The American Spectator

There is, as well, more than a whiff of totalitarianism about the Clinton White House. From the beginning in Arkansas, Clinton behaved, and required others to behave, as if he was the only person that really mattered. He used Arkansas state troopers and the federal Secret Service to abet his sexual appetites or hide his slaking of those appetites. Supposed friends like Lani Guinier were dropped completely once their usefulness ended. He ignored social norms while developing a high degree of plausibility in the rhetoric that disguised his actions. In accordance with his “scorched earth” policy, enemies, critics, and witnesses are ruthlessly smeared, from Gennifer Flowers to Kathleen Willey to Scott Ritter to Ken Starr. Even those who might judge him adversely in the future, like the eminently decent Henry Hyde, are attacked with leaks. One begins to see why the White House wanted the raw FBI files: they are a reservoir of damaging information and misinformation that can be used to destroy others.

We are told that the president is filled with remorse and has repented. That is obviously false. The behavior he displays goes back for at least thirty years, but he never repented or promised reform until impeachment loomed. The dominant emotions displayed in his August 17 faux mea culpa was not contrition but fury at having been caught and brought to account, hatred of his adversaries, particularly Kenneth Starr, and an utter inability to understand how a man as wonderful as himself could be imagined to have real faults. Even in his address to the National Prayer Breakfast, Clinton coupled his words of contrition with the promise of a strong legal defense to be conducted by his attorneys. That nullified any statement of contrition. One cannot be accepted as a repentant liar if he denies lying and continues to lie.

There is a name for people like that: sociopaths. The Merck Manual of 1992 states that sociopaths

characteristically act out their conflicts and flout normal rules of social order. These persons are impulsive, irresponsible, amoral, and unable to forgo immediate gratification. They cannot form sustained affectionate relationships with others, but their charm and plausibility may be highly developed and skillfully used for their own ends. They tolerate frustration poorly, and opposition is likely to elicit hostility, aggression, or serious violence. Their antisocial behavior shows little foresight, and is not associated with remorse or guilt, since these people seem to have a keen capacity for rationalizing and for blaming their irresponsible behavior on others. Frustration and punishment rarely modify their behavior or improve their judgment and foresight….

That definition fits Clinton to a T. Given power, the sociopath will display totalitarian tendencies. Clinton does. They are also likely to be demagogues, Clinton is.

IT WOULD BE COMFORTING to believe that this presidency is an aberration from which we will recover rather than a permanent and dangerous lowering of the qualifications we seek in a president. For that reason, we must ask whether Bill Clinton is a cause or a symptom. The answer is that he is both. He is a cause in that he has damaged our justice system, corrupted our political culture, debased our thoughts and language, and lowered our moral standards. But he is also a symptom of the combined effects of the spirit of 1968 and of our exploding media technology. The ‘68 generation believed that its moral superiority and purity of motive absolved it of any need for truth and decent behavior. Those people were, and many remain, antinomians, convinced that since they have been touched by the grace of radical politics, they are freed of normal restraints. This, too, has worked a deep corruption in the nation. People who are not in the least radical, or even interested in politics, eagerly accept the pleasures made possible by collapsing restraints. This, in turn, protects Clinton because the collapse of moral barriers means acceptance of moral relativism, and that means a refusal to judge the behavior of others. A journalist who has talked to people across the nation says the standard response to the scandal is, “Of course what he did is wrong, but who am I to judge.”

Clinton may be more typical of our future than of our past. Now, more than ever, the American public responds to politicians as it does to popular entertainers. Think of Clinton as Madonna. He may fade as she has; with any luck he may disappear completely. But, as with Madonna, there will be other Clintons, dismaying as that is to contemplate. David Riesman once wrote that as the public loses competence to judge merits, it values “sincerity,” which it believes, quite erroneously, that it is able to judge.

Clinton has learned to fake sincerity; others will too.

We must choose between reforming ourselves through Clinton’s impeachment or continue our decline by ratifying his behavior, thereby notifying future presidents that almost all bars are down. If we ratify, our tomorrows will be even more wrenching than would impeachment today.