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Getting Away With It

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Everyday I Write the Book...

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Living Through Another Cuba

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Killing In The Name Of...

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Broadway Blues

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Conservatism Go Boom?

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Begala's Baby-Boomer Blues

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Hagel-ian Logic: Bush's Ideal V.P.

3.31.00
Back Stabbin' Games People Play

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The Ink Is Black, The Page Is White

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Pleased to Meet You

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Diallo II?

he scariest thought: Is this actually Bill Clinton's world and do we just live in it? That may be the only conclusion to reach after reading the April issue of everybody's favorite libertarian magazine, Reason. Charles Paul Freund performs a valuable service as he identifies what may be the true lasting legacy of the Bill Clinton presidency: His mastery of scandal politics Freund notes five steps Clinton has successfully utilized over the last eight years:

Step 1: A Scandal Is Just a Story
Step 2: You Don't Feed a Bad Story
Step 3: Stories Are About People
Step 4: War Is the Biggest Story
Step 5: The Presidency Is a Counter-story

By following these steps, Clinton manages to manipulate the media, protect himself and completely frustrate his enemies. He has expertly wielded the weapons of stonewalling, distraction, and diversion. The cost of all this, of course, has only been the integrity of the White House (like, who could care about that?), the near-total complicity and corruption of the Democratic Party (Al Gore, in particular), and the possibly fatal timidity of the Republican Party.

Freund's article is also eye-opening as it inadvertently suggests that Bill Clinton's second- most-notorious quote (after "I did not have…") may be, "It depends on what the meaning of 'is' is." Right there, Clinton reveals himself, philosophically, to be the Deconstructionist-In-Chief. He has no allegiance to any specific ideal, because everything is, ultimately, reducible to words. Words have no meaning, in and of themselves, except at the given moment they are uttered.

Freund points to Clinton's dependence on "narrative" — a given story meant to explain away the scandal. The old view of scandals demanded a logical explanation. The narrative world of the Clintons merely requires "good guys" and "bad guys" whose personal motives explain any inconsistencies. Hillary Clinton's "vast right-wing conspiracy" is the perfect example of this tendency. Even better is the first lady's reference in that same Today interview, "…I think that when all of this is put into context, and we really look at the people involved here, look at their motivations and look at their backgrounds, look at their past behavior, some folks are going to have a lot to answer for..."

Objective truth matters not at all in the world of the Clintons, only "context." Freund's article reveals the greatest horror of the Clinton presidency: His ability and propensity to manipulate the military to "change the topic": the Sudan, Iraq, the Balkans — all become tools to knock Clinton's domestic enemies off-stride or enhance his own legacy.

Freund's essay is truly remarkable, yet even he missed a large part of the story. Clinton's political/cultural attack machine is so wide-ranging that it may very well have produced his most surprising victory: The Democrats' triumph in the mid-term elections. Let's go back to the fall of 1998. It has been an awful year for Bill Clinton, dominated by Monica Lewinsky coverage. The nadir was his August grand-jury testimony and his arrogant address to the nation declaring that even presidents have "private lives." Yet, that lowest point was the springboard to another "mini-comeback." First, Clinton cleaned the clock of the congressional GOP by getting them to agree in early October to an omnibus (or as some conservatives view it, "ominous") budget agreement.

What follows is a chronological list of subsequent events which either produced clearly positive news coverage for Bill Clinton or resulted in something beneficial to him in the larger picture. Many of these things he directly initiated, others were some convenient "coincidences" — or something like that.

October 23: Following 9 days of intense negotiating at the Wye Conference, Bill Clinton brokers a Middle East peace agreement between Yasser Arafat and Bibi Netanyahu. Clinton subsequently tells a religious gathering that his work was part of his "healing" process in the Monica scandal. The media howls at this blatant case of Clinton self-worship.

October 29: Bill and Hillary attend the launch of Sen. John Glenn's historic return into space. During an interview, Clinton opines "this is what America is all about."

