On The Heels of Greatness

Since Barack Obama failed to save the country, let's go back to a sunnier time, when Bill and Hillary rang in their new administration with a word their followers don't usually associate with them: Hope. Yes, the Bells of Hope.The Clintons' TV producer pals came up with the idea of ringing in, ahem, Change, with every bell, gong and gamelan they could assemble, from the Liberty Bell to bells in space (the astronauts of the Endeavor, who would be asleep during the inaugural festivities, had to prerecord their bell solos) and the People would ring all their bells too. It would be magnificent, overblown, and deeply hopey, except that Clinton did not win with a majority. So that put something of a damper on the chimes.

Another damper was the trouble Clinton had run into even before the inaugural: his own campaign promises. The most immediately serious was his promise not to repatriate Haitian boat people without a hearing; while Cubans who set foot on U.S. soil could stay, Haitians were forcibly repatriated to the brutal regime that had ousted Jean-Bertrande Aristide.Desperate Haitians put together improbable collections of tires, boards, netting, piled onto them and pushed off into the open sea, only to drown or be picked up by the Coast Guard, who brought them to detention in, among other places, Guantanamo. They were not, however, put in stress positions, besides the basic one of being held while waiting to be forcibly repatriated.

After he was told that over 150,000 Haitians were ripping down every tree in sight to make rafts for their 600 mile journey, Clinton went back on his campaign promise, saying that forced repatriation would continue. The following paragraph from the NY Times is so upsetting I will let it pass without comment:

Indeed, in the last two weeks, members of Mr. Clinton's foreign-policy team have expressed concern that celebrations surrounding Mr. Clinton's inauguration, which will be widely televised, will be marred by news footage of Haitian boat people drowning in stormy waters while trying to make the 600-mile journey to the Florida coast. Mr. Clinton cited a report in recent days, still unconfirmed by the Coast Guard, that nearly 400 Haitian boat people drowned when their boat sank in the Bahamas.

The fledgling presidency was darkened by plenty of ironic foreshadowing: Bush I left a deficit that scuttled Clinton's middle-class tax cut. On the very day that Bush sent missiles into Iraq, Clinton remarked that as he was a Baptist, he believed in death-bed conversions, and so he was open to restablishing normal relations with Iraq. On the very day that Bush sent missiles into Iraq, Clinton remarked that as he was a Baptist, he believed in death-bed conversions, and so he was open to restablishing normal relations with Iraq, causing. He then snappishly denied being asked about normalization of relations, a question that appeared twice on the transcript. He also tried to finesse the Haitian problem:

He tried the same on Haiti. There was no joy in reversing a policy that was proving untenable, nor was there dishonor in a forthright acknowledgment of change. Yet Clinton insisted that he was not reversing anything. His earlier statements offering asylum, he maintained, had hinged on a distinction between political refugees, who were entitled to stay in the United States, and economic refugees, who were not. "Sometimes people hear only half the message," he complained. (from "the Survivor", by John F. Harris)

The hedging and nice sidestepping aggrieved reporters, and gave them warning to examine every Clintonian statement with a jeweler's loupe.

Meanwhile, Bill had named Hillary head of the President's Task Force on Health Care Reform, and she embarked on a series of secret meetings, much to the dismay of friends and enemies alike. The Clintons' sunnily optimistic plan called for both a budget bill and a health care bill to be pushed through the Senate, but Senatorial etiquettician Robert Byrd blocked it:

(he was)convinced the strategy amounts to a "prostitution of the process" by
pushing through "a very complex, very expensive, very little understood piece of
legislation."

The process retained its virtue, and the very expensive, little understood piece of legislation died, only to be mocked in memorium.

President Clinton's other travails included his nominees being torpedoed by nannies and tax troubles, and his ultimate AG selection, Janet Reno, running afoul of the Branch Davidians at Waco. Each of these created a furor. But Clinton's compromise over his promise to lift the ban on gays in the military, the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy, has resulted in well over 11,000 service members being expelled from the Armed Forces.

