When politicians cry much worse than wolf.

• Author: Haberman, Clyde

There is a long roster of public figures who seek to call attention to their cause by invoking historic cataclysms. They take some of history's most brutal and shameful chapters--slavery, the Holocaust, the massacre of American Indians--and exploit them for whatever issue is on the agenda. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York followed this path in January when she likened the House of Representatives to a plantation, because, she said, its Republican readers squelch dissident voices. Did she serve history well? "What she is doing is insuring anybody who suffered" during slavery, says one critic. "Anyone who has a public platform should ... respect...