- WASHINGTON - Just as Hillary Rodham Clinton's New York popularity is sinking,
a new book is reviving reports that she once hired a private eye to track
her hubby, and banned Barbra Streisand from staying over.
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- Larry Downing/Reuters The first lady
sits with the president moments before he offers a prayer that the country
"come together, and pray together" in reference to the tragedy
in Colorado
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- The biography, The First Partner Hillary
Rodham Clinton, by Brooklyn writer Joyce Milton, paints the first lady
as tough, ambitious, calculating and cold.
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- The book says she once greeted a young
Chelsea with "a quick pat on the head as she sailed through the room"
after a long out-of-town trip, and "coolly interrupted and left the
room" as White House aide Bernie Nussbaum tried to read Vince Foster's
suicide note to her.
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- The book also says Mrs. Clinton hired
a Little Rock private detective to trace Bill Clinton's affairs when he
was running for a second term as Arkansas governor in 1982.
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- The ex-private eye, Ivan Duda, told the
Post Mrs. Clinton didn't tell him why she wanted the dirt but that he gave
her the names of 14 women, including six who have never publicly surfaced.
He declined to identify them.
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- Duda said Mrs. Clinton called him from
a pay phone, then agreed to meet him in the parking lot of a Little Rock
bar called Slick Willie's - the same nickname later given to Clinton himself.
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- The book says Mrs. Clinton showed no
emotion except when she realized one of the women
worked at the Rose Law Firm where she was a partner. Duda
later lost his PI license in what he claims was an attempt by supporters
of Bill Clinton to intimidate him. >>>> Mrs. Clinton's spokeswoman
dismissed the claim that her boss hired Duda.
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- "I think it's just rumors. I don't
think there's any basis for this as far as I can tell," said spokeswoman
Marsha Berry.
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- "It's my word against hers. ...
There's only two people who really know," Duda conceded.
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- Milton, 53, an ex-New York librarian
who has written biographies of Charlie Chaplin and the Lindberghs, said
she started out writing about Mrs. Clinton's policy ideas and planned to
steer away from any dirt: "That is not why I wrote the book,"
she said.
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- The book also claims:
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- * Mrs. Clinton barred Barbra Streisand
from staying overnight in the Lincoln Bedroom after her frequent White
House visits sparked gossip. Berry also dismissed that as "rumor"
yesterday.
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- * A Hillary pal, Norma Asnes, offered
Linda Tripp a private-sector job soon after Newsweek magazine revealed
that Tripp saw a disheveled Kathleen Willey emerge from the Oval Office
after the president allegedly groped her.
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- * Monica Lewinsky wasn't the only girlfriend
to get a copy of Walt Whitman's sensuous Leaves of Grass - Clinton gave
a copy to Hillary after their second date.
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