The Clinton Administration's first hundred days are a hard act to follow.

Cross-posted at Rumproast.com, Brooklyn's Meatiest Blog.

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~~~Thank you, Blossom Dearie~~~

A crisp little sugar cookie voice with a bite:

Bedfellas

That's Our Girl!

How Do You Make a Hormone?

Compare her to Hillary Clinton. Old jokes, newly mutilated. Thanks, folks, the tip jar is on the piano.

Randi Rhodes, squawky motormouth host on Air America, has been suspended for a routine she did at a comedy club, where she likened Hillary to a prostitute, and Geraldine Ferraro too, by the most direct route:

"SHE'S A BIG F&%$ING WHORE!"

"You know why she's a big f&%$ng whore? Because her deal is always, 'Read the fine print, a%%&*le!' Not quite what Air America had in mind for their on-air personalities, even when the personalities aren't on the air, so they suspended her--after her routine was uploaded to Youtube.






Leaving aside all the important issues, civility/freedom, Obama/Hillary, this really upset my mother, the redoubtable Louise. RL has been a fan of Randi's since Air America was a weak, mewling infant network, much as it is today. Randi's four hour Tarzan yell of a show gave a voice, a harsh, funny, New York honking voice, to Mom's frustrations as they had never been voiced before (except by Mom, every blinking day of her adult life. But let's not get into that).

The Redoubtable Louise has also been a ferocious defender of the Clintons, from the first fuzzy tone that blatted out of Bill's saxophone. "He's brilliant, brilliant!" she would say. How my father sighed when she swept all the nice James Beard cookbooks off the dining room shelf and replaced them with Al Franken books. "They're my weapons," she said, her eyes narrowed.




RL devotedly followed Air America through its travails, as her favorite shows were cancelled, loyally supporting even Jerry Springer's Radio Snoozefest. Who knew the Ringmaster of Topless Chairthrowing Lesbians could be so dull? When AA was dropped by its original "flagship," Mom tried to follow the beleaguered network across the dial to its new, underpowered station (the flag-dinghy). Of all the shows, only Randi's air-horn delivery was audible, on certain days, on the radio in the upstairs bathroom.


Split Down the Middle



The Redoubtable Louise called me to urge that Mr. P. and I send money to Hillary. After being subjected to barking laughter on my end of the phone, RL said, "You're just prejudiced against her!" "No," I said, "I've just never heard of a candidate in one party saying that the nominee of the other party was better than her primary opponent."

"Nonsense! You just want to throw her to the curb!"

If I were smart, I'd have said, "Mom, I want to thank your generation for all the struggles you went through for us, and we'll never throw you to the curb." But color me deaf to nuance.

"Mom, guess what! Randi Rhodes was suspended for calling Hillary Clinton a whore!"

That took the ginger out of Mom: (Cautiously) " Why would Randi say that?"

"I don't know," I said, "Perhaps it had something to do with Hillary cozying up to Richard Mellon Scaife!"




"Cozying up to Mellon-Scaife!" Pause. "I don't even want to hear it. I don't even want to know,"she said weakly. "You know, it's about time I got ready for bed. I have to floss my teeth."



Bedfellas

Well, he is the publisher of the Pittsburgh Gazette, after all. So all the years he hounded the Clintons, the vendettas against their hapless friends, the book and then the movie about Mellon-Scaife that my mother eagerly devoured (the Hunting of the President), did not stop Hillary from marching in to the Pittsburgh Gazette and sitting down with the guy.


To be fair, I'd have gone too if I were Hillary, just out of simple curiosity, to see if he exudes sulphur in person the way he does on the page. But it was all too much for my mother.

Off With Her Mike

Again with the Lewinsky question to Chelsea. How has her mother's credibility been affected by the Lewinsky scandal?

