Daily Archives: April 2, 2008

Chelsea Clinton & the “M” Words

Another college student, this time from N.C. State, asked Chelsea Clinton about her feelings concerning the Bill & Monica story of the ’90’s. I cannot help but think this was a plant. Seems to me, that passing a few bucks along to a college student for a kegger (or whatever) will ensure this kind of nonsense is covered; or perhaps, this kid just wanted his 60 seconds of fame. Whatever the truth concerning this, the media gets numerous chances to talk around the sides of something they want to insert into their ongoing “Clinton narrative” and fill yet another useless news cycle. Colbert’s contribution to the political lexicon is truthiness. Here is my contribution to the political lexicon, newsless news.

To Chelsea’s credit she answered, “None of your business.” The truth is, her feelings about this part of her life have absolutely nothing to do with her mother’s campaign. These types of questions are nothing less than prurient, tawdry, & tasteless. We have any number of voyeurs that would like to tap into this topic, but can’t, knowing full well that this despicable behavior.

I am part of the 66% of Americans who supported Bill Clinton all during the impeachment farce foisted on the public by the Republicans of the 90’s; those angered that Clinton had beaten Bush 41 in his re-election bid. The truth is the Republicans felt they were entitled to the White House. They had plans in place to rule the country for next 50 years and to eradicate all forms of competition, including the Democrats, the dreaded liberals, and the equally despised moderates.

From the very first day the Clintons entered the White House the country had to endure the 8-year temper tantrum (Whitewater, Travelgate, et al) that Rush Limbaugh and the whole conservative crowd inflicted on us. The Republicans didn’t win the White House and they were going to make good ‘n sure every day of the Clintons stay was misery. The trouble is, theses loons brought us along on their nasty ride of retribution.

Think about this. In spite of the madness and mayhem, Bill Clinton left this country in much better condition than he found it. We had no national debt whereas we are currently spending at a rate of a million dollars a minute to support the Bush/Cheney war of choice in Iraq. We face red ink and red blood as far as the eye can see because of this war.

The Monica mess was aided and abetted by the media, whose abdication of “responsible news reporting” entered a higher plane of ineptitude. I remember watching This Week with David Brinkley on the Sunday after our embassy had been attacked, and there was Sam Donaldson (and his ghastly hairpiece I nicknamed, Fred) droning on and on about what the blue dress meant and how it was going to effect Clinton’s legacy. Madeline Albright was scheduled to discuss what had happened, how it had happened, the loss of life etc. As I remember it, she was given less than 2 minutes at the end of the program to inform, We the People, about this tragedy. The choices made by the media during this period weren’t the fault of Bill Clinton or anyone in his administration. These choices were the result of a media behaving more like reporters for Entertainment Tonight than of members of the press.

Whatever happened between Bill, Monica, and Hillary was no ones business and it remains no ones business. I cannot imagine anything more painful than having a spouse’s betrayal exposed for the entire country to gawk at and ridicule. There is an exception to this and that is poking into the feelings of a child who went through this kind of difficult time with her parents.

Should anyone think the “M” in this piece is for Monica, guess again. The “M” represents all the media morons out there that regard Chelsea (or any child or spouse in a similar situation) as a target for them to shoot at. BTW, don’t try to use the excuses that she’s 27 now, or that she’s on the campaign trail with her mom, or any other lame excuse to pick this scab off this collective wound. We’ve been there and done that, and we don’t want another “go round”.

The public regards today’s media with justifiable disdain, many of us equating us the media with pond scum. Here’s a suggestion . . . start reporting & behaving like adults and leave this kind of “stuff” for the supermarket rags.

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