The Washington Post 3/4/99 John Harris "…Asked about Juanita Broaddrick's recent allegations that Clinton assaulted her 21 years ago in an Arkansas hotel room, Shalala said she has reached no conclusion about whether she believes Broaddrick or the terse denial issued by Clinton's lawyer - and said she doesn't need to in order to do her job…."
Juanita Broaddrick 3/7/99 Freeper Danno "…Hello Daniel, I have been reading on FR this am about members thinking that I may have something to hide. Please be assured that the 158 minute Juanita is not me and that I have nothing to hide regarding Starr, Clinton or anyone. I have no idea who they are referring to. It is as much a mystery to my family and I as it is to all of you. I wish someone would ask Linda Tripp about it, today. Maybe she can shed some light on the subject. Would you please relay this information to the forum. Also, please let them know that my husband, except for the time that he told BC to stay away from me, has never talked to Clinton or any of his people. The only time I have ever talked to BC was at the time of the incident in '78 and when he had me called out of the meeting in '91 and once on the telephone in 78 or 79 when I told him to stop calling me. Thank you very much. Sincerely,Juanita Broaddrick…"
UPI 3/7/99 "…Linda Tripp, the woman who secretly recorded her telephone conversations with Monica Lewinsky, told ABC's ``This Week'' (Sunday) there is another woman named Juanita ``who has not yet surfaced.'' Tripp said the woman in question was not Juanita Broaddrick, who recently alleged Clinton sexually assaulted her 21 years ago, but that Clinton had talked on the telephone with this woman for 158 minutes in 1996.'…"
3/7/99 chuck allen via Varmint Al "…There are three women named Juanita on the 967 FBI files found in the White House. Here are the three names. Juanita Mae Doggett Juanita Donaghey Duggan Mildred Juanita Hill…"
Assorted Publications 3/7/99 K. Dhalle "…I did a search of published newspapers and discovered that a number of women named "Juanita" had the misfortune of having their name in print with Bill Clinton's. Here's they are: Juanita Cobb, Mayor of Binghamton, New York Juanita Kreps, former Commerce Secretary and Economics Professor at Duke University. Appointed to Commission for the Future of Worker Management Relations in March 1993. Juanita Jordan, wife of basketball star Michael Jordan. Juanita's, Clinton's favorite restaurant in Arkansas that got its start with a loan from Madison Guaranty. Juanita Hernandez, Assistant to Deval Patrick, Civil Rights Chief at the Department of Justice (1994). Juanita Nixon, wife of Red Sox outfielder Otis Nixon, visited Clinton at the White House in '94 with a group involved in the Martin Luther King, Jr. Foundation. Juanita Millender-McDonald, Democratic Representative from California. Juanita, The Incan Mummy Clinton had the hots for. Also known as "The Ice Princess." Juanita Williams, Delegate to the Democratic National Convention (1996). Juanita Woodward, wife of Larry Woodward and overnight guests at the White House. Listed as Arkansas friends…."
CNN 3/8/99 Larry King Live Transcript "… LARRY KING, HOST: Tonight, Juanita Broaddrick claims that Bill Clinton sexually assaulted her 21 years ago. Tonight, her son, Kevin Hickey, speaks out for her….. HICKEY: Oh, I think it happened to other people. There have been allegations out there that this happened to other people. I don't think this was a one-time thing. I think the public is very interested in this. We didn't really know what the reaction would be after she did the interview, but it has been obvious the last couple of weeks that there are a lot of major people in politics, in the media that are calling for Bill Clinton to talk about this because so far he hasn't…..HICKEY: I think that he's set a terrible precedent for the presidency. I think that he has -- has done something and basically gotten away with it. What's to prevent some president 15 years from now from doing the same thing, having an affair with an intern in the Oval Office, and then completely getting away with it? I -- I think that's a terrible precedent to set, but I think that's the one that has been set….. HICKEY: I think that Bill Clinton has some serious problems. And I think he has -- I think he has a -- a sexualism that he cannot control sometimes, and I think when it gets out of control, you end up with situations like Paula Jones and Kathleen Willie and my mother. And I think he has a real problem…. KING: The story that won't go away. We continue with our panel…. KING: David Gergen, do you believe his mother? DAVID GERGEN, EDITOR-AT-LARGE, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT: Well, Larry, I kept thinking -- listening to him as the two of you talked -- what mother would tell her son that she had been raped if it hadn't happened? That's what really gave me pause. I think it added to the credibility of the story. It's possible that they're participating in some huge frame-up of the president. But he seems like a plain vanilla kind of guy. And it's just -- he was persuasive. KING: Dee Dee, you worked for Clinton. DEE DEE MYERS, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I certainly am not going to raise any questions about the credibility of Juanita Broaddrick or her son, Kevin, who I thought told his story quite... KING: David made a good point. What mother would lie to her son about being raped? MYERS: You would hope that nobody would. I mean, certainly, I saw her on another network, on NBC, and I thought she seemed like she was quite credible. And I thought he did a very straightforward recitation of what they have been through. And he obviously believes his mother. And I thought he was quite credible. KING: Jeff. JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SENIOR ANALYST: I am actually astonished almost at where the last two statements leave us. The two people who work for the president are at least unwilling to say, no, I believe the president -- that nothing happened that amounted to an assault. I mean, you need... MYERS: Well... GREENFIELD: I understand that it might be... MYERS: He hasn't said anything yet, Jeff. We don't have the president's comment on this. GREENFIELD: Yes, he has. No, what you have is his lawyer saying any allegation of an assault is absolutely false. And that has been repeated, and in fact, that's all they've said…."
