Chatterbox

Hyde Flunks Barr

Henry Hyde, in an impeachment-postmortem interview in the May issue of the American Lawyer, disses Georgia Rep. Bob Barr big time. Barr is the loudmouth Republican impeachment manager who landed in hot water for giving a speech to the white supremacist Conservative Citizens Council (yet still had the gall to use the phrase “civil rights” three times in floor speeches during Clinton’s Senate trial; see “We Shall Overcome”). “We had too many managers,” Hyde told the American Lawyer’s John Anderson. “And maybe they weren’t all the exactly right managers. From a marketing point of view, having Bob Barr as a manager probably wasn’t a good idea. But he’s a good team player, and he’s a former U.S. attorney. I didn’t feel it was right to deny him a place at the table.” Is Barr going to take this “wasn’t a good idea” swipe lying down? It’s an awkward time to ask, since Hyde put in an appearance Friday at a $100-per-ticket fund-raiser for Barr in Cobb County, Ga. “We’re going to take a pass,” Barr’s spokesman said when Chatterbox phoned today for comment.