A classic case of the girl who lapses into bimboism in her early years, then finds God and does something good with the rest of her life is that of Donna Rice. Older Americans who remember her sudden media celebrity will have in their mind's eye the photo of Rice, showing a lot of leg while sitting on the lap of a smiling (and married) Sen. Gary Hart, a leading candidate for the presidency, while aboard a yacht called (and I am not making this up) the Monkey Business.
Growing up, Rice had been truly outstanding--popular, highly itelligent, graduating with high honors and Phi Beta Kappa from the Unversity of South Carolina. She was also blessed with blonde good looks and had been that school's head cheerleader. She became Miss South Carolina World, discovered the advantages of dating older guys and moved to New York City to seek her fortune in that most empty-headed of job fields, modeling.
A few older guys later, she moved to Miami to work in commercials and there met the handsome, horny Mr. Hart (born Hartpence). The self-confident Hart had made a run at the White House in 1984 and was the apparent Democratic leader in the 1988 race at the time he and Rice met. Rumors of his JFK-like womanizing circulated among the press, and not long after the merry voyage of the Monkey Business, reporters began asking embarrassing questions.
As politicians will, Hart denied all wrongdoing and, absurdly full of himself, challenged reporters to follow him if they liked. They did, and soon they spotted Rice emerging from Hart's D.C. townhouse. As high-placed politicians' wives so often do, Mrs. Hart stood by her man, but as a presidential candidate, he was toast. Hart soon dropped out of the running.
Hart, who already had degrees in law and, of all things, theology, added an Oxford doctorate in politics in 2001 and became a celebrity professor.
Rice lay low for quite a while but turned to religion and married in 1994. She went to work for Enough Is Enough, a non-profit that combats child pornography. Then in 1998 she published a book, Kids Online, and in 1999, started her own website (www.protectkids.com).
Now Donna Hughes, she is an example of the old truism "It's not how you start but how you finish."
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