N.Y. Post 3/9/99 WILLIAM KRISTOL "…Asked about Juanita Broaddrick's recent allegations that Clinton assaulted her 21 years ago in an Arkansas hotel room, [Donna] Shalala said she has reached no conclusion about whether she believes Broaddrick or the terse denial issued by Clinton's lawyer - and said she doesn't need to in order to do her job. ''I take all of this very seriously,'' Shalala said of Broaddrick's allegations, adding that ''I do not compartmentalize'' by making separate judgments about personal conduct and public performance. At the same time, Shalala said, ''I'm both a patriot and a professional; I serve the nation and the president.'' This conviction, she said, allows her to pursue what she considers important issues on Clinton's behalf without knowing for sure what to believe about his past. So: A cabinet secretary is agnostic as to whether or not the president she works for is a rapist. At least Donna Shalala has the courage to admit her uncertainty. No other Clinton administration official with whom the Post spoke was willing to be quoted on the record about the Broaddrick allegation. One unnamed aide did admit, ''I think you have to be troubled by it; she seems very credible.'' …"
NewsMax.com Inside Cover 3/9/99 "…Bill Clinton personally tried to contact Juanita Broaddrick within a year of an April 25, 1978 encounter where, she says, he brutally raped her at Little Rock's Camelot Motel. The stunning revelation was offered this weekend by Mrs. Broaddrick herself, in a message she asked to have posted on the Free Republic website. "Freepers" have been following her case closely ever since NBC refused to air an exclusive interview with the alleged Clinton rape victim in January. Mrs. Broaddrick had previously acknowledged only two instances where she and Clinton had personal contact: The month of her alleged rape and again in 1991 when she was summoned out of a meeting to hear Clinton's apology. But in her latest communiqué she mentions a third contact from Clinton, " ... once on the telephone in '78 or '79 when I told him to stop calling me." Broaddrick did not indicate how many times Clinton tried to contact her before demanding that he "stop calling me." …"
Weekly Standard 3/15/99 Noemie Emery "…Once upon a time, it is now hard to believe, feminists thought that rape could be serious. Very serious. Exceedingly serious. One of the most serious accusations you could make. It was not only grim in itself, it was also a metaphor, a symbol for the whole sorry state of sexual matters that feminists vowed to correct…. In 1990, Clayton Williams, Republican candidate for governor of Texas, told a bad joke comparing rape to bad weather--"When rape if inevitable, relax and enjoy it"--and his mere word brought loud screams, NOW pickets, and charges that no such man should ever hold power. But those were the old day of consciousness-raising…They are being told now that the accused male merits the presumption of innocence; that without absolute proof, the man's word is valid; that if it's an old story, it no longer has meaning; and that a rape charge shouldn't be allowed to interfere with the career of a prominent man. Thus, Juanita Broaddrick's credible charge of a rape accompanied by physical battery by a man who was then attorney general of Arkansas and is now our president is too meaningless to merit a word of reproach from, among others, Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, Susan Faludi, Eleanor Smeal, former congresswoman and vocal feminist Patricia Schroeder, former governor and vocal feminist Ann Richards, or Geraldine Ferraro, vocal feminist and former candidate for the vice presidency of the United States. On cable chat shows, the ever-flexible Elizabeth Holtzman, her grin stretched as tight as a death's-head, expresses great concern for the imperiled rights of Bill Clinton. How do you defend yourself against such a charge? she wonders. On Crossfire, Clinton friend Susan Estrich claims that in the absence of proof, the benefit of the doubt goes to the accused, who is then declared innocent. But if so, innocence must also be granted to Clarence Thomas, whose denial of a far lesser charge was so much more forceful than Clinton's, and against whom no scintilla of corroborating evidence has ever been brought. So, are the apologies to Justice in the mail? Thought not…. Feminists have also made much of the power equation, according to which social arrangements are themselves weapons of intimidation, used against women by men. Indeed, Mrs. Broaddrick's charges involve not only rape, but rape by a government official, a man of vast institutional power, charged with upholding the law. …One such instance is what Brownmiller calls "police rape," in which the violation is done by an authority figure, charged with keeping these things from happening. Bill Clinton in 1978, at the time Mrs. Broaddrick says he raped her, was the top cop in his state, soon to be governor, then president, making the assault she charges him with the ultimate perversion of power. As Brownmiller writes, "The horror of police rape is special, for it is an abuse of power by one whose job it is to control such abuses of power... Police rape... represents the ultimate Kafkaesque nightmare, for when society's chosen figure of lawful authority commits a criminal act upon one of those persons he has been sanctioned to protect, where can a woman turn for justice?" Not, it appears, to the women in Congress, who used to call themselves members-at-large on behalf of all women, whose special beleaguered constituency was their imperiled and endangered sex Phone calls to the offices of senators Barbara Boxer, Barbara Mikulski, Dianne Feinstein, and Patty Murray (all of them strong backers of Clarence Thomas's accuser, Anita Hill) and representatives Nita Lowey, Rosa DeLauro, Zoe Lofgren, Carolyn Maloney, and Nancy Pelosi brought refusals to comment, unreturned messages, statements that the reported incident happened too long ago for comment, and assurances that the members were working on more pressing issues…."
