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Ever since Clinton infuriated leaders of New York's Puerto Rican community with her surprise statement opposing her husband's clemency offer for radical pro-independence prisoners, her Latino allies have mutinied against her. As a result, she's spent much of the last two weeks in damage-control mode.

She's tried everything -- shmoozing at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus gala; standing shoulder to shoulder with Bronx Borough President Fernando Ferrer, one of the city's top Puerto Rican officials, to denounce the GOP's tax bill; and working into her speeches her long-ago efforts to help register Hispanic voters in the Rio Grande Valley.

Even as she's tried to repair the damage from the clemency debacle, Clinton has faced another Puerto Rican political issue that is set to explode on the national stage this week: the status of the U.S. Navy's bombing range on a tiny island called Vieques.

At a New York press conference last week, the crowd burst into laughter when Hillary tried to avoid answering a question concerning Vieques. "One thing I want to do is consult with a number of people," she said with a nervous titter, referring to the lack of time she spent talking to Latino leaders before coming out against the clemency offer. "I am heavy into consultations right now."

She better be. On Wednesday, the House and Senate Armed Forces Committees will hold the first of a number of hearings that will no doubt keep the questions coming. Already, a number of U.S. politicians of various stripes are on the record as wanting to force the Navy from the island.

"What is unfortunate, I find, is that while we are focused on whether or not [the prisoners] should be released, the real issue here is Vieques," the Rev. Jesse Jackson recently said in a television appearance. "Should the U.S. own Vieques? If Indonesia should not own East Timor and if the U.S. should not own the Panama Canal, we should not own Vieques ... The real issue today is our Navy should leave Vieques as an occupying force. We should not be a colonial power in Puerto Rico in 1999."

In August, Jackson visited the island and held a press conference about the issue with Puerto Rican Gov. Pedro Rosello. Jackson pledged to rally Hispanic voters across the country and make Vieques a major campaign 2000 issue.

Why now?

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