-Caveat Lector-
"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the
people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent
and sudden usurpation's."
--- James Madison
Politics
'99 May 20
What follows is one of the bitingest little articles on the Prez. that I've
ever read. Enjoy! And if you want to read more by Christopher Hitchens, go
to the Christopher Hitchens Web.
Reproduction of the latest Christopher Hitchens
"Minority Report" from The Nation Magazine
(Febr16, 1998 issue)
Clinton's Comeuppance
Late in her life, Lillian Hellman was onstage at some campus event, and was
asked why she had never endorsed gay liberation. Leaning over her cane and
peering at the back of the hall through heavy dark glasses, she replied in
raspy but lapidary words. "The forms of fucking," she said, "do not require
my endorsement." One had one's disagreements with the old girl, but this
time, it would be nice to think, she spoke for us all. Half the pundits and
windbags in the continental United States have been rushing to say, with
less wit and less courage, that William Jefferson Clinton's "private" life
is, or should be, his own affair. We're all adults...let's get on with the
nation's business...what if this should give the market a tsura?
Which is not to say quite the same thing. Rape, incest, child prostitution,
intern abuse and the humping of the help are all, also, "forms of fucking,"
but they equally certainly don't require endorsement. And I, on the day that
the fragrant Monica Lewinsky broke cover, had been much more interested in
establishing the identity of the "senior Republican," cited in The New York
Times, who had told the South Korean dictators to go ahead and execute Kim
Dae Jung in 1980. I still am more interested. That doesn't make the Clinton
libido irrelevant. If the recent freshet of J.F.K. books has made anything
plain, it is that there may well be a connection between machismo Type A
(Kennedy's disgusting admiration for Ian Fleming's fiction as it related to
women) and machismo Type B (Kennedy's even more repellent admiration for Ian
Fleming's James Bond solutions in the political sphere). Between power and
the aphrodisiac, as the clammy Kissinger used to be overfond of saying,
there is a well-understood connection. You don't have to be a Reichian to
propose that a sick libido may connote, or may lead to, baseness in
politics. And/or vice versa.
I was a contemporary of Clinton's at Oxford, and though I didn't know him
personally (he was a moderate while I was an extremist), I did know several
members of his set. And I still do know three women who kept company with
him. I'll call them Sarah Maitland, Mandy Merck and Pip Northey, because
those are their names. They were all strong, clever, tough and attractive.
They still are. They all reported "Bill" to be a real gentleman, a good
companion and a sensitive confidant, and they have all resolutely refused to
gossip about him ever since, though in at least one case there were letters
that might have fetched a bundle. This is impressive testimony. Of course,
in those days Clinton also maintained a minimum of seriousness about civil
rights, the war and the subversion of American democracy by the "national
security" apparat. Stuff like that.
Here is what I think must have happened. It's borne out in the two best
Clinton biographies, by David Maraniss and Roger Morris. Sizzling with
ambition and also with the deadly need for approval, "Bill" soon found that
professional politics was a no-brainer for someone as plausible and sinuous
as himself. He was drawn very early on by the glamour and the razzmatazz
side of the business, and also by the easy money and the easy women.
("Politics," as someone once said, "is show business for ugly people.") He
would give himself a makeover at the drop of an opinion poll. He learned to
be economical with the truth, and saw this hailed as cleverness and skill.
He caught the eye of the people who look for reliable "candidates"--most
especially that safe "New Democrat" kind of candidate.
Well, you know how it is. You need the charm less and less, and there is
less and less time for attentive wooing. Money trees can be shaken. Arms can
be twisted. Likely lasses can be ordered like pizza, and may not always be
chosen for their sophistication. The evident coarsening and thuggishness of
Clinton's political evolution, and the way he prostituted himself to any and
every special interest, could have its carnal counterpart. Could have? How
else to explain his best-ever friend, Dick Morris, who has bragged about
procuring him babes and whose sordid public manners debauched an entire
presidential election? (There may be some right-wing creeps behind Paula
Jones and even Linda Tripp, but they can't be as right-wing or as creepy as
Dick Morris.) With both Morris and Clinton, women were part of the spoils
system. Even Lewinsky, we learn, was first recommended to the White House by
a big sleepover "contributor." From there, she graduated to the same Revlon
fast track with which Vernon Jordan, Clinton's corporate fixer, had rewarded
Webster Hubbell. One awkward witness is much like another.
Now we have the bulbous Baptist Clinton, who preaches sexual abstinence for
teens, an inquisition for homosexuals in uniform, an economic cutoff for
welfare mothers with insufficient moral fiber and a V-chip to impose
childish standards on an already infantile mass media. And his apologists
want everyone to be strictly nonjudgmental. We also have the Clinton who cut
great chunks out of habeas corpus and the appeals process with his panicky
"tough" new laws on terrorism and capital punishment. And his apologists
squeal that Kenneth Starr is acting like Beria. This is pathetic, and those
who are engaged in it should be ashamed. But if they were susceptible to
shame, they couldn't decently work for Clinton in the first place.
During the New Hampshire primary of 1992, I attempted to change the subject
from Gennifer Flowers and ask Governor Clinton about his decision to execute
a mentally disabled black man in Arkansas named Rickey Ray Rector. The crude
indifference of his non-response convinced me then that he was lying, as his
toadies are lying still, when they say they would rather focus on "the
issues" than on the bimbos. What they want is to be allowed to suck
undisturbed on the public and private tit, and if any analogies should
suggest themselves, well--the fault is hardly mine. I wish Rector rather
than Flowers had come back to expose Clinton as an unscrupulous and vulgar
and mendacious jerk six years later, but it was bound to happen in one
department of his life or another, and any nemesis is more educational than
none at all.
http://www.overlookhouse.com/politics.html
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Sir Rudyard's reasoned rhymes still rule in America. If Kipling were now in
the Colonies, he might add these verses to his classic:
When Billy was of draft age, Southeast Asia was the cause;
Tho' Uncle called, he ducked it without a moment's pause.
Now 'e's safe within the White House, the artful dodger yet,
Impeachment proof an' O so brave, when Kosovo's the bet.
For it's Tommy this an' Tommy that, but when Billy needs a boost,
'E throws Tommy to the lions, to keep the chickens off the roost.
An' it's Tommy this an' Tommy that an' any war's OK
As long as it's not Billy boy they're chuckin' in harm's way.
--- From the heart of a vet,
J.D. Wetterling
"WE have in the Congress permitted our Presidents
too much leeway in waging war..."
--- US Rep. Ron Paul
http://www.house.gov/paul/
------------
God bless you for your effort in spreading the word
about the socialist threat to our Republic.
For the Enemy Within, go to:
http://www.dsausa.org/dsa/dsa/dsa/dsa/dsa/dsa/pc/pc.members.html
------------------------
Read Donaldson's Letter to Boeing and TWA CEO'S.
http://www.twa800.com
----------------------------
The Shot Heard Around the World-
Disperse you rebels! Damn you, throw down your arms and disperse.
--- British Major John Pitcairn,
Lexington, Massachusetts, April 19, 1775.
-----------------
Bard
Visit me at:
The Center for Exposing Corruption in the Federal Government
http://www.xld.com/public/center/center.htm
Federal Government defined:
....a benefit/subsidy protection racket!
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