Weekly Standard 3/15/99 Noemie Emery "…Quietly, the terrain has been subtly altered. And the things that have been changed are these: (1) Bill Clinton's plan to win the verdict of history is now all but finished. He will not succeed in painting impeachment as a partisan witch hunt, punishing him for his personal shortcomings. His legacy now has been set in concrete: He is the first elected president ever impeached and acquitted; and the first president to be credibly charged with a rape…. Has anyone noticed that, since the Broaddrick interview, the once pervasive talk about the mean, nasty, intolerant, out-of-step Republican party has more or less disappeared? Maybe Bill Clinton was not quite such a victim. Maybe the stories of Paula Jones and Kathleen Willey appear more disturbing, more like predation than sex. The dread House managers now seem somewhat less sinister, in view of what their quarry is thought to have done…. (2) Has anyone also noticed that, since the airing of the Broaddrick charges, the heavy breathing about Senator Rodham has somewhat died down?… But one thing a candidate for high public office cannot do is refuse to answer serious questions on crime. The day after the Broaddrick interview aired on Dateline, Rush Limbaugh introduced almost every segment of his three-hour radio program with cuts from Mrs. Clinton's ringing 1992 endorsement of Anita Hill, which called Hill a heroine and urged women victims of abuse to step forward. As a candidate, Hillary would be fair game….. (3) A Hillary retreat would take some heat off the hustings, but the story wouldn't quite end there. Her stand-in, Rep. Nita Lowey, an early and ardent Anita Hill backer, would herself draw Broaddrick questions. As would all feminist Democrats facing tight races in the 2000 elections. Did they fight Packwood? Did they hate Tailhook? Did they back Hill? What is the difference between Hill's case, and Broaddrick's, except that Broaddrick's charges are so much more serious? ….Every feminist Democrat, male or female; everyone who ever backed the Violence Against Women Act and then either defended Bill Clinton or has said nothing about him, is now fair game for repeated questions and protests and pickets from women themselves….. (4) Broaddrick's charges bring up another quality of Bill Clinton's that is even more disturbing than anything broached so far: his strained relationship with what most people regard as real life. To many, O.J. Simpson's odd lack of outrage when he was charged with the murders of his wife and Ronald Goldman was the tip-off that all was not kosher. Likewise, Clinton's reaction to Mrs. Broaddrick's story seems... strange…"
Weekly Standard 3/15/99 Fred Barnes "… WHERE ARE THE DEMOCRATS? Only a few weeks ago, they were indignant that anyone would think they took a permissive attitude toward President Clinton's wrongdoing. While opposed to impeachment and conviction in the Monica Lewinsky case, congressional Democrats insisted President Clinton should not go unpunished. "Most of us do not want to have the public believe that an acquittal means acceptance of the behavior," said Democratic Senator Carl Levin of Michigan. So they favored strong censure of the president, and, Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein of California said, no one should doubt their motive. They weren't just looking for political cover. Now, weeks later, Juanita Broaddrick has accused Clinton of raping her in 1978. Now, there's no threat of impeachment and no criminal investigation. Now, Democrats are seeking no punishment at all. They're suddenly restrained and quiet. No Democrat has demanded that the truth be determined in the case. No Democrat has called for Congress or law enforcement officials to get to the bottom of the case, lest the public think the charge is being winked at. No Democrat has expressed outrage that Clinton might actually be guilty of sexual assault. Only one congressional Democrat, Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota, has even said the president should respond directly to Broaddrick's accusation. One more thing--Clinton's attorney has called the charge "absolutely false." But no Democrat has stepped forward in public and said he or she believes this denial…."
Salon 3/16/99 Christopher Hitchens "… It seems to me morally feeble, as well as intellectually slack, to split the difference between Clinton and Broaddrick, or to characterize her allegation as unprovable. The feeblest summary of this compromise is contained in the lazy phrase "he said, she said." In the case of the "he," we already know that he is a hysterical, habitual liar. We also know that almost no allegation ever made by a woman and denied by him has proven to be untrue. And we know that ex-girlfriends have been subjected to extraordinary campaigns of defamation, amounting in some cases to intimidation, merely for speaking about "consensual" sex. What allegation could be more horrific than that of rape? And yet, "he" hasn't said anything yet. If I was accused of rape, and the woman making the charge was a lady of obvious integrity, I would want to do better than have a lawyer make a routine disclaimer. (Especially a lawyer, in this case the pathetic figure of David Kendall, who had not even met me at the time of the supposed crime.)…. So much for the "he said." What of the "she"? If the allegation is false, then Broaddrick is not just getting her facts wrong. She is deliberately fabricating one of the most damning charges that any one person can make against another. She must be a wicked or deluded or vicious person. There seems no escaping this corollary conclusion. There also seems no reason at all for reaching it. Where is the famous Clintonian rapid-response team? Has it no pride? Can it not find or produce any shadow of a doubt to cast on Broaddrick's character? I think that if it could, we would know by now A provisional but not unpardonable induction, then, is that she is speaking the truth…"
worldnetdaily.com 3/24/99 Joseph Farah "…[Sam Donaldson:] "Mr. President, when Juanita Broaddrick leveled her charges against you of rape in a nationally televised interview, your attorney, David Kendall, issued a statement denying them. But shouldn't you speak directly on this matter and reassure the public? And if they are not true, can you tell us what your relationship with Mrs. Broaddrick was, if any?" Clinton responded: "Well, five weeks ago today, five weeks ago today, I stood in the Rose Garden after the Senate voted, and I told you that I thought I owed it to the American people to give them 100 percent of my time and to focus on their business, and that I would leave it to others to decide whether they would follow that lead. And that is why I have decided, as soon as that vote was over, that I would allow all future questions to be answered by my attorneys. And I think the American people do understand it and support it, and I think it was the right decision." Donaldson: "Can you not simply deny it, sir?" Clinton: "There's been a statement made by my attorney. He speaks for me, and I think he spoke quite clearly." And that's how Clinton dealt with the only rape charge ever leveled against a sitting U.S. president….. So, the question remains, why won't Clinton address this important allegation? The answer is: Because the White House press corps and Congress won't force him to answer it. They have let him off the hook. Clinton beat the rap on perjury and obstruction of justice, so he won't be held accountable for rape
…"
Washington Weekly 3/21/99 L D Brown "… Any vestige of doubt that was left after my conversation with Juanita Broaddrick's attorney was removed when I spoke to her myself last week. Her sharing with me the pain of going public about her experiences with Bill Clinton rang true -- and familiar. A compassionate, thinking and feeling woman, Juanita Broaddrick is telling the truth concerning her allegations of rape at the hands of Bill Clinton. She exemplifies the truthful witness, firm in her assertions about what happened that day in a Little Rock hotel room, and wanting only to "put all this behind me," as she put it. Her astonishment at Clinton's attempt to ensure her silence by calling Juanita out of a conference for a chat years later, still infuriates her as if it happened yesterday. Bill used exactly the same method of operation when he tried to silence me as he geared up for his presidential run in 1992. "I'm glad that I came forward, L. D.", she said after we had discussed the reluctance we shared about the timing of going public with allegations against Bill Clinton. We talked of how we had shared misgivings about not coming forward with what we knew before Bill and Hillary made it to the White House…."
