NYPost THE LADY'S FLACK DOTH PROTEST

April 22, 2001 -- Directly to the right of this column appears a letter from Sen. Hillary Clinton's spokesman contesting a recent Post editorial that suggested a touch of hypocrisy on the senator's part on the subject of campaign-finance reform.

Is Hillary, who decries the corrupting influence of soft-money contributions, actually accepting such donations? Well, not surprisingly, it sort of depends on what your definition of "is" is.

Clinton's personal PAC, Jim Kennedy writes, does not accept soft-money contributions and "is not ‘raising millions in soft money for herself'" (emphasis added).

What she does do is eagerly raise soft-money contributions for state Democratic committees - including New York's. And in 2000, that money was then used on her election campaign.

More importantly, you can't argue for banning soft money as a moral imperative and then greedily rake in as much as you can until all such donations are banned.

-- Anonymous, April 22, 2001