If we look closely at this question, we can see that it's become divorced from the avowed original reason for asking it and now exists disembodied, like the Cheshire Cat's smile, or perhaps the other end of the Cheshire Cat. Because she's refused to answer it, Chelsea can expect it to materialize wherever she goes in public now.

Assuming for the moment the best of original questioner Evan Strange, he wanted to help. He says he wanted to give Chelsea a chance to expound on her mother's strength and resilience. Even under the best of circumstances, then, he wasn't asking because he didn't know, and wanted to know the answer; he wished to draw out what he thought he knew. One reason why the question was a non-question.

Another reason it was a non-question: we already know the answer. We know that Hillary's sticking by Bill annoyed people disposed to be annoyed by Hillary and Bill, and pleased people disposed to support her and Bill. How many people changed their minds about Hillary? Why would Chelsea, 17 when the scandal broke, have special insight into how the public perceived her mother? Unless she had a polling firm of her own, she wouldn't. She would only have special insight into her own feelings. Feelings which anybody with more than two brain cells could surmise.

So it's not a question Chelsea is better able to answer than anyone else. Quite the opposite; it's safe to suppose that mentioning the name "Lewinsky" is painful to Chelsea, and that she doesn't have a better answer to the question than any of the talking heads who are more than happy to expound on it, a decade after the fact.

But here we run into the well-nourished constant resentment against her parents: how dare those arrogant Clintons? Now the resentment is splashing over onto Chelsea. She's no longer a child, her detractors say. If she's choosing to campaign for her mother, she should be ready to answer for her mother. And her mother should answer for her husband. And the husband should answer for the the trauma the nation went through when he was impeached, a matter of public record. Therefore, Chelsea is refusing to talk about a matter of public record.

There are weak links in this chain, chief among them the notion that Hillary and Chelsea should have to justify their decision to stick by Bill. No. They were the innocent, injured parties. They did nothing wrong. He caused them greater trauma than he did any member of the public. Whether they forgave him does not affect the public.

Another weak link is the notion that Bill Clinton dragged the public through the trauma and expense of impeachment, so the public has the right to ask him and his family about it, forever. This link is broken, too. It wasn't Bill's idea to be impeached; it was the Republicans' pet project, even though they knew the impeachment would be unsuccessful because the votes weren't there. Any time a group knowingly puts on a show at public expense, the onus should be laid on them.

Another illogical assertion is that because she is now an adult, having chosen to campaign for her mother, Chelsea should have to talk about every aspect of her parents' life, infidelity included. Has any other son or daughter of a politician been held to such a standard? Are the press and public going to hound the Spitzer children if their mother runs for office? Perhaps so. Perhaps this new low will endure. Actually, of course it will! New lows always endure!

But the question has now been transmuted into Chelsea-as-a-Clinton denying the Public's Right to Know. That means that she can be asked the question, over and over, and the questioners can consider themselves heroic for confronting her about her refusal to satisfy the Public's Right. At the same time, they get the secret, mean little thrill that comes when an obscure person makes a famous one flinch. And nourish their own sense of injury when she tells them off.

And get themselves on T.V. Guaranteed. The only problem now is how to get to the mike and ask the question before someone else grabs the glory.

Finally, to get back to the question itself, it isn't a question of any substance; it's the sort of nebulous question 24 hour cable news networks need to chew over during the long winter evenings. The phraseology is pure News Network drivel: is so-and-so's credibility affected? What does that mean, exactly? It doesn't exactly mean anything. It's a stew of "do they trust him/her? Are the 24/7 chattering classes going to be able to milk this? Will he/she make a speech or do some sort of televiseable damage control?"

Salome in a Pantsuit

It's reported by Jonathan Alter that very, very senior Democrats want to offer Hillary the New York Governorship if she will just please, please, go away, assuming that Governor Paterson is forced to step down.

