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Jewish World Review Feb. 15, 2001 / 22 Shevat, 5761

Ann Coulter

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Consumer Reports


Bill Clinton does the Harlem shuffle

http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- IMPEACHED former president Bill Clinton can't get office space in the more desirable parts of Manhattan, the first firm to hire him to speak was immediately compelled to apologize, his Hollywood friends are refusing to defend him on the Marc Rich pardon and White House ottoman heist, there is a sex-saturated emporium in Thailand named The Clinton Entertainment Plaza, and The New York Times has finally admitted to its readers that Clinton wasn't so popular after all. In a related development, O.J. Simpson has been arrested and may face jail time.

We are governed by a just and good G-d.

Wholly apart from the comedic aspects of watching Clinton's erstwhile supporters take up the hard work of the Clinton-haters, it's kind of a relief to know that once he's out of power, no one likes him. The only way to distinguish Clinton-haters from Clinton-lovers these days is that only his former friends are claiming to be shocked by his charming exit from office.

Clinton's alleged popularity was never merely a political dispute. He became the Rorschach blot of what kind of country this is. Consequently, it got a little depressing to keep hearing claims of Clinton's runaway popularity on account of his being a lying pervert.

Columnist Maureen Dowd continuously referred to Clinton's "vertiginous approval ratings," complaining that Gore had "frittered away this huge, amazing gift that had been bestowed on him."

Frank Rich (Dowd's colleague on the diverse New York Times op-ed page) said the main problem with the Gore campaign was that "the Democrats have fallen into the same 'fatal eddy' that the Republicans did in '98 -- buying into the Washington establishment's still completely unproven conviction that you can win elections running as moral paragons against Bill Clinton's sins."

Except the only "unproven conviction" was the lunatic claim that the "American people" adored Bill Clinton and adored him most enthusiastically for his "sins." It didn't matter that these were subjective assertions of irrelevant people. Soon, dour conservatives were claiming to believe lying liberals, and nearly everyone was insisting the country loved Bill Clinton.

Everyone else loved him, that is. The "American people" came to be an Oz-like concept. Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!

Sweeping statements by journalists about those 280 million people behind the curtain are always highly informative about precisely one thing: the opinions of those journalists. But they really tell us nothing at all about the "American people" that the authors claim to speak for.

On the other hand, there are methods of gauging public opinion that, unlike newspaper columns, can be tested. The behavior of campaign consultants and Wall Street investors, for example, provides meaningful data because it has real and immediate consequences. The 280 million people cavalierly summarized by the opinion columnists weren't able to chat with Dowd and Rich. They were able to vote with their ballots and with their money.

According to the Newspaper of Record, the Gore campaign experienced "very little internal debate about using Mr. Clinton more because polls consistently found that he would be a drag on the ticket." This will undoubtedly come as a shock to regular readers of that newspaper.

Moreover, just last week, Wall Street had to learn the hard way that claims of Clinton's immense popularity may have been somewhat overstated on the nation's op-ed pages. Soon after it was revealed that investment bank Morgan Stanley had paid Clinton more than $100,000 to speak at a conference, the company was besieged with complaints from clients threatening to pull their accounts.

So furious was the response that "talking points" had to be distributed to the firm's employees to deal with irate clients, and within a few days, the chairman of Morgan Stanley issued a full mea culpa: "We clearly made a mistake. ... (W)e should have been far more sensitive to the strong feelings of our clients over Mr. Clinton's personal behavior as president."

As is his habit whenever he gets into trouble, the impeached former president immediately ran to his willing dupes in the African-American community. After all other suitable office space in Manhattan had dried up -- and also after spending the weekend golfing at an all-white club in Florida -- Clinton announced he would take an office in Harlem.

As one of my friends remarked, that should be nice: Having escaped a mugging on the way to work, Clinton's female employees will then have to face an accused rapist in the office.

Even Al Sharpton doesn't expect Mr. Hollywood to be spending his days at the Harlem site. Assuming the whole extravaganza of examining office space in Harlem isn't a fraud, it shouldn't bother his devoted African-American public when he never actually uses the Harlem office. If they're not mad at Clinton for calling himself the "first black president," they are incapable of being insulted.


JWR contributor Ann Coulter is the author of High Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Case Against Bill Clinton. You may visit the Ann Coulter Fan Club by clicking here.