Laissez Faire City Times 3/22/99 William DeVore Mickey Pall Freeper Rex Rogers "… Special surgeons at NBC literally cut the life out of what should have been the TV Event of the Year. NBC edited the piece down to 23 minutes, and they ran their mini cut a month after it was first scheduled. NBC then put Juanita's story up against the Grammy Awards without advance promotion, and late enough so that TV Guide and the other scheduling services could not alert viewers. It was a story "made for TV," one novice NBC producer said, "It wasn't easy for the top brass to avoid a wide viewership. But they tried every trick in the book." These efforts were only partly effective…."
Conservative News Service 3/30/99 Justin Torres "…A panel of press experts today discussed the coverage–or lack of coverage–of charges that then-Arkansas Attorney General Bill Clinton allegedly raped a nursing home operator in a Little Rock hotel in 1978…Hume responded that the press has not followed up on the story, or attempted to force a more detailed denial from President Clinton. "If the press wants an answer, they'll go after someone like the hounds of hell, and that will usually yield an answer after time. To say that this has not happened in this case is an understatement."….. "To say that there's no where to go and everybody believes it anyway, so you may else well drop the story, is tempting," continued Hume. "But there's more to be done. The problem is not that there's no where to go, it's that nobody's going there. That's alarming." Hume says that Fox News is attempting to continue to cover the story, but that the story is "difficult" to develop…."
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette 3/31/99 Patrick Howe Freeper HAL9000 "…In a panel discussion at the National Press Club on Tuesday, Wall Street Journal editorial-page writer Dorothy Rabinowitz said the story has become "the elephant in the living room" that the national press is ignoring. Fox News Channel's Brit Hume, who was on the panel, agreed..."
White House Press Conference, 3/19/99 Sam Donaldson "...QUESTION: Mr. President, when Juanita Broaddrick leveled her charges against you of rape in a nationally televised interview, your attorney David Kendall issued a statement denying them. But shouldn't you speak directly on this matter and reassure the public? And if they are not true, can you tell us what your relationship with Ms. Broaddrick was, if any? CLINTON: Well, five weeks ago today, five weeks ago today, I stood in the rose garden after the Senate voted and I told you that I thought I owed it to the American people to give them 100 percent of my time and to focus on their business, and that I would leave to others to decide whether they would follow that lead. CLINTON: And that is why I have decided as soon as that vote was over that I would allow all future questions to be answered by my attorneys, and I think I made the right decision. I hope you can understand it. I think the American people do understand it and support it. And I think it was the right decision. QUESTION, DONALDSON: [Won't you] simply DENY IT, Sir?! CLINTON: There's been a statement made by my attorney.. He speaks for me, and I think he spoke quite clearly...."
NY Times 4/4/99 Christian Berthelsen "..."When women are willing to go public, it strips away the curtain and distance from the pain of the experience," said Rosanna Hill, a coordinator of the conference and member of the Rainbow Sisters Project, which is sponsoring it. The conference, at the Los Angeles Public Library, is billed as a day to honor women who have been raped and those who have raised public awareness about it...... "The only way to take back what was taken from you is to turn it around and make it positive, and sharing with others," Ms. Miller said in an interview. In a study released last year and sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institute of Justice, the research arm of the Justice Department, 18 percent of female respondents said they had been raped or had suffered an attempted rape. Officials and experts estimate that as many as 60 percent of women who are raped never report it. Such was the case for a woman in the public service announcement, who asked not to be identified by name...."
