-
Throw the Book at Him
June 13, 2013 | 196 comments
-
Testimonial to a Great American
June 6, 2013 | 39 comments
-
A Close Call at the Newseum
May 30, 2013 | 7 comments
-
Obama’s Imbroglios
May 23, 2013 | 45 comments
-
My Rahm Reunion
May 16, 2013 | 16 comments
The Current Crisis
Scandal in the White House in Times Past
A reading from the much underesteemed George Jean Nathan.
WASHINGTON — A presidential election looms on the horizon, and already the nation’s great organs of opinion — and occasionally of fact — are gearing up to serve the commonweal and ever so quietly their own biases.
Already we are told that Herman Cain — the non-politician seeking the Republican nomination — had two untoward incidents in the 1990s with ladies who were not his wife… or maybe he did not. He pleads innocent. His wife does too. Then there is Governor Rick Perry. He has appeared hesitant on the debate platform. First, he said he was fatigued. Then he explained he is a bad debater and so what? Ours is not a parliamentary system, and the only time a candidate’s ability to debate is exigent is during election time. After that, a candidate’s powers of debate matter about as much as a candidate’s facility with chop sticks. Judgment, decisiveness, managerial skill, and experience are what matter. Witness the pitiable floundering of the Obama Administration.
As for speaking in public, one can use a Teleprompter, as our present chief executive does. At least he did, until the truck carrying the presidential Teleprompters disappeared and with the truck went the presidential seal too. President Barack Obama really liked his presidential seal, and I publicly plead with the scoundrels who took the truck to give the seal back. Or perhaps the infamous Koch brothers could buy our president a new one.
At any rate, the presidential season is upon us so I expect to discover many shocking things in our public-spirited press. Though I must say ancient charges of sexual indiscretion by Cain startle me. When similar charges (and much else) were revealed two decades ago about President Bill Clinton in The American Spectator, my colleagues in the press were horrified. A tacit bond of good taste had been broken. Boys will be boys. They all do it. What is it that people have about this thing called sex? Has the Spectator no shame?
Ah well, at any rate there is a lot of hypocrisy in reporting politics. Still, it is a presidential race that faces us, and I have decided to look into what other journalists have through the years noticed as scandalous about our presidents. A veritable mother lode appeared in the July 1928 American Mercury, edited by the great editor and man of letters H.L. Mencken. The piece was not written by Mencken but by his much-underesteemed colleague, George Jean Nathan, a drama critic but also a historian of Americana. If he were on the scene today and he could stand the indignity, I think he would make an excellent talking head, though the audience would need constant recourse to the dictionary and to a book on etiquette. Nathan was a well-educated gentleman and was very amusing,
According to Nathan, “James Monroe used toothpicks in the presence of his guests, and Andrew Jackson relished smelly cheeses so greatly — he served them regularly at his White House dinners — that the ladies sitting near him at table had to use extra large fans. John Quincy Adams perspired copiously and, after wiping the beads from his face, would dangle his wet handkerchief to and fro, spreading moisture over everybody about him.” Moreover, Nathan sniffed, “Zachary Taylor was a victim of chronic indigestion.” Millard Fillmore, so frequently compared nowadays with the present incumbent in the White House, “would frequently doze off and snore gently in the presence of his guests.” Even the war hero, President U.S. Grant, was not insulated from the journalists’ scorn. Grant, “like a good Methodist… used often to hit the bottle in private and to show up nicely enameled.” Also he smoked pungent cigars and “liked to blow rings at persons with whom he was talking.” Can you imagine such indiscretions today? President Grant did not even go out to the Rose Garden to blow his rings!
We are doubtless going to read in the press in the weeks to come more shocking tales about the candidates — at least the Republican candidates. President Obama is a saintly man, though he rarely attends church and has Solyndra and other green projects on his mind these days. So there will be no whiff of scandal about him. But as for the rest of the candidates, I hope readers will take refuge in history and be reassured that no president today would smoke in the White House or, like Zach Taylor, burp.
