Complete Bookshop/CompleteWorkshop.iso/politics/clinton1/slickwil

Text File | 1992-07-14 | 12KB | 272 lines

Bill Clinton's real lies are not on personal questions, like he would
have you believe - they are about issues and ethical questions involving
him and money.

He or his people keep on repeating about marijuana and the draft and
sexual affairs, and have succeeded in getting nobody to talk about all
those other things, and to think that that is where his worst problems lie..

Now that's slick.

It was not the Bush people who called him Slick Willie. That phrase was
coined years ago by Paul Greenberg, editorial page editor of the Pine
Bluff Commercial. Originally he called him Willie Slick, but he quickly
improved it to Slick Willie, and the name took, because it fits him
so well.

« But as much as Mr. Clinton hates the name, he has not been able to
shake it fully, and it has entered the Arkansas political argot; today
capital insiders refer to a "Slick Willie move" or say that the governor
"pulled a Slick Willie." » - page A5 column 1, Thursday March 19, 1992
Wall Street Journal article continued from the front page.

Here's an example of a Slick Willie move: Clinton claimed to national
Democratic insiders that he should be supported for the nomination
because he could be elected because, unlike other Democrats, he had
supported the Gulf War.

Only...he hadn't! He was in fact advising Bumpers and Pryor to vote no,
or so they told the people lobbying them, and wound up saying after the
vote - there is no public record of anything from him on this before the
vote - that he agreed with arguments of the minority against war and
still hoped the sanctions would continue, but he would have voted for
the resolution to give the President the AUTHORITY to start a war.

This was reported in Deborah Orin's column in the New York Post back
in early February.

He in on record as saying:

« I agree with the arguments of the people in the minority on the
resolution - that we should give sanctions more time and maybe even
explore a full scale embargo » - AP story Jan 14 1991.

AND

« I guess I would have voted with the majority if it was a close vote.
But I agree with the arguments the minority made [against war]  »
- another Clinton quote from the same day.

After the war, of course, he went on speaking about how necessary it
was.

The national media still hasn't picked up on that story, * and when
people talk about his character flaws, nobody mentions this - I guess
because the lie is simply too big for people to imagine he could have
done it. And also because most people don't know about it.

* Some of them think he supported the war reluctantly.

Or maybe a better example is his current deficit reduction plan with
the list of actions, and the on-again off-again middle class tax cut.

Clinton SAYS that he is being specific:

He delivers sound bites shamelessly, about his plan:

« This program is the boldest, most specific, most comprehensive, ever
offered by a major candidate for President. » - before the U.S
conference of mayors, I think, on Wednesday, and broadcast on MacNeil
Lehrer.

( If someone didn't understand his plan, so much the better. They then
can more easily think it's specific.)

Or he says:

« We have to make choices, and I've made choices. We've got a guy who
wants to be President who has no program. At least I've given you an
indication of what I'll do. This is the most detailed plan ever
developed by anybody running for President. I'm telling you more about
what I'm going to do than anybody else who's ever run. » on Good Morning
America Tuesday June 23, 1992.

This is far from the truth.

Clinton is not interested in BEING specific.  Actually, all he's in
interested in generalities - what people will say ABOUT his plan. After
all, 99.9% of the people will never see it, 95% will never read any
summary in a newspaper or magazine, but maybe 30 or 40% will read or
think ABOUT it.

What he wants to get across is the VAGUE idea of specificity.

How many people here have any idea WHAT he is being specific about?

He plan was so detailed and specific that Paul Tsongas couldn't even
figure out what it was after talking to Bill Clinton for several hours
and there is going to platform fight.

Clinton tried to hide the fact that his plan really consisted on nothing
more than ASSUMING a high rate of economic growth - with no real
explanation of what he would do different to create that rate of growth.

Clinton's whole plan relied upon a projection of economic growth to
cure the deficit - and everything else is window dressing -
                   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

As Jeffrey Birnbaum said in a Wall Street Journal article on page A22 of
the June 29 or 30 Wall Street Journal: (This is the same newspaper whose
name Clinton used in vain to attack Jerry Brown's flat tax, as it
complained in an editorial)

«...the net effect of Mr. Clinton's spending and tax changes would be to
reduce the deficit only $2 billion in fiscal 1993, and $8 billion in
fiscal 1996. »

His program, « contains spending and tax changes that would reduce the
deficit by a total of only $15 billion over the four years. »

« Governor Bill Clinton says that his new economic plan would cut
the Federal budget deficit in half over four years, but it would
rely more on hopes for economic growth than on policy changes to
achieve that goal. »

The reason you didn't hear this on the news is that he tried to pull a
fast one on reporters. When his campaign distributed his list of
spending and tax cut proposals on Sunday, June 21, 1990, the middle
class tax cut was not included. That was worth $60 billion over the
four years.

He wasn't interested in getting the reporters to report his proposals,
but getting favorable CHARACTERIZATIONS of his proposals into print and
on the air - especially the CHARACTERIZATION of it as being detailed.

