Final Five Alternative Career Suggestions for Hillary Rodham Clinton: Part 3 of 3

11. Celebrity Author: Someone should make sure she pays the people who help her with her next book, though. When Barbara Feinman Todd accused Hillary of having failed to recognize, in print or in payment, Professor Todd's work on Senator Clinton's book, the candidate should have paid up at once. Failure to do so merely spawned mudslinging like http://www.drudge.com/news/104376/hillarys-fraud (I think it's mean and unfunny, but I'm including this link so you can judge for yourself).

I'm one of the people who have helped other people write books, and I was in Washington when this mini-scandal broke and the facts were aired, so the next few paragraphs contain my opinion, no jokes. (More jokes further below.)

It's a fact that Hillary Rodham Clinton is nearsighted, almost to the point of being "legally blind," and would have had a miserable time physically writing a book as long as It Takes a Village.

It's a fact that people who read Hillary's "My Turn" columns in the Washington Post agreed that the author's tone of voice in It Takes a Village was recognizably different than in "My Turn."

It's a fact that most politicians aren't writers, and hire professional writers to turn notes and tapes into speeches, articles,and books for them.

There aren't enough words in the English language to describe the different things people do that can be classified as "helping someone else write." Many books, especially the memoirs of people who are famous for something other than writing, are written by a synergistic process. Different writers have different needs and abilities that mesh in different way. I've helped seven writers with nine book manuscripts, and that's been nine different jobs.