<p>It seems that when Hillary Rodham was in college, she had a penpal–a boy she had gone to high school with. There is no evidence of romantic feelings, but the two exchanged deeply personal letters throughout college. The grown up penpal, now an English professor, recently allowed the New York Times to read and copy the old, handwritten letters. </p>
<p>The article, filled with quotes from the letters, is an interesting read. The letters show that she is thoughtful, analytical, judgmental, and obviously very talented. The letters display her transition from conservatism to liberalism, show her feelings towards her friends (she talks about the friend who was pushing her to try acid, and the friend who was caught spending the night at her boyfriend’s house) and her parents (she speaks the frequent arguments, and the increasing distance between her and her father), and witness her ponderings about where she fits in in life.</p>
<p>In these letters, she is not yet a politician or the president’s wife. She is a college student, just like the many whose parents frequent this board. If you read the article with that in mind, it’s really quite interesting.</p>
<p>I don’t think private college letters are fair game. Maybe in a retrospective biography at some point. I didn’t enjoy the article at all.</p>
<p>BTW, Clinton talked about her conversion from Republican to Democrat at a speech to the College Democrats in South Carolina yesterday. She told them that the biggest problem with waking up one day and deciding to support Eugene McCarthy’s campaign in 1968 was that she was President of the Wellesley College Republicans when it happened.</p>
<p>I think she is an intensely brilliant human being. I don’t understand why she is hated so much.</p>
<p>In this day and age if you want something you can’t just wait for it to fall from the heavens, you have to go and get it. I really commend her for pursuing her dreams. </p>
<p>We have done a lot over the years to improve the status of women in this country, promising them anything they want, when the time is near for one of them to bust the ultimate glass ceiling and claim the ultimate prize we have suddenly gone cold feet. </p>
<p>I think she is more than qualified for the post, judging by the people running the country currently.</p>
<p>Oh, it isn’t fair. Nobody in this race understands that better than Senator Clinton. </p>
<p>I’m just saying that I wasn’t that comfortable reading her college letters. But, that’s the media for you. What else do we expect from the NY Times. Even after the Judith Miller fiasco, they still haven’t learned. They had an entire front page story today spinning on behalf of unnamed administration leakers.</p>
<p>I thought her college letters were lovely, and gave a real sense that there was an actual human being in there under the image.</p>
<p>I’m not certain Hilary Clinton is my favorite candidate, or that I would enjoy working for her. I am certain that she is intelligent, thoughtful, and skilled, and that she gets misrepresented a whole lot.</p>
<p>Did this “friend” get her consent to have the letters published? (I didn’t read the article). I wouldn’t want anyone publishing the personal letters I wrote in college–or imagining that what’s in those letters has anything to do with who I am decades later. I’m not a fan of Hilary, but this seems too intrusive. OTOH, maybe she thinks it’s good publicity.</p>
<p>Oh yeah, she’s well-known for having campaigned for Barry Goldwater in '64. And not forgetting her roots, she spoke very movingly in praise of Goldwater when he died a few years ago.</p>
<p>I was turned off when I read the headline as well because my gut reaction was that the publishing was inappropriate. However, since the letters were not very controversial and were not used to bolster or disparage her as a candidate, I was able to enjoy the article. Even though I wished that the man sought Clinton’s thoughts before publishing her letters, I still found the letters themselves very interesting, and it was quite enlightening to read her words as a college student. I am the age she was when she wrote those letters. </p>
<p>I do not think that the man asked permission to publish the letters, but I also didn’t get the sense that Clinton had strong feelings on the matter–at least to the degree that she never requested the man to keep them private. The article mentioned that the man had given the letters out previously to someone who was writing a biography on her. When she learned that he still had the letters, she asked for copies.</p>
<p>She quotes Barry Goldwater regularly on the campaign trail – whenever she is asked about gays serving openly in the military. She pulls out an old Goldwater quote, “You don’t have to be straight to shoot straight.”</p>
<p>She threw in an Eisenhower reference in her stump speech in Beaufort, SC yesterday. It was in reference to a program Eisenhower initiated for science research that was the precursor to the manned space program, saying it could be a model for the US to follow in becoming energy independent. It was part of a riff on the lack of ambitious national goals to motivate and inspire young people.</p>
<p>The Beaufort Gazette has streaming audio of her full speech on this page. About halfway down on the right is a link. It’s one of her more personal speeches, talking about vacations to Hilton Head with Bill and Chelsea and the story of her early friendship with Marian Wright Edelman, the first African American female graduate of Yale Law School and founder of the Children’s Defense Fund.</p>
<p>BTW, the most shocking thing about the college letters, given that they were written in the late sixties, is the near absence of sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll.</p>
<p>Oh, I agree with that -even if I doubt that the release of the private letters is that … accidental.</p>
<p>However, why should we pay much attention to the feelings and the real person revealed in carefully selected texts when it’s much simpler to read HRH’s own thesis and try to understand how one goes from working for Goldwater to becoming a fan of Saul Alinsky. A fan who did not hesitate to write “His [Alinsky’s] new aspect, national planning, derives from the necessity of entrusting social change to institutions, specifically the United States government.”</p>
<p>It’s clear that HRH has never forgotten another Alinsky rule: “power is the very essence, the dynamo of life!”</p>
<p>The comment brings up an interesting parallel. Many journalists loved to describe a certain non-economist as someone who decided to spend his life in the relative obscurity of a small Claremont school. His name? Peter Drucker.</p>
<p>BTW, despite the lack of permission to publish the letters, I would not be shocked to learn that the Clinton campaign gave the NY Times the man’s name and a tip about the existence of the letters. The letters do fit with a relentless effort by the campaign to introduce Senator Clinton to the US people and to US women specifically.</p>
<p>Here’s a little example, compliments of Bubba video:</p>
<p>Kollegkid, the man said that he did not keep his letters to Clinton, though he said he wished he saved copies them. He said that he doubted Clinton saved his letters to her.</p>
<p>Tons of evidence there. None of your arguments for Hillary are strong. A;; you people are saying is that she is “smart and wise”. NO, she’s just a vote-peddler.</p>