Bill Clinton

Something to offend everyone. Warning: some mild language. And please excuse the ad at the end.

Update: The Obama campaign Released the Following statement this afternoon, via email:

"Senator Obama had a terrific conversation with President Clinton and is honored to have his support in this campaign. He has always believed that Bill Clinton is one of this nation's great leaders and most brilliant minds, and looks forward to seeing him on the campaign trail and receiving his counsel in the months to come," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

6/24/2008 - When Senator Hillary Clinton suspended her campaign, and offered her "full throated support" to Barack Obama, his future got so bright, he had to wear shades. Now, on the heels of news that she will be campaigning with him in Unity, N.H., this Friday, comes the endorsement that could bounce Obama right into the White House. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the former President of the United States, Mr. William Jefferson Clintoooon! (through a spokesmaaaaan.) From Reuters:

"President Clinton is obviously committed to doing whatever he can and is asked to do to ensure Senator Obama is the next president of the United States," Clinton's spokesman Matt McKenna told Reuters in a one-sentence e-mail.

Wow:

Mr Obama is expected to speak to Mr Clinton for the first time since he won the nomination in the next few days, but campaign insiders say that the former president's future campaign role is a "sticking point" in peace talks with Mrs Clinton's aides.

The Telegraph has learned that the former president's rage is still so great that even loyal allies are shocked by his patronising attitude to Mr Obama, and believe that he risks damaging his own reputation by his intransigence.

A senior Democrat who worked for Mr Clinton has revealed that he recently told friends Mr Obama could "kiss my ass" in return for his support.

You stay classy, Mr. Ex-President. Now what do you think are the chances of Obama doing anything like this. I'm pretty sure his response would be, "You first, Bill."

Bill Clinton took a pass on an opportunity to MoveOn and endorse Senator Obama on Sunday, opting instead to shake hands, kiss babies, and effusively praise Senator Obama's energy and environmental policies as, meh, better than the Republicans' anyway.

It was President Clinton's first public appearance since his wife's suspension of her campaign. According to Reuters, when asked whether he would soon be endorsing Senator Obama, Clinton "smiled and shook hands with spectators without acknowledging he heard the question."

Later on at the same event, President Clinton addressed Senator Obama's carbon emissions plan. "Because I believe so strongly in this," he said, "I favor Senator Obama's position, which is to go to 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gasses over Senator McCain's position, which is to go to 70 percent. But that's light years ahead of where Republicans have been." That statement roughly translates to "Obama and McCain are both light years ahead of Bush, but Obama wins slightly ... I guess."

As Hot Air notes, President Clinton seemed to swear off the campaign trail in a statement earlier this month, saying "I want to say also, that this may be the last day I'm ever involved in a campaign of this kind," at a town hall event June 2. If this latest event is at all diagnostic, I'd say he's keeping to that plan.

Bill and Hillary Clinton, and their supporters, are compiling and maintaining an "enemies list," according to a report by the NY Times' MARK LEIBOVICH:

Doug Band, chief gatekeeper to former President Bill Clinton...keeps close track of the past allies and beneficiaries of the Clintons who supported Mr. Obama's campaign, three Clinton associates and campaign officials said.

... As the Obama bandwagon has swelled, so have the lists of people Clinton loyalists regard as some variation of "ingrate," "traitor" or "enemy,"

Campaign Chairman Terry McAuliffe admits to the existence of the list, but swears it's not for revenge.

Of particular interest was this passage:

The news media have already focused on some list entries, ... Matt Drudge , ...Todd S. Purdum of Vanity Fair (the author of a recent profile of Mr. Clinton) and the cable network MSNBC (whose hosts Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann are charter list members, Clinton associates said).

Keeping an "enemies list" might seem like an exercise in futility when you consider that everyone on it is also on the President's "friends list." Let's set that aside and take a look at who might be on the list, and whether or not they deserve it.

