EXPANSION OF A COMMENT POSTED TO ANOTHER READER’S COMMENT ON
AN ARTICLE IN THE GUARDIAN
I think you've got it all wrong.
Whatever Trump may be, Bill Clinton qualifies as trash, as
he has demonstrated many times.
It’s not just his tiresome efforts to make-out with every
woman he ever meets.
But here is a guy who has the distinction of having oral sex
with a young intern in the Oval Office, leaving a smarmy, indelible image in
all our minds associated with that place.
Most people believe sex with people under your immediate
authority is quite unethical, and it will get you fired in many corporations
and organizations.
And as Clinton tried to explain his way out of that scandal,
we saw first-hand another unpleasant portion of his character, an endless stream
of smirky word games and shameless lies.
Apart from all the unpleasantness he lodged in our memories,
Clinton had not a serious achievement as President, unless you count destroying
a new pharmaceutical plant in North Africa.
His bombing of the capital of Serbia was disgraceful and
unnecessary, and it included the deliberate targeting of a broadcast headquarters
for Serbian television journalists, many of whom were killed.
He was a total coward when it came to the horrors of Rwanda,
of which he was aware before any of us through State department and CIA
reports. He did nothing. Going well beyond doing nothing, Clinton ordered staff
and State Department to keep the story quiet.
In his Washington political appointments, Clinton again
proved himself a coward. Time after time, he would name some impressive person
to a post, then stall and back off against harsh opposition pressure, withdrawing
his support and their nominations, leaving them out to be pilloried and
embarrassed by ignorant Republican accusations. It was shabby behavior he
repeated several times.
His achievements on the domestic front were zero, unless you
count his signing of a huge bill "to end welfare in our time," as he
bragged in describing it. That was some achievement for a "liberal!"
I do not understand admiration for this man. It’s as though
people confused a big rubbery-faced smile and an “aw shucks,” downhome act with
real achievements.
Yes, he was much smarter and less immediately repulsive than
George Bush, but that's not much of a merit.
He and Hillary – a woman who perfectly matches him in his every
quality of dishonesty, greed, and lack of principle - tried to establish a
national health care scheme, but they failed utterly. Even had they succeeded,
their proposal would have been a sad thing pretty much like Obamacare, a nasty
compromise with the insurance industry, which would likely have collapsed
before very long.
He did not deserve to be impeached, and I said so strongly
at the time, writing a long lead letter in The
Times, which earned me hate mail from the Right Wing.
But not deserving to be impeached is hardly a merit.
He and Hillary set an appalling record of grubbing for money
in office, perhaps only matched by the repulsive Lyndon Johnson. Clinton was
the first president to offer donors in exchange for contributions of a certain
size – if I recall it was a quarter million dollars - a luxury night in the
Lincoln Bedroom at the White House.
He and Hillary have become quite wealthy by extorting huge
contributions to their "foundation" from wealthy special interests,
including foreign governments, in return for favorable hearings of their cases.
It is a foundation which does little in the way valuable work – unlike for
example the Carter Center - while providing occasional political slush funds
and a hugely-overpaid job for their relatively unqualified daughter.
Clinton has long been a close friend of billionaire, Jeffrey
Epstein, who just happens to be a convicted pedophile. He lives on a private
island and purchases a steady supply of underage women, sharing them with
guests like Bill who stay there periodically.
Bill really is not just trash, he is world-class trash.