When Gene Sperling, Clinton's economic policy director was asked what
were the economic assumptions on which his projections were based - why
were they higher than the estimates made in Congress, he said that the
"investment" proposals would do it - but he did not offer any economic
reasoning to justify it.

The rate of economic growth that would exist, or the amount that they
would allegedly increase economic growth, was, it is quite clear, simply
made up! Calling Ronald Reagan......?

Many people would argue with the idea that anything he proposed would
increase economic growth one iota.

Now we are at a point when many economists assume (the Federal Reserve
Board apparently does) that the maximum long term growth rate the
economy sustain is 2 1/2% a year. I do not believe this - we had more
in the 1960's.

But you can't just ASSUME it will be higher, neither can you ASSUME that
some proposals, which you say are for growth, will in fact do that. Not
even Paul Tsongas thinks so. His plan is a GUESS at the cause of the
trouble. The one thing he is certain of, and quite rightly, that there
is SOMETHING that we are doing wrong. I think this is a fair statemenr.

In this context , Mario Cuomo has what I think is the best insight: The
problem is a lackl of bank lending. And one thing causing it, especially
right now, is the poor financial condition of the banks, causing them,
because this condition is widespread, to raise the margin between what
they pay to borrow and what they lend and to tighten credit
requirements.

Mario Cuomo has a solution to this: Let the Federal Reserve Board inject
capital into banks. This is exactly what was done during the Great
Depression by the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, when the same
thing that is happening now (on a smaller scale) was haoppening and
it is one thing the Republicans are afraid of. (Ross Perot was
interested in this when he heard Mario Cuomo make a speech last
fall)

Tsongas's book is based on the idea that de-industrialization is the
reason. Whatever, it at least is working on the idea that SOMETHING
is wrong.

And Jerry Brown also knows that there is a problem here, I think.

Clinton says in regards to his plan that he is going to tax the rich -
that we're going to put a new tax on anyone with an income of over about
$200,000. Even on this point he was vague:

« He did not offer specifics on taxes for the wealthy other than to say
that the top 2 per cent of the nation's taxpayers would be hit hardest,
along with foreign corporations that had subsidiaries in the United
States but now avoided many taxes. » - New York Times article, datelined
Atlanta, by B. Drummond Ayres Jr. on page A14 of the Monday June 22,
1992 New York Times.

And the tax on foreign corporations had revenue figures pulled out of
the air.

In fact the whole thing really consisted of figures pulled out of the
air.

None of this, of course,  had anything to do with reality - although it
may resemble, in some ways, Presidential budget proposals, so maybe it
was realistic in that sense.

This is from the New York Times of Wednesday June 24, 1992, in an
article headlined « Clinton asks Foes for Economic Plans » by B.
Drummond Ayres Jr.

The headline gives you the impression Clinton is trying to create.
Further down you can read:

« Mr. Clinton acknowledged that major economic proposals he had touted
earlier in the year were noticeably absent from his new economic plan or
had been greatly modified. For example, a proposal made before the
primaries to cut taxes on the middle class by 10 percent had been
revised downward to about 5 percent.

He conceded such changes left him open to criticism, but he said that
economic factors like deficit estimates and interest rates had changed
and he had changed accordingly.

The economy did not grow as fast as had been anticipated, he said, and
so he cut back on the tax break for the middle class... »

He comes up with a four year plan, but in the meantime he says economic
circumstances changed between last December and this June!

As Thomas Sowell put it in his column (that appeared in the New York
Post on Friday June 26, 1992)

« With George Bush, it took at least a couple of years for him to break
his "no new taxes" pledge. Clinton has started breaking his promises
before he has even been nominated. »

Of course the reason was a change not in the economic climate, but in
the political climate or surroundings. He cut back the tax cut , the New
York Times article says he said:

« in order to save enough money to start up new programs to improve the
nation's deteriorating highways, schools and communication systems. »

He had to get out ahead on this issue before Ross Perot maybe endorsed
this idea, which is being promoted by Felix Rohatyn and Mario Cuomo.

« The improvements, he argued, would constitute "investments" »

As Mario Cuomo was saying.

« that would get the country moving again economically and would correct
neglect by the Bush and Reagan Administrations. » - excerpt from article
by B. Drummon Ayres Jr. on page A15 of the Wednesday, June 24, 1992 New
York Times.

Clinton may be specific, but he's specific in a very different WAY every
three months or so.

He was always changing his plan. The taxes were being constantly changed
in order to come up with a $80 billion estimate for all new taxes in the
four years.

You say, well he should be allowed to improve it. But remember how he
criticized Jerry Brown for thinking of changing ANYTHING about his
flat tax?

You can say, well, maybe but Clinton is a Democrat. He's for...

For what?

If you want to know what Clinton is really for, I'm afraid you're going
to have to read his lips.

Don't think in general that when you vote for a President, you are
voting for a platform of issues. Even if you did, there are unknown
issues that might come up. You really are looking at his judgment,
integrity, and ambitions.