In this year's Virginia governor’s race, both party nominees are airing warm ads about family right now. GOP Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has been accused of lacking warmth. But that’s nothing next to what Buzzfeed dug up in former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe’s 2007 memoir “What A Party!”
Andrew Kaczynski offered a story where McAuliffe went to a Washington Post party while his wife was in the hospital preparing to have a baby. Somehow, this slipped past the Post itself when it reviewed the book in 2007:
I made the rounds at the party and ran into Marjorie Williams, who was writing a story on me for Vanity Fair, magazine. She was shocked to see me at the party. 'Isn't Dorothy having a baby today?' she asked. 'That's right,' I said, 'but she threw me out the room.' Marjorie just couldn't understand how I left Dorothy alone.
In the book, McAuliffe also confessed to going briefly into a fundraiser on the way home from the birth of his son Peter, with his wife starting to cry in the car. But here's how the Washington Post book review by Peter Baker went in 2007:
At the very least, there is one totally true statement in Terence R. McAuliffe's new memoir: "This is my book," he writes, "and obviously I've done my best to make myself look good."
Maybe not! The Post book review found time to end on with a McAuliffe anecdote where Barbra Streisand hates dogs and wanted no dogs to sniff for explosives or trouble on her estate before Bill Clinton arrived. She was told no dogs, no Bill. She relented, but then screamed at McAuliffe when she stepped in doggy poo. This anecdote made the paper, but not the WashPost party story.
It drew some notice now -- at least on a Washington Post blog. At “She the People,” the headline was “Terry McAuliffe partied (and argued about health care) while his wife gave birth.” Diana Reese argued, “Maybe Virginia’s voters will find Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe’s dedication to work admirable, but I’m glad he’s not my husband.”
She added a third story that when his son Jack was being born, he got thrown out of the room after having a political argument:
“[W]hile poor Dorothy was in labor with their son Jack, McAuliffe got into “a heated argument” with the anesthesiologist and the obstetrician.
The anesthesiologist asked McAuliffe if he wanted socialized medicine. (I guess we can blame the doctor for starting this discussion.) In his book, McAuliffe writes, “‘Of course not,’ I said. ‘However, there are thirty-seven million uninsured people in this country with no access to health care. Is that fair?’” He admits that he was “almost shouting” at this point.
Then the nurse kicked him out.
