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 The
Dowbrigade finds the present electoral season disappointing in so many
ways. One of the featured acts we were really looking
forward to enjoying was the display of political contortionism and dissimulation
expected from the Dems Royal Family, Bill and Hillary Clinton.
According to our penetrating if paranoid political analysis,
the Best Behavior of America’s premier power couple during this campaign
would require an exquisite touch and consummate acting skill, but we
had every
expectation
that the
Clintons
were up
to it.
The reasoning goes as follows. If Kerry wins the election,
then he is in a good position to repeat in ’08 and leave a mature and
leveraged John Edwards as heir apparent in ’12, pushing Hilary’s window
of opportunity well into her Golden Years of AARP activism.
On the other hand, if Kerry were to go down to a hard fought
and honorable defeat in November, and the economic and war chickens flapping
around the landscape come home to roost during a second Bush period,
then the
Republicans will be ripe for the plucking in ’08, and Hilary will be
primed to re-take the throne.
On the other other hand, however, we are dead
certain that with every liberal bone in both Clinton’s bodies they believe
that four more years of Bush would be a disaster for the country, and
a blow to all of the political principles they espouse. Who know what
kind of Faustian deal with the devil, what internal moral contortions
will be necessary for them to successfully rationalize that a Bush victory
will be better for the country in the long run, as it would
usher in the Shangrala of a second Clinton presidency?
We have limitless faith in the ambition and moral ambivalence
of the former First Couple, and are confident that in their hearts they
are pulling for another underhanded Bush victory. Yet they must at all
cost avoid even a whisper of a hint that they are doing anything less
than their utmost to get their party’s candidate elected THIS time. Anything
less would brand them as opportunistic political traitors and doom them
to irrelevance in future election cycles. Thus we were looking forward
to a lively lesson in the Arkansas two-step, stump-speech doubletalk
and political posturing, subtly erroneous advice and exquisitely "accidental"
campaign faux pas.
What a difficult position the Clintons were in! How to
get out of all of that embarrassing and stressful multiple role playing
and constant calculation? We know it is cruel, cheap and incredibly cynical
to suggest that Bill’s heart trouble was in any way staged, but it certainly
is convenient, isn’t it? Now both Clinton’s have a perfect excuse
to sit this one out, amid an outpouring of concern and well-wishing from
BOTH parties and campaign camps. Brilliant! And of course we wish the ex-President a swift and complete recovery.
However, since our reputation for callous cynicism couldn’t
be much worse, let us confess that we also wonder if Hilary, that marvelously
conniving caldron of political calculation, is mulling over how Bill’s
different prognoses will affect her chances in four years. Our
advice to Bill is to be very careful in picking your doctors.
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