In Defense of the 42nd President.
By Marc Ash
t r u t h o u t - 2.27.01 | To paraphrase Forest Gump, 'corrupt is as corrupt does.' Do some of President Clinton's pardons raise questions? You bet, as well they should. Did Arab nationals bomb the Murrah Federal building? I for one thought so, shame on me. In the end it turned out to be the bloody and irrational work of American right wing extremists. The mob now assembled to indict the former President is woefully short on facts but apparently more than satisfied with conjecture.
None of this should come as a surprise, unsubstantiated innuendo has provided the underpinnings for each of the many scandals. In the end the most serious indiscretion proven has been failure to admit a tryst with a young woman to a McCarthyesque prosecutor financed by conservative zealots.
Bill Clinton is a man of both style and substance, make no mistake there are those who resent it deeply. Oh where it that I might be him, my life for his in a second. He is certainly a scholar, an extraordinary statesman and as President a prodigious provider to the nation. He did everything we asked and more, building from the ashes of 12 years of republican greed the most powerful and empowering economy in our nations history, 7 years of progress between Israelis and Palestinians, intervening in the Balkans, not for the sake of oil or money but to prevent the slaughter of innocents, hundreds of thousands of square acres of the greatest natural beauty god ever created set aside for future generations, and perhaps most precious of all, a place for our country in the world community.
Much has been made of what will be his legacy, I say this; tell me the legacy of George Walker Bush and I'll tell you the legacy of William Jefferson Clinton, I surely believe that in the end, the former will stand in the shadow of the later.
For the time rest well assured, the 42nd president has the respect and support of millions.
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