That's the thesis put forth today in the Wall Street Journal. You may recall that Bill has been a big proponent of the "Dream Ticket" for some time, so what could be the problem? According to The Journal, the former president would not be prepared to go through Obama's formal vetting process:

Some in the Clinton camp also notes a possible deal-breaker for a party-unity ticket: Bill Clinton may balk at releasing records of his business dealings and big donors to his presidential library...

...For Sen. Clinton to be considered, she would have to undergo an invasive vetting of both Clinton's private and public affairs, just like other recent vice-presidential aspirants, say veterans of the process. They said it would likely require Mr. Clinton to reveal donors to his library in Little Rock, Ark., which have included the governments of Saudi Arabia and Qatar and Middle Eastern businessmen, as well as details of his confidential business dealings.

So, if you buy this theory, then it was fine for Bill to go for First Gentleman, but the intense spotlight of Vice Presidential spouse would prove just too revealing. Or, if you're feeling especially cynical, since the Clinton's didn't stand for that almighty CHANGE in the same way Obama does, past business dealings wouldn't have mattered had Hillary won.

The article is right, however, when it stresses the inherent conflict of having the former first family playing second fiddle to Obama. We all witnessed the difficulty Hillary had at times in keeping her husband reigned in and on message. The loose cannon argument seems to me to be the biggest reason she won't be on the ticket. The last thing a presidential candidate wants is a question mark in the minds of voters as to who is setting the agenda. So maybe we can blame Bill, after all, if we're desperate for a fall guy, as to why the Obama/Clinton merger will stall. As for shady financial dealings and the presidential library, the Journal floats a lot of innuendo (Arab donors are all bad people), but doesn't really have the goods.

Update: Statement from Vanity Fair at the end of this article.

Yesterday, former President Bill Clinton let loose a blistering stream of invective at Vanity Fair's Todd Purdum, in response to Purdum's article, "The Comeback Id." From Mayhill Fowler:

"[He's] sleazy," he said referring to Purdum. "He's a really dishonest reporter. And one of our guys talked to him . . . And I haven't read [the article]. But he told me there's five or six just blatant lies in there. But he's a real slimy guy," the former president said.

When I reminded him that Purdum was married to his former press spokesperson Myers, Clinton was undeterred.

"That's all right-- he's still a scumbag," Clinton said. " Let me tell ya-- he's one of the guys -- he's one of the guys that propagated all those lies about Whitewater to Kenneth Starr. He's just a dishonest guy-- can't help it."

"Scumbag" may be the grabber here, but who really cares? We're all adults, so I'm not about to get my sac twisted over it. You can if you want. The rest of his tirade is pretty unhinged by today's low standards, too, so if you're a "Dean Scream" fan, go ahead and read the rest of it.

Let's also set aside the fact that Hillary benefited greatly from one of the worst journalistic travesties I've ever seen, and the irony embedded in Bill's accusation of sleaze. Sometimes, a jerk can also be right, something I wish my readers would consider more often.

So, instead, I want to focus on the most disturbing part of his diatribe, "And I haven't read [the article]." Since he didn't, I will, and we'll see if there's any merit to Bill's claim that Purdum is destroying journalism.

Despite the varied assortment of topics considered so far in the 2008 Democratic primaries, the Clinton impeachment rarely gets brought up on the campaign trail. Other than a few attempts by journalists to get Chelsea Clinton's take on the matter, and passing references to it in regards to Bob Barr's run for President, because Barr helped lead the Clinton impeachment effort, it's as if the whole ordeal never occurred.

Politico's Jeanne Cummings points out that during the long primary season both the Clinton campaign and the campaigns of her Democratic opponents completely embargoed the topic despite Republicans making it clear that impeachment would be an issue in the general election if Senator Clinton won the nomination. The issue never emerged in the debates, despite the fact that there were 12,237 of them.

