A Tale of Two Daughters

A tale of two first daughters, one former and one present, has presented itself recently in the news. The lead up to the telling of the tale was put into play as a story broke a few days ago that former President Clinton was successful in silencing a popular men's magazine's feature on the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign with a behind the scenes angle on her staff and consultants. Former President Clinton's aides, according to The Politico, issued an ultimatum to GQ Magazine: "kill the piece, or lose access to planned celebrity coverboy Bill Clinton." Though the staff at GQ objected, the editor, Jim Nelson, kowtowed to the offer he couldn't refuse. According to the article, "GQ writer George Saunders traveled with Clinton to Africa in July, and Clinton is slated to appear on the cover of GQ's December issue, in which it traditionally names a "Man of the Year," according to magazine industry sources."

Interesting.

Hillary's campaign is said to be patterned after President Bush's campaigns, not like Bill Clinton's, which was, let's face it, animal house. At least the first presidential run in 1992. Remember the "War Room" and the 'documentary' filmed highlighting the behind the scenes look at Begala, Carville, and Georgie S? Well, you can take it to the bank that she who must be obeyed isn't about to allow that for her campaign. For all the name calling by Hillary as to the love of secrecy of the Bush administration and his cronyism of old friends, she has embraced his style of campaigning and taken it to the next level. Her schedule is run like clockwork and nothing is left to chance.

Hillary's war room is run by the old cast of characters from the two presidential terms of Bill and they know the art of intimidation. Big time. They are also still arrogant enough to expect press coverage to continue to go their way. Or else no access to everyone's American Idol, Bill Clinton. They take the two for the price of one schtick quite seriously, you know.

Just as all campaigns in recent years have made demands of campaign reporters, what with Cheney banning the New York Times from his campaign jet in 2004 and Obama banning Carl Cameron of Fox News from his campaign travels, this incident with GQ is newsworthy for its financial implications. GQ plans to sell tons of magazines with Bill on the December cover, after all. They love the guy. His face on the cover is money in the bank.

Keeping with the financial angle, a restaurant owner in Greenwich Village was sent a letter, on official William Jefferson Clinton letterhead, from a lawyer demanding the picture on the wall of the restaurant of Chelsea Clinton and the owner be removed immediately. The letter threatened future legal action if the demand wasn't met. Immediately. So what did owner Nino Selimaj do? He went to the media. Nino didn't like the attitude coming from the letter. Not a nice tone. His restaurant, Osso Buco, has lots of photos of famous patrons on its walls. It's a very common practice for eating establishments, particularly in New York. Chelsea, according to Nino was very pleasant and happy to pose for a photo. She wasn't under duress. She was there in his restaurant with a group of about 30, he said, and was well behaved and polite to everyone.

Nino was a self-proclaimed big fan of the former President Clinton. He is grateful for the action Clinton ordered in Bosnia as that is his homeland and he was concerned about relatives there. He said if someone had simply made a phone call and asked him to remove the photo he would have been ok with that. But, since the strong arm methods were used he has decided to do the media tour and wait to see what happens next. And, by the way, Hillary has lost his vote.

Jenna Bush, one of the current first daughters, will be interviewed on ABC's 20/20 Friday night by Diane Sawyer. She is doing a bit of a book tour now for her book, "Ana's Story". Recently engaged to her boyfriend of three years, Henry Hager, she is a teacher at a charter school and a former intern with UNICEF. She is currently writing a book with her mother, Laura Bush.

Jenna Bush met Ana in Latin America at a UNICEF conference for women and children. Ana is a young woman living with HIV. At the time Ana was 17 years old, a single mother, and telling her story that people do live with HIV/AIDS. Jenna was moved by Ana's positive outlook on life and her personal strength. "The more I got to know her, the more inspired I became," Bush said, as quoted by ABC News. Jenna said she didn't go to Latin America with the intention of writing a book but since her job with UNICEF was to document the lives of children living in exclusion and she wanted to do more than just statistics, the idea of a book telling Ana's story came to her.

"Although she was orphaned at a young age and was born with HIV/AIDS and suffered abuse in her home and she's a teenage mother and she see her life as perfect," Bush said. "She sees her life as the way, you know, God made it for her, and she never complains. She dances."

Diane Sawyers will ask Jenna about her father's Iraq War policy and Jenna answers, "You know I'm not here to talk about that, but I'm also not a policymaker. It's a really complicated, obviously a very complicated subject Everybody can agree on that." That made me smile as I remember reading the book by Mariane Pearl, "The Lonely Heart" and in it is a story she tells of Laura Bush visiting her during a trip to Paris to extend a hand of friendship and comfort to Mariane after the death of her journalist husband, Danny, in Pakistan. Danny Pearl was beheaded by al Quada thugs. Jenna met them both there and while there the conversation drifted to war and Jenna made a reference of her thoughts against our involvement in Iraq. The story by Mariane noted that Laura Bush shot Jenna a look and quickly changed the subject.

So, we see the offspring of one Democrat political family and one Republican political family. I just find it interesting that the Dems who claim to be all about 'the people' and all the pat feel good social issues have a daughter educated in expensive private Ivy League schools and Oxford, too. Chelsea is working for a hedge fund in Manhattan, living large in the city. Her drunken episodes were never published in this country as a young college gal. They were noted, however, in the press in England when she was at Oxford.

Jenna, a graduate of the University of Texas, was never cut a break when she made poor decisions. Jenna, from the evil, greedy Republican family, is a public school teacher in Washington, D.C. Hardly a glamorous or lucrative career choice. She has worked on issues such as HIV/AIDS and literacy, as has her twin, Barbara. Barbara frequently works with a pet project of hers in Africa in a medical setting on issues of malaria and AIDS. These two young women are known for their volunteer work.

Chelsea is not. Chelsea is only noted as a member of the board of the New York City Ballet. If it is as many boards, it would be a paid position.

Both young women are thought to be kind, smart and polite. All good. Both are working and productive in society. All good. I make no judgement on their individual choices. Just don't expect me to blindly follow the reasoning that only the Dems have the moral authority on doing good in society while the Republicans are all about big business and greed.

Funny how that works after all.