EXILED BUBBA'S POLITICAL NIGHT-MAYOR
By GINGER ADAMS OTIS

March 2, 2008 -- Bill Clinton arrived at his $1.3 million dollar home in Westchester at 6 p.m. Jan. 21, 2001, deeply in debt, jobless and struggling to adjust to his downgraded lifestyle, according to Chicago journalist Carol Felsenthal, whose unauthorized biography, "Clinton in Exile," hits stores next month.

As his final days in the White House waned, supermarket magnate John Catsimaditidis, a longtime Clinton backer, flew down to Washington to bolster his friend's spirits.

The self-made billionaire - who now is preparing his own bid for mayor of New York - tried to convince Clinton he should run for mayor in 2001.

"He didn't rule it out as foolish the minute it was mentioned," Catsimaditidis says in the book.

"I think for a few seconds he considered it."

It wasn't until after 9/11, however, that Clinton really began to regain some of his confidence and focus.

As America's popularity overseas diminished, Clinton's personal fame grew; he nabbed six-figure speaking fees at summits and seminars abroad while still somewhat shunned by the party establishment at home, Felsenthal says.

His true re-entry into politics came in 2006, Felsenthal writes, when his wife began planning in earnest for her run for the White House.

 

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Los Angeles Times

December 24, 2007 Monday
Home Edition

Publishers will hit the campaign trail

BYLINE: Josh Getlin, Times Staff Writer

Political celebrities

Former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich penned "Real Change," which Regnery's Ross described as a critique of Republicans and Democrats for losing touch with Americans. Meanwhile, Democrats are putting out a flurry of books: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has written "Open House," Virginia Sen. Jim Webb "A Time to Fight," and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid "The Good Fight." Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeline Albright is releasing "Memo to the President-Elect," and former White House Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers has written "Why Women Should Rule the World: A Memoir." Nobel Prize winner Al Gore will publish another environmental title, "The Path to Survival," on Earth Day.

Books on the Clintons have become a publishing niche unto themselves, and new titles include "Thirty Ways of Looking at Hillary," a collection of essays edited by Susan Morrison; "Clinton in Exile," a look at Bill Clinton's post-presidential years by Carol Felsenthal; and "Clintonisms: The Amusing, Confusing and Even Suspect Musing of Billary" edited by Julia Gorin.

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April 10, 2007

BY ROBERT FEDER Sun-Times columnist

Chicago magazine contributing editor Carol Felsenthal's 1993 biography of the late Washington Post Publisher Katharine Graham is about to be made into a movie by HBO Films.

Writer Joan Didion has adapted Power, Privilege and the Post: the Katharine Graham Story into a screenplay. No word yet on who'll play the legendary media mogul in the film to be directed by Tom Hooper.

Meanwhile, Felsenthal is busy working on a new biography of former President Bill Clinton, to be published by William Morrow.

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June 12, 2008

Lynn Sweet
The scoop from Washington

Obama at first downplayed vetter Johnson problem. Chicago's Carol Felsenthal new "Clinton in Exile" book looks into Obama veep vetter Holder role in Marc Rich pardon.

WASHINGTON -- Presumptive Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama -- after first downplaying questions about the ethics of his chief vice presidential vetter Jim Johnson, the former Fannie Mae chief -- on Wednesday accepted his resignation.

"Jim did not want to distract in any way from the very important task of gathering information about my vice presidential nominee, so he has made a decision to step aside that I accept," Obama said in a statement.

"We have a very good selection process under way, and I am confident that it will produce a number of highly qualified candidates for me to choose from in the weeks ahead. I remain grateful to Jim for his service and his efforts in this process."

Johnson, Caroline Kennedy and former Deputy U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder were the three-member team Obama tapped to vet potential running mates.

On June 5, Obama told reporters traveling with him that "there is no decision that I am going to make that is more important before the November election. I intend to do it right and I'm not going to [do it] in the press."

But that was before Saturday's Wall Street Journal report that Johnson obtained below-market mortgages from Countrywide, the national home lender under investigation for subprime loans -- and a company singled out by Obama for contributing to the housing market crisis.

The apparent sweetheart deal, coupled with rehashes of Johnson's lucrative pay packages while at Fannie Mae -- executive boondoggles are another Obama target -- exploded on the Internet, cable political shows and into mainstream newspapers.