About the Author
R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. is the founder and editor in chief of The American Spectator. He is the author of The Death of Liberalism, published by Thomas Nelson Inc. His previous books include the New York Times bestseller Boy Clinton: the Political Biography; The Impeachment of William Jefferson Clinton; The Liberal Crack-Up; The Conservative Crack-Up; Public Nuisances; The Future that Doesn’t Work: Social Democracy’s Failure in Britain; Madame Hillary: The Dark Road to the White House; The Clinton Crack-Up; and After the Hangover: The Conservatives’ Road to Recovery.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (17) | Leave a comment
More Articles by R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.
More Articles From The Current Crisis
http://spectator.org/archives/2011/11/03/scandal-in-the-white-house-in
Follow us:
ADVERTISEMENT
Current Issue
- His Reach Exceeded His Grasp
- Odds and Ends
- Gabby Giffords Poisons the Well
SPONSORED LINKS
FLASHBACK TO: 1995
-
Pope Culture
A man of faith in a godless age is hitting Americans where it hurts.
-
Why the GOP Does Not, Like, Totally Suck
Mr. and Mrs. American Spectator Reader, let P.J. O’Rourke talk sense to your kids.
-
Dames at Sea
-
In the Absence of Guns
In Britain, defending your property can get you life.
-
The Metaphysical Martini
-
Counting the Costs of Clintonism
The debacle of this president’s administration is both a cause and a symptom of the decline of American values. Unless Congress impeaches him, that decline will go on unchecked. An eminent jurist surveys the damage and assesses the chances for the recovery of our culture.
-
Chuck McHagel
It won’t take long for conservatives to scratch this presidential wannabe off their 2008 scorecard.
-
The Legacy of Old John and Mother Fresh-Roasted
-
It’s the Best Time of the Year
The American Christmas, like the songs that celebrate it, makes room for everybody under the rainbow. Is that why so many people seem to be hostile to it?
-
The Bush Crack-Up
Was the President done in by the economy, or by the politics of the economy?
Clip of the Day
ADVERTISEMENT
DTOM| 11.3.11 @ 7:16AM
Are you sure President Taylor's gastro-intestinal distress signalled its presence with 'burps?' It could have been lower emanations...
And do you know for a fact that other than Moochelle, this President does not blow smoke rings at his subordinates?
I'm just saying...
dennis2j| 11.3.11 @ 11:53AM
POTUS has been blowing smoke up our skirts for several years now.
Riff Raff| 11.3.11 @ 7:00PM
Now I know what the Supreme Court meant by "emanations."
The Bishop| 11.3.11 @ 7:35AM
I would posit that the current occupant of the White House is the manifestation of a national bowel movement resulting from intestinal distress in the previous administration. Bring on the 2012 Pepto.
Pecos Pete| 11.3.11 @ 8:12AM
TB: Good one! Coughed up my first cup of coffee.
hardcard| 11.3.11 @ 9:17AM
off topic: did anyone catch ben stein on joy behar last evening? what a rino!!
Dave | 11.3.11 @ 9:41AM
Times most certainly do change. Well, sort of. As the article mentions, President Grant was apparently at ease blowing smoke rings while guests were in the room. Meanwhile, over a century later, William Jefferson Clinton, enjoying privileges of the Oval Office, simply had someone else do it for him.
As my wise ol' daddy use to say: "Son, ain't nothin' gonna change but ... the changes."
Petronius| 11.3.11 @ 11:18AM
Yes, the oiks had it. And the oiks have it. Barry Goldwater spoke of it often. That day is here. People do not care what kind of person is head of state so long as they are promised spoils at the expense of their betters. Clinton has a couple dozen dead bodies in his wake. So what. He gets honked off. The public refrain is, "where's mine?" The Army Rangers in Somalia got butchered as that happened. In my father's day both him and Gen.Clark would have hanged together. The U.S.A. can no longer be called a nation when atrocities against us go unanswered because it didn't happen on everyone's front steps. Today there is national unity in two things: passivity and supplication.