Hillary isn't going to go for it, I don't think. There's the unattractive image of timid Dems attempting to sacrifice a substitute black politican for her, and the substitute hasn't indicated he's ready to go, even after his no good, very bad opening two weeks. Then, Bill in Albany? Bill not in Albany? Which is worse?

There's talk of her running against Giuliani, either in the special election that hasn't been called for or in 2010. Alter is a national reporter and I don't think he's fully aware that the New York legislature wants Paterson to remain Governor. He's one of them, he's easy to work with, he hasn't done anything that most of them haven't done. They aren't eager to get him out of office, what, for either superambitious Donkey Destroyer or superambitious scolding Prosecutor Part Deux?

Yellowdog

To the fervent Obamaniacs and Hilarians who will stay home or vote for McCain if your candidate doesn't get the nomination:

You all realize McCain will beat either Hil or Bam in November, with your help? Ever hear the phrase "divide and conquer"?

I used to be the only person maybe on earth who could either take Hilary or leave her. Diligent worker, typical politician, why should an operator not be a woman? My senator.
Obama? Wonderful mind, inspirational, maybe there could be a little more cake with the frosting.

Their policies, frankly, are not very far apart.

Then the steel-cage match began, with the kidney punches, face it, Hilarians, being thrown by her campaign, mostly.

Both camps have a lot to answer for. But never in memory has a member of one party suggested that the nominee of the other party would be preferable to his/her primary opponent.

I would love to punish the Clinton campaign for the havoc they're causing to their/our chances, and if our primary weren't over, I'd be able to, but whatever is on the Democratic side of the ticket in November, I'm voting for it, because at this point I'm more than just a yellow dog Democrat. I'm a yellow stink-bug Democrat. I'm a yellow slime-mold Democrat. If either of those has a prayer of beating McCain, I'm voting for it.

There are deaths, of soldiers, of Iraqis, to be answered for. If McCain wins, there will be significantly more deaths.
There's the Supreme Court. If McCain wins, the Court will more than tilt to the right, it'll be perpendicular.

So, I'll vote for Hillary, much more unhappily than I would have before the ruthless, silly, lying campaign of hers besmirched her in my eyes. But I'll vote for her, or the other guy, and you people out there had better get a grip and remember what misery the last eight years have brought us.

When you're bleeding to death, you don't ask if the tourniquet is dirty.

Hey Kid, Know a Good Dry-Cleaner? Just Asking.

(All quotes are slightly inaccurate)
Chelsea Clinton's emotional security was breached yesterday when an intruder, cleverly disguised as a college student, threw, not a softball, but a wadded-up-navy-dress of a question at her:
So which did the Lewinsky thing strain more, her mother's credibility or her marriage?

"MYOB," the almost-thirtyish erstwhile first daughter replied.

"But I was just trying to help," said the Swiftian, if not Swiftboatian, Evan Strange.

The rest of the day was devoted to Hilarians and Obamanics denouncing him, her and each other on blogs.

Once more the Dems are turning a non-issue into the sort of family squabble so ugly it makes the kids long to run away from home to lead lives of mindless hedonism in squalid dens of corruption where old men whisper sweet nothings to them---in other words, Republicanism.

Can we try, just try, to reimagine this situation through the clear lens of apolitical basic decency? When is it appropriate to ask a young woman (unless she's on a Mommie-dearest book tour) about how her mother reacted to her father's whoring around? If your answer is anything but "NEVER," you have unlearned everything you needed to know in kindergarten, your moral compass needle is spinning faster than Karl Rove's tongue, you have drunk deep of the Kool-Aid, you are a danger to yourself and others.

Remember when the sins of the father were not supposed to be visited on the child?She NEVER has to be rational about her Mom and Dad. Not because she's privileged, but because EVERYONE deserves a pass on what their parents do. Credibility my incredible ass. Another cable-newspeak cliche. What a weak, facile excuse for poking a sharp stick in somebody's eye.