On Monday, Obama brushed aside questions about Johnson and Holder. Republicans started using Johnson to bash Obama's holier-than-thou anti-lobbyist drive, throwing Holder into the mix because of his role in the controversial pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich by President Bill Clinton.

"I mean, first of all, I am not vetting my VP search committee for their mortgages. . . . I would have to hire a vetter to vet the vetters," Obama said.

In a new book about Bill Clinton, Clinton in Exile by Chicago author Carol Felsenthal, Holder -- then the No. 2 man in the Clinton Justice Department, with responsibility for pardons -- was seen as "so ambitious to be attorney general in the expected Gore administration" that he "played ball" with a Gore confidant, Jack Quinn, who was Rich's lawyer. Felsenthal wrote that Holder ''adamantly denies there was any secret deal.''

(Holder, also a former federal prosecutor, headed the team that indicted former Ways and Means Chairman Rep. Dan Rostenkowski.)

Several people I talked to in Obama's orbit were surprised that Obama tapped Johnson. For a candidate running on a change platform and against Washington, Johnson is an insider's insider. He vetted vice presidential contenders for Walter Mondale in 1984 and John Kerry in 2004.

Alex Conant, spokesman for the Republican National Committee, said if Obama "is concerned his campaign's ties to special interests are distracting from his VP search and message, why is Eric Holder still on his search committee," adding "Obama's hypocritical attacks show he can't stand up to his own standard -- and that he just isn't ready to make change."

Shot back Obama spokesman Bill Burton, "We don't need any lectures from a campaign that waited 15 months to purge the lobbyists from their staff, and only did so because they said it was a 'perception problem.' "

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"Media Mix," The Examiner.com
POSTED June 13, 2:25 AM

Carol Felsenthal is the author of “Clinton in Exile: A President Out of the White House.” The book takes readers everywhere from Bill Clinton’s humanitarian efforts to his role in his wife’s presidential campaign.

Q: What CD are you listening to now?
“Sain-Saens: the 5 Piano Concertos,” by L’Orchestre du Capitole de Toulouse, Michel Plasson

Q: What was the last movie you saw?
“Atonement”

Q: What Web sites do you visit in the morning?
CNN Political Ticker, PoynterOnline (Romenesko), MSNBC’s First Read, Huffington Post, Washington Post

Q: What book are you reading?
“Obama: From Promise to Power,” by David Mendell, and “Shelley’s Heart,” a novel by Charles McCarry

Q: What’s your favorite TV show?
“Hardball” with Chris Matthews

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The Huffington Post

Carol posted her first blog on The Huffington Post on March 17, 2008. Look for, she hopes, a couple of posts most weeks on:

The Huffington Post

Read Posts:

7 /01/08: Barack Obambi? Not Quite; Just Ask Alice Palmer

6/27/08: Bye Bye Book Section?

6/25/08: Someone Get Barack Bill's Cell Phone Number

6/24/08: Big Slip of Chris Matthews' Tongue

6/24/08: What Does Elian Gonzalez Have to Do With Obama's Search for a VP?

6/20/08: Bill Clinton’s Hurt Feelings: When Will He Endorse Obama?

6/20/08: Obama’s Shortlist Just Got Shorter

6/17/08: The Big Unmentionable

6/10/08: Bill and Dorothy Rodham: What Must She Think of Him?

6/08/08: Bill Clinton's Failed Television Career

6/06/08: Dick Cheney Says He Has Never Written a Book; Oops! Yes He Has

6/05/08: Does Obama Really Want Voters to Remember Marc Rich?

6/03/08: Bill Explodes But Then Apologizes

6/02/08: Bill Clinton's Sad Response to a Magazine Piece

5/26/08: Jim Johnson, NAFTA, and Barack's Short List for Vice President - Politics on The Huffington Post

5/26/08: Give Hillary a Break?

5/22/08: Chelsea in 2016? Just a Minute! What About Hillary?

5/18/08: Carol Felsenthal: Gov. Bobblehead for Vice President? - Politics on The Huffington Post

5/15/08: Hillary on the Bottom?