Dixie Pixie| 11.3.11 @ 11:43AM
May I respectfully disagree.
The Obama Regimen has been one “scandal” after another.
Consider the outright violations of Law such as the Libyan War and blatant looting of the Federal Treasury from the so called “Jobs Bill” to the Green Energy scandals.
Consider the constant dereliction of duty from day one in his refusal to preform his job and enforce the Law's of the USA such as taking time off from his continual vacation to announce he would not be enforcing the Defense of Marriage Act.
Then there is a pathological denial of the harm his policies are causing such as the 2nd Great Depression and burning down the Middle East.
There is enough fodder to have an Obama “Scandal of the Week” every week, so why have we not seen them.
Three reasons why no scandals, the first is the MSM media has been bought off by the Obama Regimen.
Face the facts, Not only is Politics is the biggest profit center of the so called “News”, but the “News” business is owned by the international corporations whose profits exists at the pleasure of the Obama Regimen.
It is no wonder anyone in the MSM who would publish the connection between Obama's fundraisers and supporters looting the Federal Treasury through “Green Energy” scams, will quickly find themselves doing the early morning farm report at a 100 watt station in Opp Alabama.
Second, The Obama Regime owns the Justice Department through AG Holder.
Ag Holder has turned the Justice Department into a Democratic Party protection racket which would never prosecute any Democrat especially not the President.
Third, Harry Reid has neutered the Senate especially the Senate Republicans.
The House can investigate but it is the Senate which prosecutes and Harry Reid's Senate would never do so.
After decades of Democratic domination the Republicans have conditioned themselves into servitude for political table scraps.
In short the Obama Regime is one interlocking multiple scandal after another but the political process has been rigged by the Democrats (with Elite Republican help) so the scandals are openly ignored.
There is no way a Democrat can be prosecuted so what would be the point as the Democrats are certain to retaliate with all the force of a full blown police state.
Dixie Pixie| 11.3.11 @ 12:55PM
Does anyone else remember the phrase “ As scandalous as a black man claiming to be Irish.”??
Obama did it when he was vacationing in Ireland!
Amazingly it was not even noticed by anyone as it was small potato(e)s compared to to the usual Obama frauds.
Pat| 11.3.11 @ 1:28PM
Although known to several members of Rev. Wright’s congregation, it is not widely known outside Chicago that President Obama does not fart. Through a superior intellect and considerable willpower, the President has trained his body not to manufacture the 1.2 liters of intestinal gas emitted daily by normal humans – in fact, President Obama has not farted since the age of 20. Upon learning of this, Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post planned to write a three part series on the President’s achievement, finalizing his report by naming controlled flatulence as just one more reason to elect Obama to a second term.
Robinson’s editor at the Post scotched the idea unless he could provide objective confirmation the President does not now and hasn’t, during his term of office, ever farted. The Washington Post is a steadfast supporter and admirer of the President but tries to follow minimal journalistic standards – after all, they’re not the Detroit Free Press. But providing positive confirmation of a negative is never an easy task.
However, Robinson rose or rather kneeled to the occasion. He wrangled an invitation from the White House Propaganda Office for inclusion in all White House social functions where Obama would attend. He would cagily circle to a position directly behind the President and pretend to drop his pencil or tie his shoes and then, when in the proper position, would vigorously sniff for any detectable emanations.
At first, the Secret Service agents assigned to the President assumed Robinson was attracted to some strange sexual perversion somewhat common among members of the Washington press corps but after further investigation relaxed their security objections to Robinson’s flatulence research. However, after Robinson tried to smuggle a Gaseous Anomaly Detector into a WH cocktail party, they advised the Post the flatulence study must be discontinued and offered to have a well-known physician, closely involved in drafting ObamaCare legislation, provide an affidavit attesting to our President’s lack of intestinal gas. Obviously, another triumph for clean air and global climate control by President Obama.
obadiah| 11.3.11 @ 1:38PM
charming. did you write that yourself just to post on spectator.org? your light needs a higher lampstand.
