Libby Holden is a deranged, suicidal manic. Nobody in their right mind would ever want to be portrayed as her, like Betsy Wright and Vince Foster were. Vince Foster had clinical depression which makes his being portrayed as an insane, lesbian woman slightly more acceptable. But Betsy Wright, who was perfectly normal, shares the role as Libby. Libby Holden did some terrible things, such as shoving a gun down the phone tapper’s pants and, ultimately, killing herself. Vince Foster also did kill himself but was never deemed a manic by anyone, and therefore would be highly upset at this slander to his name, were he alive. Libby Holden is the way many will remember him, and I highly doubt that Foster would condone this.
Betsy Wright, on the other hand, was a stalwart supporter of Jack Stanton who was reasonable and normal to every degree. Besty Wright's depiction as Libby Holden is not just wrong, it’s downright outrageous. I have no doubt that Wright would be furious and Vince would be rolling in his grave at Klein's description of both of them in one psychopathic character.
As for the other characters, I believe that the book is not so much blatantly attacking them, but more just poking fun at the people, much like standup comedy. And as with most standup comedy, feelings are going to be hurt here and maybe there'll be a bad joke that goes to far but in the end everybody has a laugh. Libby Holden, however, being not even a crucial character in the story, seems to deliberately attack Foster and Wright. That type of joke isn't even funny. It's just bad taste and horrible humor.
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I think your comment about comedy is important. It might be a mistake to take things too literally; certainly some of these folks are more caricatures than anything else. They are made fun of on TV all of the time.
The Foster thing is interesting. When he died, everyone was shocked. Not sure the character is him, but just the incident was applied to that character.
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