5/13/08: Myanmar (and China) Need the odd Couple

5/07/08: George McGovern and Bill Clinton: The state of the Friendship

4/30/08: The Reverend Wright on Bill Clinton and Monica

4/28/08: Billary Revisits a Tactic From 2004

4/27/08: George McGovern and Bill Clinton: the State of the Friendship

4/23/08: Bill and Hill On Stage Together Again

4/22/08: Bill Clinton: "They (Obama and company) Played the Race Card on Me"

4/19/08: Bill and Hillary's Biggest White House Stresses were Self-Inflicted and Obama Should Say So

4/17/08: Bill, Bernardine, and Barack

4/15/08: It Takes One Elitist (i.e. Bill Clinton) to Recognize Another

4/10/08: Bashing Bill Clinton (Again)

4/03/08: Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton: They Genuinely Dislike Each Other

3/31/08: The Cost of Being a Woman (Candidate)

3/28/08: Waiting for a Wise Man

3/24/08: Who's Paying Maggie Williams?

3/21/08: The Blue Dress, The Stain, and the Deal

3/21/08: The Big Whopper

3/17/08: Bill Clinton's Memoir Envy

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Spring reads
New Vonnegut, a big debut, a pig in the city . . .
By Brandon Griggs
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 03/29/2008 08:34:35 AM MDT

It's spring, traditionally a time of year to emerge from hibernation and get outside. Publishers don't issue as many major books this season as they do in the fall, but that doesn't mean there's nothing new to read.
Here are a handful of titles - high-profile, provocative or just intriguing - scheduled to hit bookstores in April and May.

Armageddon in Retrospect, by Kurt Vonnegut - To be released on the first anniversary of Vonnegut's death, this volume collects 12 of the the master satirist's new and unpublished writings on war and peace. Included are Vonnegut's last speech, selections of his artwork and an introduction by Mark Vonnegut, his son. (April; Penguin, $24.95)

Where Are You Now? by Mary Higgins Clark - Clark, America's reigning queen of guilty-pleasure suspense novels, returns with this tale about a young New York lawyer investigating the mysterious disappearance of her older brother 10 years earlier. He places a ritual call to their mom every Mother's Day, tells her he's fine and then hangs up. (April; Simon & Schuster, $25.95)

The White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga - Reviewers already are hyping this literary debut by a young Indian novelist. Adiga explores India's infamous class struggles through a darkly comic story about an impoverished but cunning man whose fortunes rise after he's hired as a driver for a rich landlord. (April; Free Press, $24)

Boots on the Ground by Dusk: The Remarkable Life & Death of Pat Tillman, by Mary Tillman - Tillman chronicles the life of her son, who walked away from a multimillion-dollar NFL contract to enlist as an Army Ranger in Afghanistan, where he was killed by friendly fire. She also recounts her efforts to pry the truth about his death from a reluctant and secretive U.S. military. (April; Modern Times, $25.95)

Story of a Marriage, by Andrew Sean Greer - Set in a pre-liberated 1950s San Francisco, this novel is about an agonizing love triangle among a dutiful housewife, her childhood sweetheart-turned-husband and his male lover, all of them trapped by the conformist nature of the era. Dave Eggers calls it "a haunting book of breathtaking beauty and restraint." (April; Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $22)

What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and What's Wrong with Washington, by Scott McClellan - Political pundits already are speculating about what's in this account by McClellan, White House press secretary from 2003 to 2006. His publisher says the book was "written with no agenda other than to record his experiences and insights for the benefit of history." We'll see. (May; Perseus, $27.95)

Clinton in Exile: A President Out of the White House, by Carol Felsenthal - If you're wondering what Bill Clinton has been up to in recent years besides campaigning ineffectively for his wife, here's the book for you. Felsenthal promises fresh insights into the ex-prez's post-White House life, his health and the true nature of his complex relationship with Hillary. (May; HarperCollins, $25.95)

Swine Not? by Jimmy Buffett with illustrations by Helen Bransford - The tropical crooner's latest, pitched at adults and kids alike, is the tall tale of a family who move from the South to a posh New York hotel and must hide their beloved pet pig, Rumpy, from the staff. Think Eloise meets "Babe: Pig in the City." (May; Little, Brown, $21.99)
griggs@sltrib.com