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Hillary Clinton Caught with Abramoff CashUnlike many in her party, 2008 presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton has been silent about the influence peddling scandal erupting around lobbyist Jack Abramoff, whose plea bargain with the Justice Department is said to have more than a few on Capitol Hill quaking in their boots. Now we know why. Turns out, Mrs. Clinton is among the dozens of Democrats who accepted Mr. Abramoff's tainted contributions. Clinton spokeswoman Ann Lewis told The Buffalo News on Thursday that "after examining our records we found two contributions for $1,000 from tribes which have been clients of Jack Abramoff...

The Hillary-Condi avalanche By Salena Zito TRIBUNE-REVIEW Curb your enthusiasm and fasten your seat belts; today marks the first day of Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential bid. This is a moment of glee in many camps. Others are observing a moment of silence with a primal scream quickly to follow...But it's not all demographics, Morris says. "Condi is a woman that has made it on her own, whose accomplishments are hers." Hold that up to Hillary, whose "accomplishments are entirely derivative of her husband's," making even the National Organization of I-don't-know-what-kind-of-Women wince.

So what to make of Westchester District Attorney Jeanine Pirro's decision to drop her bid to unseat Hillary? Instant pundit wisdom has it that Pirro's campaign fell apart because of her gaffes on the stump and her failure to raise money. There's some truth to that, of course. But the real reason Pirro collapsed was that it immediately became apparent that her rationale for why Hillary should be removed was not compelling enough — not by a long shot. And that in turn suggests that Hillary has reached something of a milestone: Her public transformation is largely complete. Pirro's disastrous...

Now that the issue of what's under the tree has been settled, the biggest question facing many Democrats for the next year reduces to three words: Will Hillary run? The race for the next Democratic presidential nomination can't really take shape until Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York signals her intentions, and that probably won't come until 2007. But the expectation that she'll run is influencing the early maneuvering, as her potential rivals start to define how they might position themselves against her. If Clinton jumps in she will be the front-runner, with big leads in the early polls,...

December 26, 2005 -- WASHINGTON — Now you, too, can groove to the greatest iTunes hits of Hillary Rodham Clinton . Sen. Clinton is hitting the world of MP3 players with a 14-track best-of-her-speeches album for 2005. But wait, there's more. It will also have her Senate statements and press conferences. There's Hillary on health care, on Katrina and on violent video games. Camp Clinton is posting these podcasts on iTunes and other MP3 Internet portals, — all downloadable to iPods and computers for free. "Now Sen. Clinton's constituents and supporters have yet another way of keeping current with her...

Print Article         Close Window     A Visit From Old St. HillaryBy Lisa Fabrizio Published 12/22/2005 1:09:33 AM 'Twas the night before Christmas, as in days of yore; Not a liberal was stirring, not even Al Gore; Our prospects were sinking, we pined in despair, And prayed that St. Hillary soon would appear. We Democrats waited, while snug in our beds, Impeachable articles danced in our heads! But with Bush in the White House and Cheney as veep, I'd just settled down to a paranoid sleep. When out on the Beltway arose such a clatter, I headed for Hardball to...

A Democratic activist in Virginia has formed a national Hillary Clinton for President campaign committee and said his dream ticket for 2008 is to have New York's junior senator paired with his own Governor Mark Warner. Peter Feddo, a former top official with the Young Democrats of Virginia, filed papers with the Federal Election Commission that allows his independent committee to raise and spend money promoting a Clinton 2008 presidential candidacy. Neither Clinton nor Warner has said they are running for national office, but both are considered hot prospects for 2008 by party leaders. National polls show the former first...

The liberal activist whose been trying to draft Hillary Clinton into the presidential race since 2004 says her husband is ruining her chances for the 2008 nomination. "Bill's position on trying to get her to be centrist is not relevant since 9/11," Bob Kunst tells the New York Post. "People are looking for a leader, not the same old politics." Kunst runs the web site HillaryNow.com. He ran TV ads in New Hampshire last year in a bid to get Mrs. Clinton to run against John Kerry. He now fears, however, that the old Clinton triangulation strategy is hurting Hillary...