October 31: Clinton litigant Paula Jones accepts one-million-dollar check from eccentric New Yorker Abe Hirschfeld. The following day, papers across the country have Page One pictures of Jones "kissing it" (the check).

November 1: Scientist reports that DNA evidence exists suggesting that Thomas Jefferson was indeed the father of one of the children of one of his slaves, Sally Hemings.

November 1: Bill Clinton commences his African-American-media tour. Over the weekend, he cuts several spots on black radio. Sunday, the President worships and is lauded at a black church in Baltimore.

November 2: Clinton does half-hour interview on Black Entertainment Television with liberal host Tavis Smiley.

November 3: Election Day, 1998. Clinton, the first Democrat President elected to two consecutive terms since Franklin Delano Roosevelt, now gains another feather in his cap: He's the first president since FDR whose party gains seats (5) in a midterm election.

November 4: Paula Jones legal team(s) collapse due to infighting. Oops! Hirschfeld doesn't actually wire Paula Jones her money. November 5: President Clinton's attorney yanks his $700,000 offer to settle Jones sexual-harassment suit.

November 6: Clinton nemesis Newt Gingrich steps down from the speakership, quits Congress.

Oh, and just for good measure, throw in 400 academics (allegedly recruited by Sidney Blumenthal) who publish an open letter stating that Clinton's Monica-related offenses do not reach the level of impeachable offenses. Given all this, where everything seemed to break Bill Clinton's way, no one should have been surprised that all the close House races broke for Democrats as well.

When the Jefferson-Hemings story broke, more than one person thought that this seemed like a blatantly political move by an academic overly friendly to Bill Clinton. Here was "evidence" that one of the Founding Fathers engaged in illicit sexual activity. The news conveniently reinforced a major contention of Clinton and the Democrats: "Everybody does it," that Clinton is not doing anything that previous Presidents hadn't done. The political suspicion gained further credence once it was pointed out that the scientist who revealed the Jefferson story was one of the 400 academics who signed the open letter regarding impeachment. Of course, to save himself, Clinton must bring down not just contemporary politicians, but historic ones as well.

However, the exact breadth of this political strategy is far more devious than that. In many respects, African Americans have always "known" and believed the Jefferson story. It has been an article of faith in the black community for decades, if not centuries. The tale's "validation" by DNA resonated in that community. It became proof positive that blacks were indeed "linked" by blood to the United States. So, this particular story is running on two political and cultural tracks at the same time.

So in the space of ten days or so: There was "peacemaker" Clinton at Wye; blessed are the peacemakers. The Glenn flight (aside from being a payback for Glenn's helping crush Senate investigations into campaign finance) also made Clinton the first president since, ahem, Nixon to view a space — launch — the patriotic, visionary Clinton. Paula Jones briefly revealed herself to be out for the money just as James Carville always claimed. "Respected" academics dismiss the impeachment charges. The Jefferson-Hemings story fit perfectly into the Clinton-Democrat plan to energize black voters and also worked subliminally with regular voters.

Now, these events did nothing to ultimately stop the impeachment process. However, the election results gave Clinton partisans more ammunition with which to tar Republicans as being out of touch with the wishes of the American people. Furthermore, it was one more notch in Clinton's "legacy." Yes, he will always be linked to Andrew Johnson, but there are now also two distinct ways in which he will be mentioned by historians in the same breath as Roosevelt.

As Charles Paul Freund says, it's all about the story and a President has inordinate powers to affect the story and present a counter-story -- with him in the featured role. No wonder he told a national group of editors last week that he was "proud" to be impeached because he was "defending" the Constitution. He has cast himself as the heroic protagonist so often that he actually believes it. And, as Hillary Rodham Clinton says, it's all about the context.

That is just one example of the secret history of the Clinton presidency. Don't be surprised to find many more as we examine this guy for decades to come. Makes you wonder what might have been if only the man had used his incredible powers for good instead of evil.

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