Posted on 03/28/2002 9:35:18 AM PST by libber-tarian
I recently wrote an article in which I referred to Bill Clinton as a shallow man, and was asked to explain myself by a reader who went on to claim that Bill Clinton "righted the wrongs of active exclusion, willful ignorance, and offensive pity" and "[led] the nation through its longest period of peacetime expansion of economic, social, and individual opportunity."
What I've never understood about the Clinton apologists is that they apparently value talk over action. Other than make speeches filled with feel-good rhetoric, what did Bill Clinton actually do? People may have felt comforted by his words, believed that he cared about them and felt their pain, but in the end, all of Clinton's talk amounted to nothing.
Whenever I talk to supporters of Bill Clinton, I ask them to list the things he did. Most people can't name a single thing, and instead credit him with presiding over an expanding economy, as though coincidence--the dumb luck of having his presidency aligned with the business cycle--somehow proves that he caused it to happen. But what did he do that was so beneficial to the economy? For that matter, what actions did he take to "right the wrongs of active exclusion"? Don't ask, don't tell? Hardly the epitome of inclusiveness.
My memory may be failing me, but when I try to recall the achievements of the Clinton presidency, I can name only two of any significance: Welfare Reform and NAFTA. Despite the fact that neither of these bills originated from the Clinton Administration, I do give him credit for signing them; most Democrats would not have signed either bill. On the other hand, neither of these bills could pass Congress until the Republicans took over in 1994. So I guess the real achievement of the Clinton presidency was scaring enough people during his first two years in office that he put the Senate and the House of Representatives in the hands of the Republicans for the first time since 1954. But I doubt the fans of Clinton would celebrate that monumental achievement.
As far as the economy goes, there is no doubt that Bill Clinton presided over a favorable economy and a remarkable expansion in the stock market. But remember that most of this expansion was due to the rise of the Internet and the resulting speculation on Internet stocks. Remember when the economy started to go south? That's right, just when the Internet bubble burst. Al Gore's attempt to take credit for inventing the Internet notwithstanding, nobody in their right mind would claim that the Clinton Administration was somehow responsible for the Internet boom.
But if you insist on crediting Bill Clinton with the rise of the stock market, then you must also blame him for the "irrational exuberance" that led to its collapse. You must therefore also blame him for the recession. Otherwise, you're crediting him for handing out the drinks at the party and blaming his successor--the guy who has to clean up the mess--for everyone's hangover the next day.
Getting back to my claim that Bill Clinton is a shallow man, it seems to me that someone who squanders an opportunity to achieve greatness and instead uses his power for nothing more than the satisfaction of his own wants and needs is shallow. Bill Clinton is pathologically self-absorbed, which is why he constantly found himself bungling into scandal after scandal.
Now, one may scream that there was a vast right-wing conspiracy to bring down Bill Clinton; even if you believe that nonsense, you have to wonder why Bill Clinton went out of his way to hand his enemies so much ammunition on such a regular basis. And when I say scandal, I'm not even thinking about the "lying under oath" thing, which Clinton supporters dismiss as inconsequential. I'm talking about other serious stuff, all of which is well-known to people who were paying attention, but most of which was underreported due to the media's focus on the more salacious--and therefore media-friendly--Clinton scandals.
If you'll recall: Under Bill Clinton, the White House became a glorified motel, where the Lincoln Bedroom was rented out to contributors who coughed up enough dough. Military secrets ended up in the hands of the Chinese, who laundered money that ended up in the hands of the Democratic National Committee just in time for Clinton's re-election campaign. Al Gore was dispatched to hold illegal fundraisers at Buddhist temples, where he collected money from dozens of nuns who--despite having taken vows of poverty--each managed to produce a $5,000 check for Clinton's re-election. His top fundraiser, Terry McAuliffe, the current head of the aforementioned DNC, made $18,000,000 from a $100,000 investment in Global Crossing, now bankrupt and under investigation for shady government contracts during the Clinton Administration. When Enron's Ken Lay was staying in the Lincoln Bedroom during the Clinton Administration, Enron came to ask the federal government to underwrite foreign loans on 20 different occasions; on 19 of those 20 occasions, the Clinton Administration said yes, to the tune of $2 billion dollars. And let us not forget about selling presidential pardons to drug-runners and fat-cat tax-cheat felons on the lam in Europe. Or the looting of White House furniture for their new home, which is unfortunately located in my home state. And all that's without even getting into Whitewater, the Travel Office firings, or the perjury scandal.
