Mark Steyn: Bill's bogus journey

The Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | 05/12/2002 | Mark Steyn

[Pokey78]

AT one level, Bill Clinton is so September 10. On the other hand, so are many of the most influential figures in the American media, and in recent days they've been doing their best to persuade the world that Bill is still the coming man. NBC executives met the former President last week and offered him $50 million (£35 million) to host his own talk show.

That's rather more, presumably, than he is getting from the BBC to slough off a quote or two for whatever documentary they've got on the go: in the last fortnight, he has been seen on tributes both to Mo Mowlam ("truly a character") and to the Queen (likewise) and, though both ladies were no doubt flattered, he was worryingly reminiscent of Jonathan Ross who, during a low point in his career, whined plaintively that he had become one of those people you only ever see on television paying tribute to someone.

Meanwhile, his wife, Senator Rodham Clinton, the one who wears the trousers in the family if only because Bill's are usually round his ankles, was also being tipped for bigger things. A thoughtful thumb-sucking commentary by the toe-sucking pollster Dick Morris predicted that Hillary would be President within the decade.

It was a good week for Chelsea, too. Vanity Fair declared the 22-year old Oxford student a "media queen" and a "sex symbol. She's the new JFK Jr." That's one flight of fancy you don't want to get carried away on.

To deal with the least contentious Clinton first, I put in a good word for her looks in The Spectator three years ago, defending her honour against John McCain and his obnoxious joke ("Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because her real father's Janet Reno"). I said that I found Chelsea rather attractive in a coltish sort of way, which was a sufficiently rare acclamation in those days that the New York Post reported it under the headline "Fetching Filly".

It's nice to see Vanity Fair belatedly catching up with The Spectator, and it's heartening to be reminded that Senator McCain is as wrong on Chelsea Clinton as he is on campaign finance reform and much else. But it seems a bit unfair that Chelsea should be hailed as the new JFK Jr before Bill's cemented his reputation as the new JFK - young, handsome, inspiring, bit of a ladies' man, but with the crucial difference that whenever the "vast Right-wing conspiracy" tried to put a bullet in him they kept shooting themselves in the foot.

But that was the old days. Clinton's still youthful - at 55, the youngest ex-president since Teddy Roosevelt and, if his fellow Southern sex fiend, the near-centenarian Senator Strom Thurmond is any guide, he has excellent prospects for being around for another half century.

But the last 17 months haven't gone half so smoothly for the former President. For a start, there's that word "former". It's no secret Bill Clinton didn't want to leave his job, and for the first few months it was almost as if he hadn't. George W Bush was in office, but not so as you'd know it.

Instead, the papers were full of new Clinton scandals as if his Hillbilly Presidency was simply cruising on into a third term: there was the furore over his various dodgy pardons; there were the lesbian jokes he was overheard telling in a swanky restaurant; there was the shameless wheeze of his Harlem "office", at the opening of which black New Yorkers thronged him, some of them drolly shouting "Bwana!"; there were his shifty brothers and brothers-in-law whose clumsy attempts to sell pardons to their shadier acquaintances gave the papers an excuse to dredge up their embarrassing pasts all over again - Roger Clinton's cocaine conviction, Tony Rodham's hazelnut scam in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia. Bill Clinton looked like a historical first: a man unfit to be ex-President.

Then came September 11, the day on which the Bush presidency really began. Later that week, Mr Clinton, the globetrotting lounge act making a rare appearance back in the United States, turned up on the streets of Lower Manhattan to comfort New Yorkers. He looked for the first time oddly anachronistic - stuck in the day before yesterday, like some Lite FM disc jockey who doesn't realise that the station has switched formats.

Yet, amazingly, September 11 seems only to have confirmed America's Ex-President-for-Life in his indestructible view of his own indispensability. As he said to Paul McCartney's girlfriend backstage at one all-star gala, he feels that he would do a better job than Bush as he's got more experience.

This was marginally more tastefully formulated than the confidences quoted in The New York Times, when the Narcissist-in-Chief regretted that the deaths of thousands of Americans hadn't happened on his watch. He told Georgetown University students that he supports the war, but he thinks America is "not blameless. Even today we still have the occasional hate crime rooted in race, religion, or sexual orientation. So terror has a long history."

No president has been so obsessed with his "legacy" as Bill Clinton. There was that poignant moment during his final Middle East peace talks when the old schmoozer raged at Yasser Arafat, "I'm a loser and you made me one!" Since September 11, that assessment has been harder to dispute, which is why he's been meeting regularly with old Administration officials to burnish his legacy.

In fact, he sees more of his cabinet nowadays than when he was President. In 1998, he held just two cabinet meetings: one to lie to them about Monica, and the other to apologise for lying to them about Monica. These days, they sit around trying to figure out what else they were busy with back then.