CBS via The American Spectator 4/99 John Corry Freeper Aculeus [The April 1999 edition of The American Spectator went to press weeks before the bombing of Serbia began. On page 53 John Corry writes in "Clinton Bites" about the media's soft handling of the Broaddrick story. At the end of his piece he writes the following.] "…None of this is promising. It should be obvious by now that Bill Clinton suffers from not merely reckless but clearly compulsive behavior, and that he will, as always, do anything to save himself when he gets in trouble. On the day the Broaddrick story broke in the WSJ, the most interesting, and appalling, item on the evening news broadcasts was a report by David Martin, the CBS Pentagon correspondent. The White House, he said, wanted to bomb Serbia, even though our NATO allies opposed it. It is to think the unthinkable that the proposed bombing had anything to do with diverting attention from Juanita Broaddrick, of course. The thought is overwhelming. But it is also unthinkable that we have a rapist in the White House. Who could possibly believe that, either? …"
National Review online 3/27/99 Philip Weiss "…No one can prove that Bill Clinton is an s.o.b. -- but everyone knows it. The best defense his defenders have come up with, which reflects the thinking of the New York Times and many upstanding Democrats, is that this is gossip that should not be brought up in polite society. But feminists have (honorably, in my view) led our society across too many traditional lines of privacy to allow us simply to will this information away. Gossip about Robert Packwood justifiably ended his career in public office. ….Moreover, after months of actual gossip, Juanita Broaddrick came forward and proved to be a hugely persuasive witness. The White House denial of the matter has been terse and witless. Is someone's statement about the worst experience of her life, which she regarded as a crime, really the same as gossip about who is sleeping with whom? Yet the defense has apparently been effective. As any Clinton critic can tell you, the charges seem to have very short legs. The president may well be a rapist; and no one cares! Mrs. Broaddrick's statement is almost never mentioned on network television or in the agenda-setting dailies and weeklies. She is so marginalized that only a nut would bring her up at a press conference. Still, I'd argue that the story is taking a toll. "This thing is like a fire in a peat bog, spreading out of sight," says Lucianne Goldberg. "But every once in a while you see a puff of smoke." Here are some of the ways this story has spread and may continue to spread:…I like to think that the Democrats' denial of this information will become legendary, that it will rank right up there with other Neville Chamberlain-like blindnesses, that history books will some day include the observation, "He may well have been a rapist, and yet elements of the power structure supported him exuberantly." Indeed, this reckoning may come "sooner rather than later," as the president might put it. In 22 months, or at such time as Clinton ceases to be president, people like the Washington Post will at last feel freer to think for themselves about who he was and what he did. Stockholm syndrome will be over. Being an optimist, I believe that the blindness about Broaddrick is so staggering that it will have the effect of destroying other articles of faith and so help to effect a reexamination of the depths of Clinton corruption -- demonstrating, for instance, that there have been cover-ups (boggling the meager abilities of Ken Starr) of responsibility in the travel-office affair and the FBI-files situation, let alone of more nefarious matters, such as the suspicious bombings of Afghanistan, Sudan, and Iraq. …."
Drudge Report 4/7/99 "…Still reeling from the rape charge made recently by an Arkansas woman on national television, the White House has carefully constructed a strategy where President Clinton does not publicly utter the term rape during the Kosovo conflict….."The president has been very careful not to use the term rape," says one insider. "But his surrogates have taken up the slack."…. "With Broaddrick's charges yesterday's news, there's really no need for him to raise the specter of rape at this point," notes one strategist. "It would be foolish." The First Lady has also tiptoed around the word rape when describing Serbian atrocities…."
Universal Press Syndicate 3/30/99 Joseph Sobran "...Am I the only one who senses that President Clinton, while making war in Kosovo, has been avoiding a certain subject? One of the perennial horrors of war is mass rape. It's no surprise that rape should be a feature of the long civil war in the former Yugoslavia, and those urging intervention against the Serbs usually cite this as a reason for outside forces to step in and do something. But Clinton, in his recitation of Serb atrocities last week, failed to mention rape, which stirs even stronger passions than murder. Could it be that he is sensitive about the subject because he has been plausibly accused of it? Who can say? But I noticed several years ago that this chronically trendy president, whom the feminists call "good on women's issues," said very little about the trendy subject of sexual harassment. He seemed to feel vulnerable on that particular "women's issue." The reason became obvious when several women accused him of making crude advances. If he's also a rapist -- which few put past him -- it's natural for him to avoid the topic of rape. ... Clinton is very sensitive to what people say about him, and he's always been especially concerned about his "legacy." As things now stand, history will note him chiefly for bringing his Arkansas id into the White House, then covering up his behavior with lies and perjury. So why wouldn't he want to create distractions not only for us, but for history? He may prefer to be remembered for a war, even another Vietnam, than for Monica Lewinsky. Though he talks of "putting people first," Clinton consistently puts himself first. He wouldn't make war unless he thought it was in his own interest to do so....Maybe Clinton has really deluded himself that he can bring peace to the Balkans by bombing. Or maybe he thinks it's a long shot but worth the gamble, since his reputation can't get much lower than it already is. As long as the bombs are falling, at least the nation isn't talking about Juanita Broaddrick...."
The American Spectator 4/99 John Corry "...Words fail. Things fall apart. The president's apologists made the expected denials, but no one believed them, and even Geraldo Rivera had the grace to look embarrassed. Juanita Broaddrick had caused a problem. The New York Times, for one, tried to ignore it, although later it tried to make amends. It said in an editorial that Bill Clinton in his past confessions had presented himself as a "recreational philanderer," but now it seemed he might be "a serial masher or worse." The wording was close to whimsical - masher had a quaint ring to it - but you could excuse the Times for that. Some things are almost too painful to talk about, and the Times, and all the rest of the press, was having a problem. How do you deal with the idea of having a rapist in the White House? Or must you deal with it at all? .....None of this is promising. It should be obvious by now that Bill Clinton suffers from not merely reckless but clearly compulsive behavior, and that he will, as always, do anything to save himself when he gets in trouble. On the day the Broaddrick story broke in the Journal, the most interesting, and appalling, item on the evening news broadcast was a report by David Martin, the CBS Pentagon correspondent. The White House, he said, wanted to bomb Serbia, even though our NATO allies opposed it. It is to think the unthinkable that the proposed bombing had anything to do with diverting attention from Juanita Broaddrick, of course. The thought is too overwhelming. But it is also unthinkable that we have a rapist in the White House. Who could possibly believe that, either?..."