Bill Clinton is a low-life thief, a petty swindler, and a smooth-talking scam artist more suited for Tammany Hall than the White House. But I will admit that Bill Clinton was a man of action, as long as that action involved greasing his palms (or anything other body part for that matter) or furnishing his house. Somehow, Bill Clinton found the time to conduct all of that "business", but he was too busy to take Osama bin Laden when the Sudanese government offered to hand him over to us in 1996. Think about it: we wouldn't be chasing bin Laden around the globe right now if Clinton had focused a little more on taking care of the threats against us and a little less on figuring out every conceivable way that he could cash in on his power or use it to get women.
Which reminds me...as far as giving Clinton credit for presiding over a time of peace, what kind of peace was it? During the Clinton Administration, there were 6 major terrorist attacks against the U.S. which left over 415 dead and 6,500 injured. It seems to me that it's very easy to maintain the illusion of peace by ignoring the dangers that surround us. You may look back fondly at the 1990s as a time of peace, but it was a peace during which we relaxed while our enemies were getting stronger and preparing to annihilate us. That's a pretty shallow peace if you ask me.
Bill Clinton is shallow because he spoke often of his convictions but did nothing to realize them. He's shallow because he was given remarkable gifts and the opportunity to do great things with them, yet he achieved nothing substantial. In the end, his presidency amounted to little more than talk and corruption. He rarely took any action unless it somehow benefitted him. But whenever action mattered for the good of the nation, Bill Clinton was nowhere to be found. And that is why the man who spent the final days of his presidency fretting about his legacy will find it to be recorded quite accurately by history: Bill Clinton is a shallow, failed man.
What has Dubya done? He's only begun.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1066122/posts
Funny how Clinton always takes credit for these when clearly they were introduced by republicans during the contract with America. He claims it, and people believe him! Maddening!
Since nearly 15,000 partial birth infanticides happen in America each year now, accounting for a rise over the eight years of clintonism, we may fairly say that bill clinton (the sinkEmperor) is at the very least complicit and quite possibly responsible for the horrific deaths of more than 60,000 alive, unborn children by his acts of vetoing the partial birth abortion bans passed to his desk during America's sick eight years of the degenerate clintons in the WhiteWhore House.
I don’t care how long it’s been since Clinton dragged his sorry carcass — and anything else he could swipe — out of the White House. I don’t want to forget the Clinton years. I don’t want to move on. I don’t want to put it all behind me.
I hate Clinton as ardently now as when he energetically defiled the Nation on a daily basis. I hate his wife, and his daughter, too. And I won’t be satisfied until everyone hates them as much as I do.
That, you may argue, isn’t feasible, despite the multitude of excellent reasons to hate them. My answer is that in a country that could elect a deceitful sleaze like Clinton, anything is possible.
For years I gave Chelsea a pass. After all, it wasn’t her fault that she was born into a family of crooks. She’s grown up now, though, and is her own person. So what did she do immediately after the terrorist attacks of September 11th? She’s written that she was “expounding on the detriments of Bush’s tax cut as we approached Grand Central Terminal . . .” Quite clearly, she’s a developing basket case, one deserving the same scorn and derision as the unfit parents who inculcated her with socialist nonsense.
What are especially preposterous are Clinton’s incessant attempts to rewrite history. A few months ago he rounded up some of his bootlicking apologists and urged them to publicize all his supposed accomplishments as president. More recently, he permitted the Monica Lewinsky of newsmagazines, Newsweek, to interview him. Clinton claimed that giving Marc Rich, former regular on the FBI’s Top Ten Most Wanted List, was a mistake because — hold your breath here — “It wasn’t worth the damage to my reputation.”
His reputation? His reputation? What a knee lapper. Clinton’s got a reputation, all right. But it’s certainly not one that could be damaged. Here’s a guy who was:
Fined $90,000 for lying under oath and obstructing justice. Forced to pay an $850,000 settlement in the Paula Jones lawsuit. Disbarred in Arkansas. Prohibited from practicing law before the U.S. Supreme Court.
He ran the White House like a Motel 6 for Democrat fat cats. He took campaign contributions from Chinese communists. He entertained felons, including drug peddlers and arms smugglers, in the Executive Mansion.
Remember how the Clintons managed to get their hands on 900 FBI files they weren’t supposed to have? Or the puzzling reappearance of subpoenaed billing records?
