Arnold Is No Bill Clinton

Now that nearly a dozen women have stepped forward to accuse California gubernatorial front-runner Arnold Schwarzenegger of groping them, Democrats and their media friends are brimming with comparisons to Bill Clinton.

But are the allegations against Schwarzenegger and Clinton at all similar? Not really. In fact, they're not even close.

Nothing that Arnold stands accused of comes remotely close to the charge by Juanita Broaddrick, who was subjected to a thorough FBI investigation and vetted by NBC News for a full five weeks before the network would even consider broadcasting her account of a sexual assault by Mr. Clinton.

The encounter, by the way, left Broaddrick not merely humiliated, as so many of Arnold's accusers say they were, but also bruised and bleeding.

Compare the meticulous investigation that the Clinton accuser was put through to the way allegations against Schwarzenegger are now being rushed into print.

The New York Times, for instance, reported late Friday, "Gail Escobar, a waitress in Santa Monica, accused Mr. Schwarzenegger of threatening to rape her 25 years ago."

After covering the charge, however, the Times admitted: "It was impossible to verify the accusation by Ms. Escobar, who was joined by a representative of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., which supports Mr. Davis. Nonetheless, the woman was mobbed by reporters."

Why is the press covering an accusation that it acknowledges is "impossible to verify" - especially one that's so potentially incendiary?

Broaddrick, after all, had five witnesses who corroborated her story, including one who saw her minutes after the attack and described to NBC her torn pantyhose and bruised face.

Ms. Escobar is the only one to use the "R" word in connection with Arnold, and then only to describe a taunt that was not acted upon.

Mrs. Broaddrick, however, isn't alone in accusing Mr. Clinton of a violent sexual assault.

In his 1996 Clinton biography, "Partners in Power," award-winning author Roger Morris reported:

"A young woman lawyer in Little Rock claimed that she was accosted by Clinton while he was attorney general and that when she recoiled he forced himself on her, biting and bruising her.

"Deeply affected by the assault, the woman decided to keep it all quiet for the sake of her own hard won career and that of her husband. When the husband later saw Clinton at the 1980 Democratic Convention, he delivered a warning. 'If you ever approach her,' he told the governor, 'I'll kill you.'

"Not even seeing fit to deny the incident, Bill Clinton sheepishly apologized and duly promised never to bother her again." [End of Excerpt]

While Arnold now admits he engaged in boorish and offensive behavior, not a single accusation leveled against him approaches the egregiousness of the attack described above.

Some Schwarzenegger critics prefer to ignore the Clinton assault charges altogether, and instead draw a comparison between the GOP front-runner's actions and what the ex-president did with Paula Jones.

But even this misses the mark by a substantial margin.

In a story similar to that told by some of Arnold's accusers, Jones says she was groped by the future president in a Little Rock hotel room in 1991. But that wasn't the main offense.

According to the affidavit filed by Jones in 1994, after Clinton groped her, he "approached the sofa and as he sat down he lowered his trousers and underwear exposing [himself] and asked Jones to 'kiss it.'"

Jones refused, drawing this reaction from the future president, according to her affidavit:

"Clinton, while fondling [himself] said: "Well, I don't want to make you do anything you don't want to do."

Jones, by the way, told lawyers she didn't bolt from the room earlier because she knew Clinton's bodyguard was standing outside with a gun.

Arnold may have indeed groped and grabbed his way through his movie days, but his accusers' complaints pale next to Paula Jones' lurid account, not to mention the accusations of Juanita Broaddrick and the "young woman lawyer in Little Rock."

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
California Governor's Race

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