Clinton's problem is that since September 11 either his presidency is seen as a trivial interlude, a holiday from history between the Cold War and the present war, or - worse - he's set up as the designated Neville Chamberlain figure, the weak man who never appreciated the enormity of the threat.

Week by week, more and more intriguing tidbits leak out: according to some rumours, there is an Iraqi link to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, but Clinton chose to ignore it because it suited him politically to blame the bombing on the broader "climate of hate" created by Right-wing militias and conservative radio hosts. There'll be a lot more of this before it's all over.

Meanwhile, Hillary's star continues to rise, mainly because in the post-Clinton Democratic Party the firmament's all but deserted. The party thinks George W Bush is eminently beatable, it's just that they can't find any candidates up to the job. Hillary talks in the robotic metallic monotone of that voice in your car that tells you to buckle your seatbelt, but the evidence of her Senate campaign is that, with enough discipline and training, Mrs Clinton can be almost likeable.

For the moment, she's downplaying Dick Morris's prediction. "Oh, please," she told WABC Radio. "You know that, uh, he's made a lot of other predictions about me that haven't come true." This may be a reference to Morris's appearance on a California radio show in which he suddenly started speculating on whether the First Lady is a lesbian.

Whatever, she's spending less time with Bill and looking all the better for it. He rattles around in their pretend "home" in Chappaqua without even a pooch for company. Buddy the dog was killed in a mysterious car accident a few months back, merely the latest FOB (Friend Of Bill) to die prematurely. Bill is looking more and more like the Clintons' past, Hillary their future.

Here's a prediction: if NBC do sign him to a $50 million contract, they'll regret it. People will tune in initially, but in two years' time he'll be on some shoestring cable station at two in the morning.

[RonDog]

"I just finished watching "First Mothers" on The History Channel. Every president's mother was a woman of character and accomplishment, women of faith and character, and THEN we get to Bill Clinton, and the whole program took a downturn. Harry Thomason was on and his comment was amazing.

He said that Virginia Kelley would enter a room and if everyone was paying attention to her but one person, she would wonder what was wrong with that person. Thomasson said Bill Clinton is exactly like his mother.

The other presidents inherited courage, duty, compassion, and faith from their mothers. Clinton inherited an obsessive need to be popular. Some legacy." - Miss Marple

"Will this program be repeated? My son insisted on watching some Blue Water fish program!" - Carolinamom

From http://www.historychannel.com/firstmothers/:

[Leisler]

A lounge act that plays out at the Holiday Inn by the airport every wendsday night.( No cover )

[SuziQ]

Bump for a later reading!!

[Alouette]

("Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because her real father's Janet Reno"

BWAHAHAHAHA!

[Cian]

It is Swahili and it is what the workers call the plantation owner.

Thanks. I didn't understand it either. How is anyone meant to get an obscure reference like that?

[BigWaveBetty]

Who knew Chris M. was really Vernon Jordan?!

[friendly]

LOL your usual four star posts...thanks for the AM pick me ups.

[another cricket]

How is anyone meant to get an obscure reference like that?

On FR you just ask. 99.998% of the time someone here is going to know.

a.cricket

[MeekOneGOP]

LOL! My pleasure.......Thanks, FRiend!

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[maica]

How is anyone meant to get an obscure reference like that?

On FR you just ask. 99.998% of the time someone here is going to know.

So true! One of the great strengths of Free Republic.

BTW, I am surprised that "Bwana" can be considered obscure - showing my age (and the age of Cian) ;>)

[stands2reason]

I love it: "metallic voice." I've called her (Hillary) the Iron Maiden before, but maybe now I'll start calling her Metallica.

Hey, now, that's totally uncalled for! I think Phantom Lord will agree, you'd be undeservedly blaspheming a great band!

[stiga bey]

Okay, bad joke. Cliff Burton is spinning in his grave.

[Victoria Delsoul]

Clinton's problem is that since September 11 either his presidency is seen as a trivial interlude, a holiday from history between the Cold War and the present war, or - worse - he's set up as the designated Neville Chamberlain figure, the weak man who never appreciated the enormity of the threat.

My sentiments exactly. Good article. Thanks Meek.

[MeekOneGOP]

You're welcomed, Victoria.

[leilani]

"according to some rumours, there is an Iraqi link to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, but Clinton chose to ignore it because it suited him politically to blame the bombing on the broader "climate of hate" created by Right-wing militias and conservative radio hosts. There'll be a lot more of this before it's all over." So the Senator from New York, Bubba's right hand woman, knew all about the Iraqi & radical islamic threat as well as the possibility of the WTC attack before Sept 11? YOWSA!!Don Imus actually intimated this a long time ago. This is very very scary.