Hillary's Ambitious Tightrope By Tom Bevan What a remarkable spot Hillary Clinton finds herself in at the moment. On one hand, her power and stature have never been greater. Clinton continues to cruise toward reelection in New York with a 62% job approval and a $14 million war chest against Republican opposition that can't walk and chew gum at the same time. Her near-certain victory in November insures Clinton will remain the prohibitive favorite to win the Democratic party presidential nomination in 2008. On the other hand, signs of discontent with Clinton’s stance on Iraq continue to grow. Antiwar activists...

<p>December 16, 2005 -- WASHINGTON — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton will meet face-to-face with President Bush and military commanders today at the White House for a top-level briefing on the future of Iraq. "I'm old-fashioned enough to believe that when the president invites you to the White House to discuss an issue of grave importance, you go. I hope to get some answers to the questions I have about what the way ahead might be," she told The Post.</p>

Report Could Torpedo Hillary Clinton's Prez Plans Two Washington pundits are warning that Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential plans may depend on whether congressional Democrats can continue to keep Independent Counsel David Barrett's final report on IRS abuses during the 1990s under wraps. "Prominent Democrats in Congress have spent much of the last decade in a campaign to suppress Barrett's report," columnist Robert Novak reported yesterday. "Its disclosures could dig deeply into concealed Clinton administration scandals." Notes Fox News Radio's Tony Snow: "By all accounts, the 400-page Barrett report is a bombshell, capable possibly of wiping out Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential...

It may have been lost in all the news about Iraq but Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, Democrat Senator of New York, has received the 2005 National Farmers Union presidential award for her leadership in introducing the Milk Import Tariff Equity Act. The snippy feminist who nearly derailed her husband’s first presidential campaign by scoffing that she didn’t just ‘stay home and bake cookies’ can now be presented as the Butter Queen of the Empire State. [Predictable fluff snipped.] Which is why the constant muttering about what may or may not be going on with Bill in private is a bomb...

Last month Justice Antonin Scalia was politely quizzed by Norman Pearlstine, the outgoing Time Inc. editor in chief. The event, held in Time Warner's New York headquarters, was supposedly off the record, but so much of it has already been reported that it will not hurt to add Scalia's views on flag burning. He explained why it was constitutionally protected speech. It's a pity Hillary Clinton was not there to hear him. The argument that this famously conservative member of the Supreme Court advanced -- actually, reiterated -- was that while he may or may not approve of flag burning,...

Zogby: Democrats Have 'Substantial Lead' A key measurement of partisan advantage in the United States Congress shows Democrats with a substantial lead in public opinion as the nation heads into 2006 and the important mid-term election season, a new Zogby International survey shows. Asked if they would "definitely" or "probably" vote for the Democrat or Republican in next year's fall congressional election, 48% said the Democrat would get their support, compared to 40% who said they would vote for the Republican. While 3% said they plan on supporting a third-party candidate, 9% said they were unsure. The year-end survey by...

Worried that the left-wing Democratic Peace Train may be leaving the station without her, Hillary Clinton is scrambling for a seat by moving away from her carefully crafted hawkish support of the Iraq war. But she can’t join the left body and soul because she still needs to show how tough she is on national security issues, so she is trying to craft her own “third way” on Iraq. All she has succeeded in doing, however, is fudging her position, muddying it up, but convincing nobody on the right or on the left.Hillary became a hawk in the first place...

bill's bud explains1.... by Mia T, 11.26.05 Hillary, it seems, is not only "watching me like a hawk," as Bill puts it at one point,1 Having failed to snare the Nobel Peace Prize by ignoring terrorism, clinton has apparently decided to intensify his America-bashing on foreign soil, the method employed by Jimmy Carter to great (if somewhat belated) effect. (The Nobel committee, sufficiently mollified only after 24 years of the peanut president's America-bashing, awarded Carter his 1978 Peace Prize finally in 2002.) Meanwhile, back in the Senate, the missus, the other half of the clinton construct, maintains her hawkish...

November 26, 2005 -- Did Hillary Clinton just announce her candidacy for president? Sure, she'd deny it. And it certainly there's been no formal campaign kickoff. But what do you call it when a leading Democrat — from New York — calls for tax relief in . . . Puerto Rico? True, pandering is par for the course among pols — particularly Democrats. But this one seems to have an unmistakable purpose: to shore up political support among Puerto Ricans in New York for her Senate bid next year and maybe also nationally for a possible run for the White...