Feeling His Pain (Bill Clinton Barf Alert)

On Bill Clinton's desk at his Harlem office, there are nearly 100 missing flyers, sorrowful mementos of his handshaking visits to ground zero and to the family-crisis center. He can't bring himself to file them away, an aide says, so they sit there, a reminder of the horrendous loss of life -- and of his inability to either prevent it or do much to heal the wounds.

The World Trade Center attacks have catapulted the former president -- who was just starting to mellow out and revel in his post-Oval Office life as a New Yorker, senatorial spouse, and money-making private citizen -- into the unfamiliar and frustrating role of action figure in search of action.

"Clinton misses the work, sitting and making the hard decisions, having these smart people around him," says Joe Lockhart, the former White House spokesman. "It's a new experience for him, not being in the middle of it."

Interviews with nearly a dozen Clinton confidants reveal a man struggling to find a way to be useful and worrying that his peace-and-prosperity presidency will be recast as a footnote to the Bush-family dynasty. Right after the attacks, Clinton admitted to a friend that he wished, for the first time, to be back in the White House. And he couldn't resist bitterly telling an ally that if the FBI had spent as much time chasing terrorists as it had investigating his behavior, perhaps things would have played out differently.

Yet if he has any I-could-handle-this-crisis-better thoughts, he's keeping them to himself; in speeches and in numerous conversations with friends, Clinton has made a point of supporting Bush. "He knows his role is trying to provide comfort in New York City, and to add his voice in support of President Bush," says John Podesta, Clinton's former chief of staff. The feeling may not be mutual. Condoleezza Rice briefed Clinton early in the crisis, but a former aide says the exchange was "not rich in detail."

At least he can still get back-channel information. As Sidney Blumenthal, Clinton's White House spinmeister, puts it, "He and Tony Blair are good friends. And he talks to world leaders who seek him out."

While there have been rumors that Clinton and Giuliani might co-chair a commission to rebuild downtown, his aides say he seems more likely to use his bully pulpit and play national hand-holder. Nevertheless, being on the sidelines has become perhaps the toughest challenge of his career.

And he couldn't resist bitterly telling an ally that if the FBI had spent as much time chasing terrorists as it had investigating his behavior, perhaps things would have played out differently.

Bill:"It wasn't my fault! I could have gotten Bin laudin, but the FBI blew it."

New day, same old bull! Hey Bill, you will be remembered as the interruption we had between Bush Presidents. The President who got BJ's in the Oval office. Get over it!

After the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, which killed six and injured 1,000, President Clinton promised that those responsible would be hunted down and punished.

After the 1995 bombing in Saudi Arabia, which killed five U.S. military personnel, Clinton promised that those responsible would be hunted down and punished.

After the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 and injured 200 U.S. military personnel, Clinton promised that those responsible would be hunted down and punished.

After the 1998 bombing of U.S. embassies in Africa, which killed 224 and injured 5,000, Clinton promised that those responsible would be hunted down and punished.

After the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole, which killed 17 and injured 3 U.S. sailors, Clinton promised that those responsible would be hunted down and punished.

Maybe if Clinton had kept his promise, an estimated 7,000 people would be alive today.

Received via e-mail.

This has to be one of the the few bright spots in my life since 9/11 -- that not only is he making a championship-caliber a-hole of himself, but that he's no longer President and can't do much more damage.

Perhaps his greatest karmic punishment is that he has spent his pathetic and corrupt life trying to achieve "greatness" and universal adoration, while his successor came into office just wanting to do good for the nation and then retire to his ranch with his wife, but President Bush has had the big opportunity for greatness literally thrust upon him, unasked for.

I hope the Sink Emporer is chewing off his own limbs over this. It's appalling -- but not surprising -- that he is more distraught over his loss of power and the spotlight, not the horrific terrorist acts that killed 6000+ innocent people. But the fact that he's such a victim of his own megalomania and is now suffering from self-inflicted wounds is good enough for me, for now. When he's officially irrelevant, I will be even happier.

I hope he's still wandering around midtown Manhattan, stopping people to lecture them all about how he nearly "got" Bin Laden, blah blah blah. If so, I pray that we meet up soon. I will cure him of ever again wanting to badger normal people. Among other things, if given the opportunity, I'd tell him that I hold him personally responsible for 9/11 and that if he'd spent more time thinking about serious issues -- things that didn't always make a big *ping* in the polls -- and less time sticking cigars in interns, that 6000+ people might be alive today.

It's official. Since it's all about him, I HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim
HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim
HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim
HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim
HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim
HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim
HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim
HateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHimHateHim.

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Ringo: Say! Owhats that your takin' a picture of now?

Sellers: Bill Clinton, right where you'd expect him to be in the middle of it."