
strain of her standing for the Senate in New
York, Hillary replied: "He's responsible for
his own behaviour whether I'm there or 100
miles away. You have the confrontation with
the person and then it is their responsibility,
whether it's gambling, drinking or whatever.
Nobody can do it for you.
"He has been working on himself very hard
in the past year. He has become more aware
of his past and what was causing this
behaviour."
Hillary emphasised that the affair with
Lewinsky occurred after the deaths of his
mother, her father and their old friend
Vincent Foster, who shot himself. "He
couldn't protect me, so he lied," she said
simply.
"You know in Christian theology there are
sins of weakness and sins of malice, and this
was a sin of weakness."
When Hillary was challenged that many
people believed she had stuck by Clinton for
her own benefit, she revealed her deeper
motivations for loyalty. She said she had
learnt the lessons of her mother's bitter
experience: Dorothy Rodham, the product of
a divorce, was put on a train at the age of
eight with her three-year-old sister to be
brought up by her grandparents.
"My mother never had any education. She
had terrible obstacles but she vowed that she
would break the pattern of abandonment in
her family, and she did," Hillary said.
"Everybody has some dysfunction in their
families. They have to deal with it. You
don't walk away if you love someone. You
help the person."
When Hillary tried to draw a comparison
from the Bible to describe her allegiance,
the interviewer suggested a passage from
Corinthians. "Love endures all things? No, I
love that, but I was thinking of when Peter
betrayed Jesus three times and Jesus knew it
but loved him anyway. Life is not a linear
progression. It has many paths and
challenges; and we need to help one
another."
"And it is love, isn't it?" asked the
interviewer.
"Yes, it is," Hillary replied. "We have
love."
She survived the infidelities and the public
outcry through "soul-searching, friends,
religious faith and long hard discussions".
She said: "I don't believe in denying things. I
believe in working through it. Is he
ashamed? Yes. Is he sorry? Yes. But does
this negate everything he has done as a
husband, a father, a president?
"There has been enormous pain, enormous
anger, but I have been with him half my life
and he is a very, very good man. We just
have a deep connection that transcends
whatever happens."
Her chief of staff, Melanne Verveer, said
that as the president tried to make up for
what he had done she had seen "physical
passion" come back into their lives. But the
rapprochement emerged slowly, according
to another aide, who said Hillary had
"barely spoken" to Clinton for eight months
after the semen stain on Lewinsky's dress
was made public.
During the past 18 months Hillary has lost
weight, changed her hairstyle and started
wearing smart clothes. Clinton, say aides,
has noticed the difference with some
surprise. "Doesn't she look beautiful?" he is
said to have observed to friends.
Hillary says she and Clinton enjoy the
intimacies of any married couple. "We talk.
We talk in the solarium, in the bedroom, in
the kitchen - it's just constant conversation.
We like to lie in bed and watch old movies,
you know, those little individual video
machines you can hold on your lap."
News of the interview began to circulate in
Washington a few days after a court fined the
president $90,686 (£56,700) for lying in the
harassment case brought by Paula Jones. It
was the first time a sitting president had
been fined for contempt. Jones had accused
Clinton of making an unwanted sexual
advance to her in a hotel in Arkansas before
he became president.
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FROM THE DESK OF: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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The Best Way To Destroy Enemies Is To Change Them To Friends
Shalom, A Salaam Aleikum, and to all, A Good Day.
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