Then there were the last minute pardons. Susan McDougal, Roger Clinton, and Clinton’s former secretary of Housing and Urban Development were pardoned. So were Weather Underground radicals, murderers, drug dealers, and a bunch of folks who stole tax dollars. Hillary’s brothers, seeing how well Roger Clinton was doing by peddling influence, jumped on the pardon bandwagon themselves.
And what of Clinton and terrorism? In 1993 bin Laden’s thugs exploded a bomb in the World Trade Center, killing six and injuring hundreds of others. In 1995 they bombed a military headquarters in Riyatdh, Saudi Arabia and killed five Americans. In 1996 they bombed military barracks in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia and killed 19 Americans. In 1998 they bombed U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and killed 224 people, including 12 Americans, and injured more than 5,000 others. In 2000 they bombed the U.S.S. Cole and killed 17 Americans. What did Clinton do about all this? Not much. He was too busy lying, obstructing, denying, obfuscating, stonewalling, and, of course, traveling.
Clinton whines about how much money has been spent on investigating him. But how much would have been spent if he had only told the truth?
So much to hate, so little time. Yet there’s reason to think that finally, finally, more Americans are recognizing the true Clinton legacy.
A recent Gallup poll rated the last eight presidents in terms of job approval. In the poll, the first one taken since he left office, Clinton ranked sixth, ahead of only Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon.
Not bad for a start. In the meantime, let the hating continue.
April 11, 2002
Little Dumbya would profit from imitating the Clinton-Gore economic miracle.
Clinton did tell the truth! When Republicans hear the truth they think the facts are biased, they've been listening to Rush, Fox, Hannity, Coulter et al. for so long!
You know, Clinton doesn't really matter to me anymore. He has his tacky library with his side of the story on display, and that's just fine. I noticed at the opening in Little Rock his speech was not quite as golden-tongued, and he looked rather small and pathetic soaked in all that rain, particularly since his intelligent supporters didn't have enough sense to put up a tent for the dignitaries.
He is fading into the background of history, and all of his fans are just going to have to accept it. President Bush has been reelected, and he will be making more history over the next few years. The wheel has turned.
True.
I think NAFTA was Clinton's way of cozying up to business, and one of the ways in which his minions telegraphed that his administration was FOR SALE. I have always been astounded at the fact that CEOs of large corporations, by the time of Clinton's second run for the presidency, were LINING UP to contribute to him, even though they had to see that they were the DECLARED ENEMY of Clintonian tax and regulatory policy. The reason? Protection money. And he obliged them.
Clinton had obviously read Ayn Rand and had grasped that American capitalism could be brought to its knees with the FULL COMPLICITY of business, and he almost pulled it off.
My son is a lukewarm Clinton supporter and the other day he was talking about how the economy was so good under Clinton so I asked him what Clinton actually did to fix the economy and he couldn't think of anything so he finally said kind of desperatly, well he must have did something to fix it. Carville always liked to say, its the economy, stupid. But I think Bill Clinton got by with sheer charisma. He reminds me of the boy in high school that is super popular and all the girls want to date him and all the guys want to hang out with him and he is the teachers pet but inside there is no character or substance. Its all an illusion. But than the Clinton fans thrive on illusion.
Sadly, I am afraid Clinton is going to steal Reagans thunder and his legacy will be the booming economy and longest peacetime in history even though its all a lie.
Grow up and let go of your fantasy. The Clinton years were a disaster on hold. President Bush has had to step in and try to clean up the mess Clinton left behind. Of course you're never going to understand the war on terror as long as you believe the terrorists are innocent Iraqis that our troops are killing.
More like, very nice smarmary of the past 8 years!
Exactly WHERE in Canada are you?
What is PRESIDENT Bush up to in total votes now? 62 Million or so?
Say hi to Susan Estrich please.
G
Bush Repukes ain't got no sense of responsibility for any of the disastrous economic news occurring on their watch. That's why their days in power are numbered.
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Gee, another clueless prediction from MurryMom.
Yes, our days in power are numbered.
FOUR MORE YEARS!
Oh, is that why fined $90,000 by a federal judge for giving under oath "false, misleading and evasive answers that were designed to obstruct the judicial process."?
Yeah, that boy's quite the truth teller.
bump
Good L-rd. I would have assumed you would have killed yourself a long time ago.
Jeez Lousie! I was sure you'd been rounded up and sent to the re-education camp already... I guess the Patriot Act isn't all it's cracked up to be.
bttt
Can I give you my mother-in-law's email address to add to your list of Clinton-lovers?
Condolences .. bet THanksgiving was fun at your house !
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