Narcissus Unbound

As Glenn Reynolds observes everyone’s talking about Bill Clinton again after his snit during a Chris Wallace interview for Fox News. Wallace had the audacity to actually ask a tough question, which apparently gave good old Bill a serious case of the vapors.

Former President Clinton recommended that everyone read former White House counterterrorism advisor Richard Clarke’s book Against All Enemies which supposedly shows how the Clinton Administration didn’t really drop the ball on terrorism, and especially al-Qaeda. The problem with that is that Clarke’s book directly contradicts Clinton’s attempts to argue that he was proactive on terrorism. Clarke paints Clinton has being interested in how things polled rather than what the results actually were and deferential to members of his Cabinet who argued against a strong response to al-Qaeda’s attacks against US interests.

If that weren’t enough, Clinton outright lied when he said that Richard Clarke was “fired” by the Bush Administration — Clarke states in his book that he resigned from the White House voluntarily. But Clinton has always played fast and loose with the facts, and there’s no reason why he’s likely to stop now.

Clinton’s sense of self-aggrandizement and incredibly thin skin are another manifestation of the character flaws he brought to his term in office — and the last thing this country needs now is a repeat of the sordid history of the Clinton Administration. Clinton had eight years to deal with the threat of al-Qaeda, and he scored a few wins and made several key mistakes. It’s not all that likely that anyone else would have done much differently under similar circumstances. What is certain is that the always-egocentric ex-President can’t stomach even a modicum of criticism — and when Wallace actually dared to throw more than a slow-pitch softball, Clinton threw a temper tantrum.

Once again, Clinton proves that behind the slick exterior, he has some of the thinnest skin in politics.

UPDATE: Powerline has some relevant quotations from Clarke’s book which contradict Clinton’s tirade.

6 thoughts on “Narcissus Unbound

  1. With the election midterms coming up, Clinton managed to make a complete jackass out of himself and has allowed Fox News, Jay Reding, and other right-wing news/opinion sources an easy means to not talk about this weekend’s report about Iraq increasing the threat of Islamic terrorism.

  2. … to not talk about this weekend’s report about Iraq increasing the threat of Islamic terrorism.

    You mean the illegally leaked and incomplete NIE? Had I the time to delve into that subject, I would… needless to say the CIA is once again leaking classified information for partisan political purposes. Hopefully this time heads will roll for such foolish acts…

  3. Funny how you had time to not only fire off a lengthy screed about Clinton’s insignificant tirade on Fox News AND keep close tabs on what those hacks at Powerline had to say on the matter, but not a spare second had you to spend on digesting an NIE ruling from military and foreign policy professionals who completely contradict your cartoonishly bellicose worldview, particularly as it pertains to Iraq. Those law schools just don’t challenge students like the used to!

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