The New York Observer 4/12/99 Philip Weiss "..."When they were setting up, I said, 'What's the process after this interview is finished? How will you go about getting it on the air?' "Lisa said she would have to speak to her higher-ups. I said, 'Wait a minute-what are the chances that this won't run?' My stepfather was standing there. And she said, 'None.' I said, 'O.K.'" Mr. Hickey paused. "And, you know, it ran. But how could she sit there and tell us that?" The accusation by a mature businesswoman that she had been raped by Bill Clinton in 1978, when he was Arkansas' Attorney General, aired on NBC on Feb. 24, opposite the Grammy Awards. The 35-day interval between tape and air is now one of the legends of the impeachment process. Why didn't the American public get to hear Mrs. Broaddrick before the Senate voted to acquit Mr. Clinton on Feb. 12? "This came out at a time when it had the absolute smallest impact it could have," said Steve Friedman, a lawyer friend (who favored censure) said to me at lunch. "The thing was finally over. Everybody was sick of it, and the Republicans looked like a bunch of scoundrels when they said, You have to understand what we're seeing and can't talk about. It was certainly relevant to the question, his fitness to be President." My friend's suspicion that NBC protected Mr. Clinton is widely shared..."
The New York Observer 4/12/99 Philip Weiss "..."Recently, the National Press Club held a panel on the Broaddrick story, "Too Hot for a 'Scandal-Weary' New Media to Handle?" where several speakers made that point. Conservative media watchdog Reed Irvine charged in the Washington Times that NBC delayed the story because executives are cozy with the President. And TV Guide has questioned why NBC's "apparent hesitation" to run the interview cost it a scoop-to the Wall Street Journal editorial page.....The mainstream press again ignored the story in the fall of 1998, when Mr. Starr's referral to Congress reported that Jane Doe No. 5 had told an F.B.I. agent that her earlier affidavit was indeed false. The press has never been comfortable with Mrs. Broaddrick's story. "It smells because it comes out of the sewers in Arkansas," one reporter said. Another said, "People hate rape stories." Its means of exposure had an air of Clinton-hatred, or the culture war, or sexual McCarthyism-whatever paradigm you choose to taint those who see Mr. Clinton's private life as having public relevance. And the story was associated with the venomous Clinton enemy Larry Nichols. Even while the press ignored it, the curious name Juanita Broaddrick became a shibboleth on the Internet, talk radio and supermarket tabloids. That is why Mrs. Broaddrick, who owns nursing homes, said she changed her mind about talking to Ms. Myers...One source outside NBC with knowledge of the process described it in this way: "They go down and do the interview. They come back. It sits there. You hear that [Jeff] Zucker, the Today czar, David Doss, the czar of Nightly News, and [Tom] Brokaw don't like this. It's not going to air on their program, nor did it. Within the first week, three problems developed that were being touted against the piece for reasons to be suspicious..."
The New York Observer 4/12/99 Philip Weiss "..."Some resistance gathered at the network around the feeling that they might be used in the impeachment context. Why was Mrs. Broaddrick going forward now? Some felt that the Jones lawyers had successfully manipulated Nightly News the previous March into going on air-off Mr. Brokaw's watch-with irresponsible charges. More importantly, the House impeachment managers had never named Juanita Broaddrick publicly, even while they were using the confidential F.B.I. report of her assault to push impeachment.....Mrs. Broaddrick was by then deeply angry at NBC. She told her son that the network's treatment felt in ways like being raped again. "I felt that way because they had been after me and after me for a year. And I finally give in and go through this, a day of baring my soul. A bunch of people are standing around in my house as I tell the most private things of my life. Then it was like what I told them wasn't really worthy," she said. How many rape victims go public? "It was very hard for me to say the word rape. It's a difficult word to say." When Lisa Myers named higher-ups, it struck Mrs. Broaddrick that almost all the NBC executives were men (the only woman's name among eight listed to me was Cheryl Gould)....."
The New York Observer 4/12/99 Philip Weiss "...NBC's wrenching interview has had a quiet impact. It disturbed several columnists who have tended to see Ken Starr as the problem, including Richard Cohen of The Washington Post, The Nation's Katha Pollitt, and San Francisco Examiner columnist Stephanie Salter. The National Organization for Women (finally) urged the President to end his "nuts and sluts" defense, and leading newspapers have called on Mr. Clinton to respond substantively to the charges.....When I asked Sam Donaldson whether there had been rancorous arguments at ABC over coverage of Mrs. Broaddrick, he stammered. "I am dodging your question," he said. "I can tell you that people in charge of our coverage, at managing editor status, have not seen this as a story they wanted to spend a lot of time on. But I have not seen a memo, nor have I been given any orders not to do this story, and when I have, there have been no problems from above." He went on: "The thing that astounded me from the get-go, and some day I may write about this, is that important aspects of the news business argued that we shouldn't follow the [Lewinsky] story. I don't mean just Mr. [Steve] Brill, Mr. [Anthony] Lewis, Mr. [Frank] Rich. But lots of people argued that it was unseemly." ..."
The New York Observer 4/12/99 Philip Weiss "..."Julia Malone, a national correspondent for the Cox newspapers, grew so upset by the neglect of Mrs. Broaddrick's story that she organized the March 30 panel at the National Press Club. "It's like we're in Lotus Land," she said. "It seems like everybody has been smoking something and the economy has been so good that this man has bamboozled the country. I mean, the irony of this man who's very likely a rapist talking about human rights!" Seventy-five people attended the panel. Ms. Myers declined to appear (as she declined to comment to me on the matter). Ms. Rabinowitz said that NBC had treated the story like a "dead fish." Fox News anchor Brit Hume argued that neglect of the story reflected a deep bias in the media against material that might hurt someone they had voted for. Ms. Malone echoed that point. "My impression of Tom Brokaw is that he was not a newsman on this decision, he's a Democrat." (I sent Mr. Brokaw a letter, and he left me a message. "I have just a little bit for you, not much, because we have felt strongly from the beginning that our decisions in the Juanita Broaddrick story or any news decisions we make have to be kept within these walls, otherwise we'll spend too much time explaining and too little time reporting." He told me to call him back, then didn't return my call.) Ms. Malone said she hopes that reporters will get together before Mr. Clinton's next press conference and try to force an answer about Mrs. Broaddrick. "But in this city that's considered some kind of conspiracy." Mr. Donaldson said he can remember occasions when reporters barraged a President, forcing a more forthright answer. "But that certainly wasn't the case in the Broaddrick matter." No, Mr. Donaldson was alone when he boldly asked the President about the rape allegation at the President's March 19 press conference. Mr. Clinton said he would have no more to say than his lawyer's statement, and that was that...."