Impeachment may have been inexorably put off limits, Cummings explains, when Hollywood heavyweight and Obama supporter David Geffen raised the topic in early 2007. Clinton's rivals recognized that mentioning the ordeal quickly generated sympathy for Senator Clinton. Over a year later, when Senator Clinton's schedule was released in March 2008, ABC News reporter Brian Ross was panned on Democratic-leaning blogs for reporting that Hillary Clinton may have been in the White House on "Blue Dress Day".

The result was a net gain for Senator Clinton, because the overriding factor is all of this is that even after all the emotion of the long campaign, Democrats remain firmly united in their rejection of Bill Clinton's impeachment. Georgetown University political scientist John Haskell told Cummings, "The Clinton administration wasn't popular among liberal Democrats because he was triangulating like mad and [also wasn't popular] with African-Americans because of welfare reform. Then the Republicans go crazy and try to impeach him and everybody came together and said the real problem's in [former Speaker] Newt Gingrich and the rest of them."

I really, really think they just might be in til the convention. Remember the calculus, assuming Obama gets the nomination, if he becomes president this was probably her last best shot at the White House. But if he loses in November, Hillary is all set up to say, "I told you so" and she will be the top prospect in 2012 versus a John McCain.

By that time I speculate that McCain will have angered everyone on both sides of the aisle and will likely be ripe for defeat. But in either scenario it makes sense for her to stay in. She really has nothing to lose and as Republicans have known for years and the Democrats are, oh so slowly! beginning to realize, the Clintons are in it for themselves, not the party.

To which I present Bill Clinton's big speech today:

Clinton spent more than six minutes calmly discussing what he called a "frantic effort to push her out" of this race, saying that no one asked Ted Kennedy, Jesse Jackson or Gary Hart to end their presidential campaigns early.

Clinton also spoke against bullying superdelegates to make up their minds, saying, "I cant believe it. It is just frantic the way they are trying to push and pressure and bully all these superdelegates to come out. 'Oh, this is so terrible: The people they want her. Oh, this is so terrible: She is winning the general election, and he is not. Oh my goodness, we have to cover this up.'"

...

"If you notice, there hasn't been a lot of publicity on these polls I just told you about," Clinton said. "It is the first time you've heard it? Why do you think that is? Why do you think? Don't you think if the polls were the reverse and he was winning the electoral college against Sen. McCain and Hillary was losing it, it would be blasted on every television station? You would know it wouldn't you? It wouldn't be a little secret. And there is another Electoral College poll that I saw yesterday had her over 300 electoral votes, yeah. She will win the general election is you nominate her. They're just trying to make sure you don't."

Nice. It's fun to see that Bill Clinton is complaining of unfair press coverage. Considering his anointed run in 1992, it's a little hard to take, but his annoyance at the current turn of events helps. A lot.

You can't always get what you want. But if you raise enough of a stink and threaten to take your fight all the way the credentials committee at the Democratic National Convention in Denver this August, you might find, you get what you need. Or something like that.

From our friends at Time magazine comes word that Bill Clinton is aggressively working to see that his wife is included on the Democratic ticket. Second fiddle is better than no fiddle at all:

Her husband, for one, seems to have a pretty clear idea what he thinks she should get as a consolation prize. In Bill Clinton's view, she has earned nothing short of an offer to be Obama's running mate, according to some who are close to the former President. Bill "is pushing real hard for this to happen," says a friend.

The story was corroborated a day later by The New York Times. But really, the 64-thousand-dollar-question is, What Does Hillary Want? Calling Mel Gibson and his gender-specific psychic powers. Tell us, Mel, what's brewing in that noggin of hers? Most observers will admit that, in terms of delegates, this race is over. While Hillary Clinton may yet be able to gerrymander a popular vote edge (if Michigan and Florida go entirely in her favor, and we don't try to assign vote tallies to a few of those pesky caucus states), only a superdelegate miracle that overturns pledged delegates (i.e. the will of the people) can save her bid to become president-elect in 2008.

So, is her goal to nab the V.P. slot? And do threats to hijack the mile-high city really help in this cause? I'll leave the tea leaves to Mel. Here's a track from the Rolling Stones to, er, play us out.