A blast from the past

First there was a Reagan bounce, as Americans remembered what was great about him, his courage, and apparently decided that Bush is who he'd vote for if he were with us today.

This week it's Bill Clinton's turn to take center stage as he plugs his book. No doubt he'd sell a lot of books, but I wonder if the contrast with Bush will give Bush or Kerry a bounce. That's lip-biting rationalization of Clinton's really turns my stomach with its dishonesty but a lot of people don't see it. David Brooks says that Clinton "understands the role religion actually plays in modern politics." I think that goes a little overboard, but Brooks does qualify it with "[m]ore than any other leading Democrat."

I'm listening to Hugh Hewitt who is playing back clips from Clinton's appearance on Oprah. When she brought up his "because I could" remark, he quickly broke in with a non sequitur reminiscent of "what the meaning of 'is' is". He said that he meant that in a "defined way" requiring the explanation that he was in the midst of a "titanic struggle" with the Republicans over their plot to shut down the government, and the pressure of that battle forced him into battling "his old demons" (that's carnal lust to you and me).

You can hear the folksy grin in his voice as he spins this story, but you can't follow it through all the loops when he tries to tie his abuse of a willing, star-struck young woman for sexual release to a mythic struggle to save the country from the Republicans. While he was thus occupied, that cowardly and dirty Starr took advantage and attacked him because the Whitewater Investigation hadn't turned up any evidence. So it was all because he was trying to save the country from the Republicans that he was driven into gaping maw of Monica. See?

Me neither. Oprah didn't ask him what about his first two years had cost the Democrats their control of the Congress, especially the House of Representatives. I guess it must have been the attack of the Giant Newt that led him into the clutches of the Starr Beast.

He's been working on this spin for 3 and a half years, and this
is what he comes up with, a drive-in double feature: The Attack of the Giant Newt and Billzilla vs. the Starr Beast.

Update: This interview really sticks in your mind. It occurred to me later that he sounds like he's repeating a bunch of excuses he's heard others make for him, but can't get them get quite right, because they really don't make sense to him either. What really comes through is that he can't face the truth that he had his big chance and he botched it about as badly as it is possible to do. That's why he makes the silly claims that fighting his impeachment was a badge of honor, or that the beating back the stupid stunt by Gingrich and his rebels of shutting down the government was a "titanic struggle" for the future of the country. If he needs a badge of honor, how about leadership of NATO in intervening in Bosnia, Kosovo and defeating Milosevic? Those were real achievements, but the government shutdown didn't really require much from him other than waiting for the Republicans to back down.