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Calendar: Roll Call Book Club Scours ‘HRC’

Are you or your boss on an enemies list? It’s not as paranoid as you might think to wonder.  

Where do you stand with the Clintons? (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call File Photo)
Where do you stand with the Clintons? (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call File Photo)

More than 40 years after President Richard M. Nixon’s list of political opponents and enemies made headlines, political reporters Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes detail an undertaking by aides to then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., to chronicle what they call a “political hit list”  in the aftermath of her defeat in the presidential primary to Barack Obama.  

Obama, of course, went on to win the presidency and tap Clinton as his secretary of State, but political battles leave scars, particularly in the halls of power. On Thursday, the Roll Call Book Club will be back in action at the Hill Center to discuss the book, as well as to feed and water the book-hungry political masses.  

“There was a special circle of Clinton hell reserved for people who had endorsed Obama or stayed on the fence after Bill and Hillary had raised money for them, appointed them to a political post, or written a recommendation to ice their kid’s application to an elite school,” Allen and Parnes write. The list of people with the highest ranking, compiled by Kris Balderston and Adrienne Elrod, includes such luminaries as the current secretary of State, ex-Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.; the Senate President Pro Tem, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy, D-Vt.; and House Budget ranking member Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.; as well as some senior Democratic elder statesmen like Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., and Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.  

But that was so 2008! Think so? Just look at whom the Clintons bestowed favors upon in the 2012 election (Howdy, now-Rep. John Delaney, D-Md.!) and take a look at their current political activity. Allen, now Bloomberg News’ Washington bureau chief, and Parnes, White House correspondent for The Hill, look deeply not just at the aftermath of the 2008 election, but Hillary Rodham Clinton’s tenure at Foggy Bottom, with particular attention to the Benghazi, Libya, attacks, where Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three others were killed on Sept. 11, 2012.  

Benghazi has popped up again, with Republicans in the House revving up a special committee and prepping lines of attack for 2016. Hillary Rodham Clinton has already testified on the Hill about the attacks . But this party, and the 2016 race, is just getting started, so don’t be surprised if the nascent Democratic frontrunner gets another invitation to go under the microscope again.  

So there should be plenty to discuss with Allen and Parnes. Things get started around 6 p.m. on Thursday at 921 Pennsylvania Ave. SE. It’s free, as always, and we’ll supply the food and libations as well. The authors will be there not just to discuss the book, their reporting and to answer questions, but also to sign free copies of their book on a first-come, first-served basis. To register, see the listing on EventBrite .

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