A peculiar anecdote
A New York Times piece tries to describe Senator Clinton’s softer side and opens with her delivering a eulogy for a close friend:
“Diane, you were the awesomest,” Mrs. Clinton said, referring to Diane Blair, a political science professor whose eulogy she was giving. “You were the best person that one could have as a friend.”
Mrs. Blair, who died at 61, was described as the sister Mrs. Clinton had always wanted. She practically moved into the White House in 1993 to ease Mrs. Clinton’s transition to Washington, and returned at the end, during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. She sent Mrs. Clinton recipes (though the first lady did not cook), bird-watching manuals (though she cared little for birds), vitamins ( with a note signed “Nurse Diane Fuzzy Wuzzy”) and cards.
“Whenever you have trouble coping, just think of Snow White,” one note said. “She had to live with seven men.”
The crowd laughed when Mrs. Clinton read that at the memorial service, and she smiled along. Her eyes stayed dry, another triumph of her self-possession. Still, her face was puffy and her jaw slightly clenched, as if any breach of emotion could start a deluge. That was a glimpse of a “softer” Hillary Clinton, billed as the “real Hillary” by legions of loyalists…
Maybe it’s just us, but this anecdote seems to make rather the opposite point. Perhaps even more to the heart of the matter, as it were, if that’s the best lede the author could come up with, it suggests that the list of “softer” anecdotes is pretty short indeed.