Clintons planned to have eight years each as president, book says

Bill and Hillary Clinton drew up a secret plan 15 years ago under which each of them would occupy the White House for eight years, according to one of several new books about the leading Democratic candidate for the US presidency.

According to the book - which has been dismissed by Mrs Clinton's aides - even before they were married, the couple had formulated a plan to reinvent the Democratic Party and make it to the White House. That blueprint was updated after Bill Clinton's election victory in 1992, with the proposal that she would run once he had left office.

The claim adds to the perception of the methodical, driven nature of the Clinton campaign for the presidency - a race in which she is currently the front-runner within her party. Taken with other allegations contained in a separate book, it also boosts a widely held belief in political circles, that by the late 1980s, the Clinton marriage had become little more than a mutually-beneficial political arrangement.

The claims, reported by The Washington Post, have been dismissed by Mrs Clinton's campaign team. Howard Wolfson, a campaign spokesman, said: "The news here is that it took three reporters a decade to find no news. Two overwhelming Senate victories in the toughest media market in the country demonstrated that voters have put these issues behind them."

The allegations are contained in two forthcoming books. One, A Woman in Charge, by the former Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein, says that in 1989 the Clintons almost divorced as a result of his infidelity and desire to be with another woman. Mrs Clinton apparently refused to divorce him, telling her husband's then chief-of-staff: "There are worse things than infidelity." The second book, Her Way: The Hopes and Ambitions of Hillary Clinton, is written by two reporters for The New York Times. It claims, among other things that in 1992, a team overseen by Mrs Clinton hired a private investigator to undermine Gennifer Flowers, the former Arkansas television reporter who claimed to have had a 12-year affair with her husband.

Bernstein's book also portrays Mrs Clinton as going to great lengths to keep her husband's alleged infidelities secret. It claims when he was running for the presidency, two partners who had worked with her at the Rose Law Firm, were hired to represent two other women claiming to have had affairs with him.

It says the lawyers questioned the women and then obtained signed statements that they had never had sex with Mr Clinton. On one occasion, says the book, Mrs Clinton was present.

The book also questions whether Mrs Clinton read the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq before voting to authorise war - a vote that has caused her considerable political problems ever since.

A spokesman for Mrs Clinton said that she was "briefed multiple times" on the intelligence regarding Iraq, including being briefed on the NIE. The comment appeared to confirm she had not personally read the document, which contained a number of caveats from elements of the intelligence community who were less than certain as to whether Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction.

The book by The New York Times reporters quotes a former girlfriend of Mr Clinton, Marla Crider, as saying she had seen a letter on his desk written by Mrs Clinton outlining their long-term political plans. She says that the couple referred to this as their "20-year project". Polls suggest Mrs Clinton is only part of the way towards realising that plan.

Most polls give her more than a 10-point advantage over her closest Democratic rival, Senator Barack Obama. But against Rudy Giuliani, the front-runner for the Republican Party's nomination, her fortunes are less clear. One poll, in late February, suggested Mr Giuliani had a nine point lead over Mrs Clinton.