Vast right-wing conspiracy
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"Vast right-wing conspiracy" was a phrase used by then First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton in 1998 in defense of her husband President Bill Clinton and his administration during the Lewinsky scandal, characterizing the Lewinsky charges as the latest in a long, organized, collaborative series of charges by Clinton's political enemies.
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[edit] Origin
While popularized by Ms. Clinton in her 1998 interview, the phrase did not originate with her. In 1991 the Detroit News wrote:
- Thatcher-era Britain produced its own crop of paranoid left-liberal films. ... All posited a vast right-wing conspiracy propping up a reactionary government ruthlessly crushing all efforts at opposition under the guise of parliamentary democracy.
An AP story in 1995 also used the phrase, relating an official's guess that the Oklahoma City bombing was the work of "maybe five malcontents" and not "some kind of vast right-wing conspiracy."[1]
[edit] The Today Show interview
Allegations that Bill Clinton had an affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky, and then lied about it under oath, first made national headlines on January 17, 1998, when the story was picked up by The Drudge Report.[citation needed] Despite swift denials from President Clinton, the clamor for answers grew louder. On January 27, 1998, Hillary Clinton appeared on NBC's The Today Show, in an interview with Matt Lauer.
- Matt Lauer: "You have said, I understand, to some close friends, that this is the last great battle, and that one side or the other is going down here."
- Hillary Clinton: "Well, I don't know if I've been that dramatic. That would sound like a good line from a movie. But I do believe that this is a battle. I mean, look at the very people who are involved in this — they have popped up in other settings. This is — the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president."
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[edit] Later interpretations
David Brock, a conservative-turned-liberal pundit, has said he was once a part of an effort to dredge up a scandal against Clinton.[2] In 1993 Brock, then of the American Spectator, was the first to report Paula Jones' claims.[2] As Brock explained in Blinded by the Right, after learning more about the events and conservative payments surrounding Paula Jones he personally apologized to the Clintons. He documented his experience in Blinded by the Right: The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative, wherein he alleged that Arkansas state troopers had taken money in exchange for testimony against Clinton which Brock had published in a previous book. Adam Curtis also discusses the concept in his documentary series The Power of Nightmares. Brock has confirmed Clinton's claim that there was a "Right wing conspiracy" to smear her husband, quibbling only with the characterization of it as "vast", since Brock contends that it was orchestrated mainly by a few powerful people.
Claims have also been made against Republican supporter and billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife, whom former Clinton White House Counsel Lanny Davis once claimed was using his money "to destroy a president of the United States." Scaife claims to be public about his political spending (q.v. [3]). CNN stated in a study the news outlet conducted on Scaife, "If it's a conspiracy, it's a pretty open one."[4]
Hillary Clinton later said in her 2003 autobiography that, "Looking back, I see that I might have phrased my point more artfully, but I stand by the characterization of Starr's investigation [regardless of the truth about Lewinsky]."[5] Moreover, by 2007 Clinton was saying in her presidential campaign appearances that the vast right-wing conspiracy was back, citing such cases as the 2002 New Hampshire Senate election phone jamming scandal.[6]
On the stump for Al Franken's 2008 Senate campign, Clinton invoked the "vast right wing conspiracy".[7]
[edit] Use in popular culture
After the Starr investigation revealed that the Lewinsky allegations were not a fabrication of a "vast right-wing conspiracy," and that Bill Clinton had committed perjury, conservatives began to use Hillary's phrase in an ironic context. In 2004, conservative lawyer Mark W. Smith wrote the Official Handbook of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy, which came with a "membership card" that made its owner an "official member of the VRWC." A number of entrepreneurs are selling VRWC merchandise. [8] Similarly, a number of newspaper, magazine, and website articles have played on the phrase.[9][10]
Rush Limbaugh, radio talk show host and political pundit, has referred to his fan base as the "Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy" and himself as "Mr. Big" of the VRWC. Limbaugh distributed coffee mugs imprinted with "Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy."
QubeTV has the slogan "Starring The Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" on its website's masthead.
Darby Conley (cartoonist for the comic 'Get Fuzzy') produced a comic where Bucky Katt used the line "It's a right wing conspiracy!" to which his compadre Satchel responds, "I wish I was in a vast chicken wing conspiracy."
In october 2008 Stephen Colbert was named the Arbiter and Defender of the "Vast right wing conspiracy".
[edit] See also
- The Arkansas Project
- Clinton Chronicles
- Troopergate
- Whitewater (controversy)
- List of political catch phrases
[edit] References
- ^ Safire, William. Safire's Political Dictionary. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.
- ^ a b "Reporter Apologizes For Clinton Sex Article", CNN (March 10, 1998). Retrieved on 2008-10-17.
- ^ scaife.org
- ^ Who Is Richard Mellon Scaife? - April 27, 1998
- ^ Living History, p. 446.
- ^ Clinton: Vast right-wing conspiracy is back, MSNBC/AP, March 13, 2007
- ^ "Hillary Clinton, Al Franken and the Return of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy" The Washington Post - The Trail October 21, 2008 By: Kane, Paul http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/10/21/hillary_clinton_al_franken_and.html
- ^ member "vast right wing conspiracy" - Google Product Search
- ^ "Wiring the Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy", The New York Times Magazine (2004-07-25).
- ^ "The Clinton-McFarland Connection: A vast left-wing conspiracy?".
[edit] External links
- Washington Post, January 28, 1998 "First Lady Launches Counterattack"
- CNN, January 27, 1998 "Hillary Clinton: 'This Is A Battle'"
- Transcript of Hillary Clinton interview
- The Hunting of the President: The Ten-Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton
- CBS
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