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On her own
Hillary takes one giant step and one baby step out of her husband's political shadow.
By Anthony York
[07/08/99]

"My fiancé wants me to be a racist!"
Before Benjamin Nathaniel Smith's killing spree got him on CNN, Rev. Matt Hale was consigned to the Jerry Springer show, where he sparred with black and Jewish viewers and defended hate as a religion.
By Anthony York
[07/07/99]

Politics the KLA way
Divisions between rebel leaders manifest as some leaders split off to form a political party.
By Laura Rozen
[07/07/99]

"Jews have been the villains, not the victims"
The outgoing message on the World Church of the Creator's answering machine offers diet advice, tips for raising "strong, natural, instinctive" white children and a warning to its opponents.

[07/07/99]

Throwing the book at it
Allegations of deceptive politics and public giveaways shroud plans for the Clinton presidential library.
by Suzi Parker
[07/06/99]

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His father, Tennessee Sen. Al Gore Sr., was a Vietnam War opponent who was in the political fight of his life because of his stance on the war. So his son "decided that he was going to enlist and he was helping the anti-war movement by going and enlisting," according to his Harvard roommate, John Tyson, quoted in "Gore: A Political Life," by former ABC News reporter Bob Zelnick.

"He felt by helping his dad and campaigning with his dad [as a soldier] that that was the greatest thing he as an individual could do to stop the war." Gore served as an Army journalist assigned to an engineering brigade near Saigon. In seven months' duty he never saw one American casualty.

At Oxford, then-Rhodes scholar Bill Bradley was asked by a U.S. Air Force officer to inform on Oxford anti-war protestors. He declined. Shortly thereafter, Bradley joined the Air Force Reserves and served on active duty in New Jersey for six months in 1967, after which he joined the New York Knicks midseason.

On the Republican side, the story of Dan Quayle's Indiana National Guard service is well known. Another wealthy Republican, Malcolm S. "Steve" Forbes, also served in the National Guard, in New Jersey, from 1970 to 1976.

And, as a young man, Pat Buchanan may have acted like a tough guy in Georgetown bars, but he received deferments during Vietnam because of his rheumatoid arthritis.

Rep. John Kasich, R-Ohio, was, according to a spokesman, "very fortunate; he got a high draft lottery number."

Alan Keyes, former ambassador to the U.N. Economic and Social Council -- who lists the fact that his father was an Army sergeant on his bio -- had an educational deferment while he was an undergrad at Harvard.

Lamar Alexander's biography brags that he's a former Eagle Scout, but mentions no military experience whatsoever.

Gary Bauer, president of the Family Research Council, also doesn't claim any military service, though he turned 18 in the early 1960s. His campaign refused to return calls for comment.

Only McCain and Sen. Bob Smith, R-N.H., whose father was killed in active duty at the end of World War II, actually fought in the war. Smith served in the Navy and was stationed in the Gulf of Tonkin from 1966 to 1967.

And as a real-life example of the story that inspired "Saving Private Ryan," Sen. Orrin Hatch was exempt from military service because his brother had been shot down and killed over Italy during World War II.

Vietnam marked a departure from the past, when presidential candidates old enough to have served in other wars generally did so. Michael Dukakis, for example, served with the Army from 1955 to 1957, receiving a Good Conduct Medal along with his honorable discharge. Sixteen million American men served in World War II, so odds were that that earlier generation of candidates served. Plus, all the factors that made the conflict what Studs Terkel called "The Good War" made non-service a non-issue. Things were not so simple for Vietnam.

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