Unfortunate And Untrue?

Just because he lied to his editors about being a convicted felon isn't a good enough reason for those editors to doubt his book, in which he uses anonymous sources to accuse George W. Bush of covering up an arrest for cocaine when he was a young man. That's what J.H. Hatfield, author of Fortunate Son, a book its initial publisher pulled from the shelves for lack of credibility, tells 60 Minutes' Lesley Stahl in his first interview on Sunday, Feb. 13.

St. Martin's Press "pulled the book because I have a criminal background and that doesn't have anything to do with the price of eggs in China," Hatfield tells Stahl. He admits hiring a man to kill a woman for him, committing burglary, writing bad checks, embezzling and taking kickbacks.

A list of criminal convictions like these doesn't have anything to do with his credibility, Hatfield asserts. "Don't you think some things in the past should stay in the past? I mean, I served my time," he says.

Scores of journalists have failed to corroborate his much-publicized accusation against the presidential candidate, and instead have found holes in it. Bush has flatly denied it. But Hatfield persists with his anonymous sources, none of whom, he admits, was an eyewitness, saying, "Why are all three telling the same story essentially?

And, its a story St. Martin's Press never checked out, even in a minimal way, says Hatfield. "Even the lawyer didn't ask me who [the sources] were and I started to offer it to her, because I knew we would have attorney-client confidentiality. She said, 'I don't want to know,' he tells Stahl. The fact that the lawyers signed off on it is, according to Hatfield, the most compelling reason his credibility and criminal record shouldn't be an issue.

Hatfield now says that he is blacklisted; since St. Martin's pulled his book and called it furnace fodder, he's lost two book contracts.

But truth or lie, Fortunate Son is being published by upstart Soft Skull Press of New York. Soft Skull Publisher Sander Hicks says he called Hatfield's agent and said, "You don't know me sir, but maybe youve read about the punks of publishing? And he, instead of saying, 'who are you kid?' he said, 'That's good. I'm looking for a punk.'"