Mike 3/505| 11.3.11 @ 3:41PM
"...nicely enameled." I gotta remember that one.
BARBARA BF| 11.3.11 @ 4:01PM
DOUBLE STANDARDS????
http://www.mrc.org/realitychec.....24925.aspx
REMEMBERING BILL CLINTON
Paula Jones, who accused Bill Clinton of exposing himself to her in a hotel room when she was a state employee in Arkansas, held a public press conference in February 1994, CBS and NBC ignored those charges, while ABC devoted just 16 seconds to Jones' press conference.
As a January 29, 1998 Media Reality Check pointed out, "The rest of the media waited three months, until Jones filed suit, and the networks then did just 21 stories in that month."
Appearing on the late Tim Russert's CNBC program, then-Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw dismissed, "It didn't seem to most people, entirely relevant to what was going on at the time. These are the kind of charges raised about the President before."
In the Jones case, the networks were openly disdainful of covering her accusations. "It's a little tough to figure out who's being harassed," NBC Today host Bryant Gumbel smugly asserted (May 10, 1994).
After ABC's Sam Donaldson interviewed Jones for Prime Time Live in June 1994, anchor Charles Gibson wanted to know: "Why does anyone care what this woman has to say?"
Gibson continued to pile on, adding, "Bottom line, Sam: Is she not trying to capitalize on this, in effect to profit from impugning the President?"
Newsweek editor Evan Thomas, who sometimes appears on the networks to offer analysis, derided Jones as "some sleazy woman with big hair." (This was on the May 7, 1994 Inside Washington.)
- In the case of Kathleen Willey, who said Bill Clinton groped her in the Oval Office while President, the networks gave minimal coverage to that story when it was broke by Newsweek magazine in late July 1997.
On July 30, 1997, the CBS Evening News aired a story, but managed not to mention Willey by name. Reporter Bill Plante warned, "But unless and until this case is settled, this is only the beginning of attempts by attorneys on both sides to damage the reputations and credibility of everyone involved."
A March 20, 1998 Media Reality Check explained how ABC delicately approached the subject:
In an August 8, 1997 presidential press conference, ABC reporter John Donvan asked about Willey without naming her. Donvan confessed: "Even for those of us who don't have much appetite for this entire subject, this particular answer in this particular category seems needlessly evasive. My question to you is: Is it your wish that it be answered this way, and is it consistent with your intention to run an open White House?" But ABC continued to avoid the story despite the question.
CBS gave it one minute on the July 30 Evening News, with brief items on the July 31 CBS Evening News and NBC Nightly News. Willey eventually became a big news story when CBS's 60 Minutes interviewed her in March 1998, during the Lewinsky scandal.
"Wow! That was something," Today co-host Matt Lauer exclaimed on March 16, 1998, reacting to the 60 Minutes story. There was no introspection as to why it took Today and other outlets so long to cover the charges.
- In the case of Juanita Broaddrick, who publicly came forward to say Bill Clinton raped her while he was the Arkansas Attorney General and a candidate for Governor, the networks offered weekend coverage in March 1998, when the charge surfaced in a court filing by Paula Jones' attorneys. NBC interviewed Broaddrick for a Dateline special in January 1999, but the airing was delayed until February 24, 1999, after the end of Clinton's impeachment trial.
The March 1999 Media Watch pointed out the disparity of coverage of Broaddrick versus Anita Hill:
In the first five days of Hill’s charges (October 6-10,1991), the network evening shows (on ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and PBS’s NewsHour) aired 67 stories. (If a count began with Jones’ February press conference, the networks supplied just a single 16-second anchor brief; if the count began with her sexual harassment lawsuit against Clinton in May, the number was 15.)
