Book Review: Hell To Pay

The late, great Barbara Olson was a brainy woman. As a passenger on board American Airlines Flight 77, she was among the first to perish in the War Against Terror. In her honor, a yearly lecture is presented at the Federalist Society. Her husband, then Solicitor General Ted Olson, gave the first of these lectures in on November 16, 2001. In summing up his wife's life he said,

It was typically Barbara that when Al Regnery suggested that she write a book about Hillary Rodham Clinton, she literally jumped at the chance. She told me at the time that she wasn't sure that she was a writer, but a friend of ours told her that she didn't have to be a writer to be an author. So, with her legendary energy and limitless self-confidence, she poured herself into the book, finished it in nine months and, against seemingly insurmountable odds, without any previous experience with serious writing, climbed onto the New York Times best seller list during the heaviest competitive time of the year, and stayed there for nine weeks. Ten days ago, her second book, written in about six months and finished just days before her death, opened at number two on the New York Times bestseller list, ahead of Bill O'Reilly, Jack Welch and Tiger Woods. Not bad.

Barbara was everywhere in Washington. A witness for Clarence Thomas at his confirmation, a co-founder of the Independent Women's Forum, hosting Federalist Society members from all over the country in her home, at the epicenter of the travel office and filegate investigations, and the China campaign contributions investigation, the second-most invited guest on "Larry King Live," appearing on MSNBC, FOX, "Meet the Press," "Cross-Fire," "Geraldo," "Politically Incorrect," you name it. Ready to talk about any subject, ready to face down any adversary. She always had an opinion. And she always had that smile.

I could tell you Barbara stories for hours, and I think that you would be glad to listen. But, in short, Barbara partook of everything life gave her. She saw no limits in the people around her and she accepted no limits on what she could accomplish. She could be charming, tough, indefatigable, ferocious and lovable. And all those things at once.

Barbara was Barbara because America, unlike anyplace in the world, gave her the space, freedom, oxygen, encouragement and inspiration to be whatever she wanted to be. Is there any other place on earth where someone could do all these things in forty-five years?

So, sadly, and ironically, Barbara may have been the perfect victim for these wretched, twisted, hateful people. Because she was so thoroughly and hugely an American. And such a symbol of America's values, ideals, and robust ambition. But she died as she lived. Fighting, believing in herself, and determined to succeed. And, if she was the perfect victim, she is also a perfect symbol of what we are fighting for now and for why we will prevail.

Ms. Olson's first book, Hell To Pay, shows us the real Hillary Rodham Clinton. We learn about her first forays into funding Defeat-ocrat candidates with federal tax dollars. We learn about her first acts of enabling her husband's lascivious behaviour. We learn about her exposure to liberalism in law school and her study of Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals. And we learn why children are so very important to her, politically.

We also see, on almost every page, a combination of shock, amazement, and revulsion at what a person will do for personal power. That's because Mrs. Olson, like so many people, was the anti-Hillary. Where Mrs. Olson would have seen the best in people, Hillary sees either an asset to be used or an enemy to be investigated and crushed. Where Mrs. Olson would answer questions forthrightly, Hillary will evade or prevaricate or do whatever must be done in order to avoid the truth.

A telling excerpt:

There is another side to their early relationship. Hillary was well acquainted with Arkansas long before she moved to Fayetteville. She had lived in Arkansas for part of 1974, when Bill Clinton had decided to run against incumbent Republican Congressman John Paul Hammerschmidt. The Clintons and their boosters rarely talk about that race, and for good reason. It was during this time that Hillary learned all too well what kind of husband Bill Clinton would make.

Two legacies were created during this period. First, in the Clinton marriage, the personal fused with the political. The risks that Bill Clinton took with his relationship with Hillary were inseparable from the risks he took with his own career.

The second legacy is the need for what Clinton consultant and friend Dick Morris called "the secret police." Hillary learned about private investigators in her work on behalf of the Black Panthers and the Communist apologists Robert Treuhaft and Jessica Mitford. Now Hillary was constantly checking up on bill, not just to learn the extent of his betrayals, but to assess the danger he posed to their joint political career.

Hillary began her surveillance of bill during this period in simple ways, eavesdropping and checking his desk. While Hillary knew Bill was cheating, she didn't know that Mary Lee Fray—the woman charged with making Hillary more attractive—was also the shepherd who kept the doors revolving so that Hillary never umped into what she called "Bill's special friends." Clinton campaign coordinator Neal McDonald remembered that Bill "had a girl friend in every county."

While Hillary assumed that her intellect would keep Bill at her side, Mary Lee Fray lamented that Hillary "had a weight problem and she wouldn't diet.... She didn't have a body for a dress. So I told her to at least buy some nice underclothes."

If it came to a choice between changing her lingerie or snooping on Bill, Hillary preferred to search for scraps of paper with phone numbers on them and tear them up, mutilating the paper as though it were a Black Panther informant betraying Bobby Seale to "the pigs."

With liberals, and most certainly with Mrs. Clinton, it's all about personal power; accumulating it, maintaining it, and exercising it. This book covers all three. I consider this book an indispensable guide into the mind of Mrs. Clinton. If you want to know how Her Vileness became Her Vileness and why she acts the way she does, read this book.