As much as I dislike Bill Clinton, even I have to admit that he is the ultimate political opportunist. Every words from Bill Clinton’s mouth is measured so that it appeals to the most number of people at the right time. Given that, his interview with Larry King is fascinating. When confronted with the charges against the current President, here’s what he had to say:
Let me tell you what I know. When I left office, there was a substantial amount of biological and chemical material unaccounted for. That is, at the end of the first Gulf War, we knew what he had. We knew what was destroyed in all the inspection processes and that was a lot. And then we bombed with the British for four days in 1998. We might have gotten it all; we might have gotten half of it; we might have gotten none of it. But we didn’t know. So I thought it was prudent for the president to go to the U.N. and for the U.N. to say you got to let these inspectors in, and this time if you don’t cooperate the penalty could be regime change, not just continued sanctions.
I mean, we’re all more sensitive to any possible stocks of chemical and biological weapons. So there’s a difference between British — British intelligence still maintains that they think the nuclear story was true. I don’t know what was true, what was false. I thought the White House did the right thing in just saying, Well, we probably shouldn’t have said that. And I think we ought to focus on where we are and what the right thing to do for Iraq is now. That’s what I think.
The importance of that statement is monumental – Bill Clinton actually defended President Bush. That’s something that doesn’t happen every day – in fact, I believe this may well be the first time it’s ever happened.
What could cause Clinton, who is as strong a partisan as any, to do such a thing? The top theory I see is that Clinton realizes that there is going to be a massive backlash when WMDs or documentation of WMDs are found in Iraq. He’s doing the exact opposite of what Howard Dean and some of the other Nine Democratic Nazgûl are doing – he’s keeping quite on this issue. He still wants to remain politically viable, and he may well realize that the best way of doing that is to not go over the edge with the rest of his party.
Given that the Clintons are the ultimate political survivors, one does have to wonder what they know that the Democrats don’t…
Amazing. Even when Clinton is on your side of the issue, you prophesize that it’s a conspiracy rather than taking any pleasure out of it. Even as right-wingers get everything they want in today’s political culture, they just can’t let go of their rage from the Clinton years when they only got 80% of what they wanted.
Conspiracy? Nope, my argument is that (gasp!) – Clinton is right on this one. Quite frankly, if I were in his position, I’d do the exact same thing.
Say what you want about Clinton, but when it comes to playing politics, he’s one of the masters.