Up

02/08/01: Eight more Clarence Thomases
02/01/01: This just in: Price controls cause shortages
01/25/01: People United for Swindles and Hucksterism
01/18/01: Ashcroft and the blowhard discuss desegregation
01/11/01: TWO WEEKS TILL INDICTMENT!
01/04/01: Liberal pimps for Clintonism
01/02/01: Kwanzaa: Holiday from the FBI
12/28/00: If Americans support abortion, let's vote
12/26/00: Gore, him and her
12/21/00: Channeling Jackie O
12/14/00: My Court is bigger than your Court
12/11/00: HANG IN THERE, AL!
12/07/00: National Lampoon's Florida Supreme Court Vacation
12/04/00: It's past time for GOPers to quit being good at losing
11/30/00: Things only a Dem will say with a straight face
11/27/00: Certify the electors, then the judges
11/23/00: Kangaroo coup
11/20/00: This is what the Electoral College is supposed to prevent
11/16/00: The liar next time
11/09/00: JUST GO!
11/06/00: Hail Mary past
11/02/00: As the nose grows: The scripture according to Gore
10/30/00: Clinton sure can pick 'em
10/26/00: Gore's 'Nam flashbacks
10/23/00: Courting George Orwell
10/20/00: The three faces of Al
10/17/00: Must Christian conservatives be fascists?
10/13/00: Oil good; Dems bad
10/10/00: Al Gore: Serial fibber
10/06/00: Sigh of the crook
10/03/00: So who's the 'dumb guy' now?
09/29/00: Don't do drug legalization
09/26/00: I'd burn down my neighbor's house
09/22/00: Democrats worship the money shot
09/19/00: Other film footage we'd like to see
09/15/00: Bush can name the **^%*
09/12/00: The Supreme Court ratchet
09/08/00: Our mistake -- keep polluting
09/05/00: Bubba protects and serves
09/01/00: AlGore's 'going out of business!' tax plan
08/29/00: Bush's compassionate conservatism
08/25/00: Space alien tells funny jokes in bathtub
08/22/00: Dems view world only in black and white, not in color
08/18/00: Another Damascus Road conversion
08/15/00: The viagra cotillion
08/11/00: The hand-wringing Hamlet from Hartford
08/07/00: The Democratic party's white face
08/04/00: Hillary's potty mouth
08/01/00: The hole in the story
07/28/00: Cheney's detractors can't get their story straight
07/25/00: AlGore: Elmer Blandry
07/21/00: The tyranny of non-objectivity
07/18/00: The state's religion
07/14/00: Reform it back
07/11/00: Keating for veep
07/07/00: Gore invented 'Clueless'
07/04/00: The stupidity litmus test
06/30/00: O.J. was 'proved innocent' too
06/27/00: The last guys 'proved innocent'
06/23/00: Serious Republican candidates don't get serious press
06/19/00: They weren't overzealous this time
06/16/00: Evolution of the strumpet
06/13/00: Actual journalistic malpractice
06/09/00: I did not have sexual
relations with that ... man!
06/06/00: IRS turns Bubba's screw
05/30/00: Too corrupt to be an Arkansas lawyer
05/26/00: Choose liberalism
05/24/00: Violence against coherence
05/22/00: Developmentally disabled Republicans
05/16/00: For womb the bell tolls
05/12/00: Asylum from Georgetown
05/10/00: The truth is out there, even for the clueless
05/08/00: Barbie is a liberal Democrat
05/02/00: Moving the goalpost
04/28/00: The bastardization of justice
04/25/00: How Monica Lewinsky saved the constitution
04/24/00: It's sunny today, so we need gun control
04/19/00: No shadow of a doubt -- liberal women are worthless
04/14/00: It takes a Communist dictator to raise a child
04/11/00: The verdict is in on Hillary
04/07/00: Vast Concoctions III
04/04/00: 'Horrifying' free speech in New York
03/31/00: Check-Off Box For Pimp Suits
03/28/00: All the news that fits -- we print!
03/24/00: Net losses all around
03/20/00: To protect, serve --- and be spat on
03/16/00: Thank Heaven for the consigliere
03/13/00: Vast concoctions II
03/09/00: The bluebloods voted against you
03/07/00: The Tower of Babble
03/03/00: Vast concoction
03/02/00: Hillary's sartorial lies
02/28/00: You have to break a few eggs to make a joke
02/22/00: I've seen enough killing to support abortion
02/18/00: A liberal lynching
02/15/00: McCain and the flag
02/11/00: The Shakedown Express
02/08/00: To mock a mockingbird
02/05/00: Summing up Campaign 2000: 'Oh, puh-leeze!'
02/01/00: A Confederacy of Dunces
01/28/00: Dollar Bill's racist smear
01/24/00: How high is your freedom quotient?
01/21/00: Numismadness
01/18/00: How dare you attack my wife!
01/14/00: The Gore Buggernaut
01/10/00: The paradox of discrimination law

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