NewsMax.com 5/5/99 Carl Limbacher "...Juanita Broaddrick has offered her support to Kathleen Willey and says she would make a personal appearance at the Virginia trial of Willey's accuser if asked to do so. "I emailed Kathleen," Broaddrick told NewsMax.com's Carl Limbacher late Wednesday. "And I told her that if she needed me there I'd be there." .... "He was very forceful," Willey testifed at Steele's trial Tuesday. "His hands were all over me." Broaddrick's support, especially if Willey asks her to attend the trial, could add a dramatic twist to the only Sexgate prosecution to emerge from Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr's year-long Monica Lewinsky probe. Any association between the Broaddrick and Willey charges could rapidly re-focus the Steele trial on questions of whether Mr. Clinton is guilty of a pattern of criminal sexual assault....."
NewsMax.com 5/19/99 "...Just a week after Kathleen Willey went public with new details about a stranger who tracked her down and warned against testifying in the Paula Jones case, Inside Cover has learned that Juanita Broaddrick says she was also followed just days before her interview with House impeachment investigators. And, in yet another mysterious twist mirroring Willey's allegations, Broaddrick reveals that her house pets were set loose and that her phone was tampered with shortly after her first contacts with the press in early 1998. Though second hand accounts of unwanted sexual encounters with President Clinton now number over a dozen, Broaddrick and Willey are the only women who have personally described overpowering physical assaults on the record...."
Capitol Hill Blue 6/9/99 "...She admired and campaigned for then Attorney-General Clinton until an episode 21 years ago when, she said, he brutally attacked, bit and raped her in her hotel room....Although opinion polls indicated that people who saw her interview believed her, the news media dropped the issue within a few days.... She told NBC,s Dateline that "I was afraid that I would be destroyed like so many of the other women." She also felt direct pressure from Clinton, who in 1991 approached her while she was attending a meeting for nursing home business. Here's her recollection e-mailed on June 2, 1999....More recently, she has reported that a man in a car was obviously following her, and she said that her house was burglarized. All that was stolen was her telephone answering machine tape. VULNERABILITY: Her nursing home business was regulated by the attorney general's office...."
NewsMax.com 6/24/99 Julia Malone "...With Vice President Al Gore's sudden epiphany that his boss's behavior with with Monica Lewinsky was "unforgivable" -- and his wife Tipper said to be outraged by Bill Clinton's symbolic semen stain on the Oval Office, now might be a good time for the Second Couple to remember that Sexgate has an even darker side. Bill Clinton's alleged rape of Juanita Broaddrick still haunts Washington like no other scandal in living memory. In fact, the prospect that America might have elected, then re-elected, a rapist to its highest office terrifies even the hardbitten newsies of the Washington press corps. Why? Because they failed to do their jobs in 1992, and dismissed the second hand accounts they'd heard about Broaddrick's assault.....NewsMax.com is proud to present highlights of the panel discussion the mainstream media did not want you to see or hear, "The Juanita Broaddrick Charges: Too Hot for the Press to Handle?" We thank panel moderator, Cox News reporter Julia Malone for making this transcript available to NewsMax.com. The Juanita Broaddrick Charges: Too Hot for the Press to Handle? National Press Club Forum Washington, D.C., March 30, 1999 SUMMARY: A panel of journalists split on whether news media bias or "scandal fatigue" killed the coverage of the charge that Bill Clinton raped nursing home executive Juanita Broaddrick 21 years ago. Five weeks after NBC's Feb. 24 edition of "Dateline" aired its interview with Mrs. Broaddrick, the subject had disappeared from the news media. Four panelists at the National Press Club forum agreed that her charges were credible and that the issue was both serious and newsworthy. Half the panel faulted news organizations, the others concluded that the charges were too old to pursue...... ANN MCFEATTERS: I was listening to "Imus in the Morning" this morning, and he was desperately trying to gin up outrage on this very issue against Clinton. He was talking to his fabled brother out in the West...He was saying, "Fred, why aren't you infuriated about this? Why aren't you writing Senator Pete Domenici and why aren't you talking to everybody you can think of?" And Fred said, "I don't know what to do. What's the point? So here you have a situation where, as Bill Bennett says, there is a "death of outrage" on this president in regard to sex. There is a death of outrage because people don't know what to do. He's been impeached. It went to the Senate. The Senate said he could stay in office for two more years. He's a lame duck. We don't know at this point how to prove this charge....You could go down to Arkansas and re-interview the people, but what would it prove? Six out of 10 Americans already believe the charge is probably true. BILL EATON: A little history on this story: It first surfaced in 1992 as a rumor in the presidential campaign of that year. At least several reporters were informed about it. And since it came up in the last hours of that campaign, it was not pursued...."
