Star Telegram | Now she's talking

A review of the book about how a pretty, small-town Arkansas woman becomes a hero.

"Her confinement included punishment which can only be deemed 'cruel and unusual,' " [Helen] Thomas writes in the introduction to The Woman Who Wouldn't Talk. All to punish a woman simply for refusing to testify.

"I remember [Starr] would come out during the trial at these press briefings and say these things," she says. "Once he said, 'I stopped at a red light on my way to the court and sang a hymn.' I thought, 'I may have to physically intervene.' It was galling that he could be ruining my life, ruining other people's lives, and use the guise of his Christianity to say, 'Oh, I'm such a nice guy.' It's the hypocrisy I couldn't stand more than anything else."

It comes up time and again from those involved with Susan's defense: that Starr's team acted like religious zealots on a mission from God.

"They felt like the end justified the means; they felt so self-righteous and holier-than-thou, so much better than the Clintons," says McDaniel. "They were willing to do anything they could."

Susan says that her decision to fight Starr never had anything to do with Bill Clinton. It had to do with being able to live with herself.

I may have to buy this. Right now I am working on Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion which extensively documents how crack was introduced to the US by the contras to finance their terrorist war with the knowledge of elements of the US intelligence community. I also recommend Blinded By the Right: The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative as well, for a good look at the people running this country and how they got there.