Feature

Hillary's Turn

NYM: What are the specific burdens, then, of being both First Lady and candidate?

HRC: Well, I don't know any person who runs for Senate who gets as much attention as I do at this point in the race. Adding to my high visibility is the fact that because I do come from the White House, I think it's appropriate that people would be weighing what I say and trying to understand whether what I'm saying is in some way related to the administration, or to the president, or to the Justice Department, or to somebody else. So I think I have that extra caution, to be as clear as I can and not to raise any extraneous issues. And that's what I'm trying to do.

NYM: That might be a particular liability in New York, which is a place that likes its politicians -- well, to mouth off, really. Ed Koch is the archetype of this.

HRC: He is. And I think as the campaign goes on, that becomes more of an option for me. I have a lot to say. I have a lot of, you know, irreverent mouthing-off to do. Which I fully intend to be able to do. But I don't think that this far out from an election, when I'm still getting to know people and people are still getting to know me, that that's the best way for me to spend whatever time I can have getting into people's living rooms.

There's a rhythm to any campaign, and in this campaign, people are intensely interested, and while they're interested about me, I want them to get to see me talking about what they care about, and how I'd go about the business of the Senate. There'll be plenty of time for one-liners and retorts, but it's not now.

NYM: Okay, I asked you about serious things like literature. What silly things do you like? I, for example, have a soft spot for The Flintstones.

HRC: Well . . . it's funny you should mention The Flintstones. My family were big Flintstones fans, too. And I can't carry a tune, but I could in an off-key way join my brothers in the humming of the Flintstones theme song. My father hated The Flintstones. My father had this devastating stroke and was in intensive care. And we're all in there with him. It's shortly before he died. The doctors had said, "He's not going to come out of it." And my brother said, "Yeah, but, you know, if he wanted to, maybe he could. And what always gets a rise out of him is the theme from The Flintstones." So there we are in intensive care singing and humming -- and carrying on, with tears coming down our faces -- The Flintstones. And my mother's saying, "Oh, God, he's always hated that, don't do that!" My brothers to this day swear that they saw a slight flicker of distaste on his face.

I happen to be more of a Three Stooges fan. I walked into -- oh, I know where we were, we were doing an event at C.W. Post with Chuck Schumer on making college tuition tax-deductible, and we had a family who was sort of representing what this would mean to them. And I walked in, and the man who was going to be on the program and his wife -- he had on a Three Stooges tie. Which I've never seen! And I mean, all their faces in big relief coming down his chest, you know? And so I go up to the man, and I go she leans forward, puts her hands right in front of my face, and, à la Curly, starts snapping her fingers and rapping her knuckles, and he looks at me like laughs, imitates man's shock, you know . . . and I say, "Hi, I want to be your senator!"