www.judicialwatch.org 7/29/99 98-1991 (WBB) Browning v Clinton Motion "...Ms. Broaddrick recently came forward with allegations that she was the victim of a brutal rape by Clinton in 1978. Plaintiffs seek to question her about telephone calls she stated she received from Clinton between1978 and 1979 subsequent to the rape incident, and whether the substance of those calls was in the nature of a threat to stay silent. In addition, Plaintiffs want to question Ms. Broaddrick about her statements that she was followed days before her interview with House impeachment investigators, and that her house was broken into, the tape from her answering machine stolen, her three cats set loose, and her telephone tampered with in early 1998. Plaintiffs want to know whether she felt that these incidents were also meant to threaten or intimidate her into silence. Further, Plaintiffs wish to ask her if the reason that she did not come forward earlier with her allegation of rape was because her business, Arkansas nursing homes for the elderly and mentally retarded, which are subject to state regulation for licensing and government funding, were at risk from retaliation by Clinton-appointed state regulators. As recently reported by NBC News, Ms. Broaddrick has claimed that Clinton raped her in Little Rock in the Spring of 1978, while she attended a nursing home conference. She also told Lisa Myers that Clinton called her a half dozen times at the nursing home after the rape, and then unexpectedly appointed her to a state advisory board in 1979. She had no further face-to-face contact with him until 1991, when she attended a meeting in Little Rock with two friends. Broaddrick said she was suddenly called out of the meeting and, to her astonishment, there was Clinton standing in the hallway. [H]e immediately began this profuse apology, saying, 'Juanita, I'm so sorry for what I did. I'm not the man that I used to be, can you ever forgive me? What can I do to make this up to you? When asked why she did not report the rape and signed an affidavit in the Jones case denying that anything ever happened, Broaddrick stated: "I was also afraid what would happen to me if I came forward. I was afraid that I would be destroyed like so may of the other women have been." The Washington Times also reported that "[f]riends and others in Arkansas say she is fearful for her family's business interests, two homes for the elderly and mentally retarded in Fort Smith and Van Buren, Ark., which are licensed by the state of Arkansas and which receive government payments."..."
www.newsmax.com 7/28/99 Carl Limbacher "...In an unusual move that puts the ugliest charge against President Clinton back on the front burner, Clinton's personal lawyer David Kendall has attacked Juanita Broaddrick's detailed charge that the President raped her as a "partisan rant." ....The Clinton lawyer's attempt to demean Broaddrick's rape charge suggests an abrupt change of course in White House strategy. Previously Kendall had issued only a brief, one-sentence statement on the President's behalf denying he raped Broaddrick, in the apparent belief that the less said about the matter, the better. But Kendall's decision to attack Broaddrick's charge as partisan in response to the Judicial Watch lawsuit could signal new White House fears that other women with similar charges may be ready to go public.....The mainstream press has been extraordinarily deferential to Clinton himself, asking him about Broaddrick's allegation only twice. Both times Clinton referred to Kendall's terse denial and refused to say more...."
Drudge Report 8/2/99 "..."How can she just pretend that I do not exist?" These are Broaddrick's first on-the-record words since news came out that Hillary Clinton has come clean on her husband's misdeeds. In an exclusive interview with the DRUDGE REPORT, Juanita Broaddrick revealed the chilling details of her one encounter with Hillary Rodham Clinton....Broaddrick painfully recalled: The night she met Hillary Clinton. "It happened at a political rally, in Van Buren, Arkansas in the spring of 1978, at the home of local dentist," Broaddrick begins. "She came directly to me as soon as she hit the door. I had been there only a few minutes, I only wanted to make an appearance and leave. She caught me and took my hand and said 'I am so happy to meet you. I want you to know that we appreciate everything you do for Bill.'" Broaddrick was stunned by Hillary's comments. Only weeks had passed, Broaddrick claims, since she had been raped in a Little Rock hotel room by then attorney general Bill Clinton. "Here her husband had just done this to me, and she was coming up to thank me? It was scary... "I started to turn away and she held onto my hand and reiterated her phrase -- looking less friendly and repeated her statement----'Everything you do for Bill'. I said nothing. She wasn't letting me get away until she made her point. She talked low, the smile faded on the second thank you. I just released her hand from mine and left the gathering." "I was in state of shock... nausea went all over me... "You know, I should not have gone to that political gathering, but I think I was in denial at the time. I actually became physically ill. I went outside and told my first husband I had to go home." Broaddrick says that while Hillary was quick to approach her, Bill Clinton stayed on the other side of the crowded room. "He never spoke or came near me," Broaddrick recalls. Broaddrick, who had been a 'Clinton for governor' campaigner, says that one of her friends had driven the Clintons to the rally from the airport that day -- and the topic of conversation throughout the ride was Broaddrick! "Hillary knew something---- I just don't know what exactly. For years, I thought she knew what had happened to me, but now I just don't know." ...."
Cox Newspapers 12/4/99 Julia Malone "....Former independent counsel Kenneth Starr said Friday that President Clinton has yet to show remorse for deceiving the court in the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal. ''In some way, through some manifestation of genuine sorrow and acceptance of responsibility, the president should get himself right with the law,'' Starr said....... The White House greeted Starr's recommendation with disdain. ......Starr also defended his decision to send Congress what he called ''sobering to the point of devastating'' material in which Juanita Broaddrick, a Little Rock nursing home executive, accused Clinton of having raped her when he was attorney general of Arkansas more than 20 years ago. That information was not included in the independent counsel's public report, Starr said, because it did not relate to possible obstruction of justice, which was the focus of his probe. However, he said it did relate to Clinton's ''fitness'' for office. ''I didn't think it was completely irrelevant. I had to be careful about what I was keeping from the Congress.'' Asked whether he believed Broaddrick's charges, Starr said he did not meet her, but added: ''The investigators found her entirely credible.'' Clinton, through his lawyers, has denied the assault allegations, but the evidence forwarded by Starr was said to have swayed some House members to vote for impeachment......"
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