But in the first five days after Juanita Broaddrick has charged the President with rape in The Wall Street Journal (February 19-23), the number of evening news stories was two. That’s a ratio of 67 to 2.
During the period of February 19-28, as NBC prepared to finally air its Dateline special, ABC virtually ignored the controversy. World News and Nightline skipped it. Good Morning America allowed two brief mentions. This Week briefly discussed it.
CBS allowed just one story on the February 20th Evening News.
Considering that NBC had the scoop, it's not surprising that the network offered more coverage. While Nightly News ignored it,
Today aired only a brief until the Myers interview. The morning after the interview, it carried a report by Claire Shipman and a Katie Couric interview with Clinton ally Alan Dershowitz and Dorothy Rabinowitz, who wrote the Wall Street Journal story. On the 26th, Matt Lauer asked NOW’s Patricia Ireland tough questions, including whether she’d ask Clinton to resign, since that’s what she demanded of Sen. Bob Packwood. On the 28th, most of Meet the Press focused the Broaddrick story.
When one contrasts the sexual harassment scandals of Democrat Bill Clinton, which included on the record accusers, with the hazy allegations against Republican Herman Cain, it becomes clear that the networks have enthusiasm for one and ignored the other.
--
bluecollarbytes| 11.3.11 @ 9:25PM
There was only one standard during Bill Clinton's embarrassment- supporting Clinton at all costs...eventually. I do remember a period of time when the only Bill-defenders seemed to be criminal defense lawyers and the NAGS. NOW reps washed away Clinton's sins and Hillary gave PopMedia alternative propaganda to run with- vast right wing stuff. Media simply ran with the lies from the Clintons as they could and winked at the rest.
Hypocrisy of the media doesn't even cover what went on then or goes on now.
longer memory| 11.4.11 @ 12:40AM
To put things in proper perspective, google LBJ's Flirting with Post Editor (Katherine Graham) YouTube has tape recording of Johnson, in phone conversation, telling her that he only thing that bothered him , was he was married and this job allowed him only to hear her sweet voice - and made him just want to be like the animals down on his ranch and jump the fence - - and Graham says, "Well, Mr. President that just makes my day..." and he responds ,"well, I am right here until 10 or 11 at night....." And Katherine Graham did not scream, "Sexual harassment"! She demurely said, "That just makes my day. . ."
Or you could read of the years-long rumors about LBJ's affair with Nancy Dickerson, NBC news chick of the 60s and read in Dickerson's daughter's memoir of listening to a tape in the Austin Library of her mother behaving like a nervous schoolgirl on the phone with Johnson, saying she should take him with her when she shops for a swim suit. Why would a serious "journalist" say that to a married man who is President of the United States? It is on tape in the Johnson Library in Texas.
Is there anything on tape by the three women the press is saying have "come forward" accusing Cain? Exactly what is the definition of "coming forward", anyway?
There is not enough room to catalog LBJ's dalliances. Lady Bird was once asked how she felt about his roving eye and she responded, "Well, Lyndon loves people and half the people in the world are women. . ."
What in the hell is new about leering remarks made by men and obvious teases made by women?
If you would like to veer off political figures and into TV journalism - what about Ed Bradley and Jessica Savich? Or Juan Williams sexually harassing women at Washington Post over a period of 4 years and being forced, finally , to apoligize by Editor Downie. Or Bill Oaf Reilly a few years back making some clumsy remark to a woman subordinate and having to pay her off to shut her up?
general summerall| 11.6.11 @ 8:55PM
Be just a little careful of quoting Mencken and Nathan as usable historians of Potusii. HL supposedly admitted once that he had made up on a slow news day his quote about Millard Fillmore installing the first bathtub in the White House, and I'm becoming wary of using HL as an accurate source of everything he wrote about Wilson, Harding, and Coolidge. My favorite wish I had been there moment was when John Adams one day blew up and stomped on his wig.