"why is it that many of the conspiracy theorists and Bush bashers came from the 1998 FR class?"
The whole sense of the political landscape back then that Clinton would do ANYTHING. Women who had complaints against Clinton were being escorted out of the country; there was that list of 400 FBI files (remember that Haldeman went to jail for having ONE file); there was evidence among the republicans that the nuclear option was being deployed -- several prominent republicans started getting exposed for their sexual indiscrepancies; and there was that whole amazing Wagging The Dog warfare; and look how much garbage Linda Tripp put up with, to the point that she started recording her conversations (thank God). Those were heady times, and even Congress didn't have the courage to follow up on the obvious criminal conduct.