Clinton, Marc Rich, and Election Theft: GET OVER IT

Every now and then, when I get completely depressed about the world as it is today, I take the time to imagine another world.  A world the should have been.  A world with President Al Gore, no Iraq war, no September 11, an amazing Government response to a storm which might not have done as much damage to New Orleans, and a Constitution treated as something more than just an old piece of paper.

And then I think about all of the different reasons why the world is not as it should be.

Bill Clinton's role in this was most pathetic.  

I can almost remember him getting huffy and puffy about the illegitimacy of W's Presidency and the lack of a mandate for ultra-Conservative policy.

I almost got my hopes up that Bill could save us, at least in terms of PR, and minimize the damage inflicted upon us by a stolen administration.

And then the Marc Rich bomb got dropped.

Bill Clinton pardoned a very wealthy arch-criminal who was on the run from American law enforcement.

Then Bill Clinton's face on TV talking about Bush stealing the election was replaced by Republicans talking about making big, big legal trouble for Bill over Marc Rich, while telling all of us that a stolen election was just something that we should all just GET OVER already.  

Imagine the blind audacity of telling voters to get over something like that.  It's so Republican.

Then Republicans made the point in public, everywhere:  Shut up about this stolen election, Bill Clinton, and then we'll leave you alone about your shitty pardon of Marc Rich.  Just Go AWAY.  

And off Bill Clinton ran, with his tail between his legs, into a heart-attack.

So we lost our greatest public advocate when we really needed him the most.  Because our President cared more about money donations to his library than what was good and right.  And they scared him away.

And now Bill Clinton and his buddies are telling every voter in the Democratic primaries that their votes are second-class, and our primary contests are probably going to be reversed at our convention by better people.

We should GET OVER IT.  

Party insiders know better than us about what's good for us.  Votes are inconsequential.  They were in 2000, after all.

Imagine the blind audacity of telling voters to get over something like that.  It's so Clinton.

•  Al Gore=No 9-11, come on now...

  Let's be real.

  The attacks of 9-11 still would have happened, unless you believe that Bush rigged it.  But all that would have followed would have been different.

  It was not 9-11 that did this country in, it was that it was used as an excuse to change this country dramatically.

  We don't need to exaggerate when reality is bad enough.

  by arodb on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:22:29 AM PDT

  •  August 6, 2001 Briefing: Bin Laden Determined

    You think Al wouldn't have read it?  You think he'd have been on farting around on vacation?

    by Ouroboros on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:24:31 AM PDT

  •  Well, probably....but

    I don't think the diarist is saying that the 9/11 attacks were planned by the Bush Admin.  I believe that is real tin-foil hat stuff.

    However, there is no doubt that a Gore administration would have been paying a lot more attention to al Qaeda in the months leading up to 9/11 whereas the Bushies were busy planning how to get at Iraq.

    I always used to think that 9/11 would have happened no matter who was President. Then I read Richard Clarke's Against All Enemies, and my mind changed a bit.  While still a distinct possibility that the attacks would have still occurred under Gore, the sense that they were unavoidable went into the crapper.

    by oxfdblue on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:26:25 AM PDT

    •  There was warning before...

      and no administration, Republican or Democrat, really defended against what happened on 9-11.   Perhaps someone other than Bush would have responded to the imminent warning, perhaps. But they were general, not specific.

      Even now, after 9-11, after spending a trillion on Homeland Security, we are only marginally safer from a similar type of attack.

      And catch the film "The Assassination of Richard Nixon" for an eerie preview of the 9-11 tactics.  

      by arodb on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:32:11 AM PDT

  •  I actually think this is right actually

    I was in Europe for six months during the last years of the Clinton admin., and again during the first year of the Bush admin.

    The second time I was there anti-Americanism was off the f'ing hook. Keep in mind this is before 9/11, before Afghanistan, before Iraq. People would come up to me at restaurant tables and berate me about how my president wants to bomb everyone.

    And that was Italy. We didn't even do anything to Italy.

    Imagine how much the blood was boiling in places that actually had good reason to hate us?

    9/11 was totally Bush's fault. Not that al-Qaeda gave a rat's ass about violating arms control treaties, changing Taiwan policy, backing out of Kyoto. But they, like everyone else, had a clear sense that the US was being a total dick.

    Unless VP Joementum was allowed to go totally Likud apeshit in a Gore administration, no way 9/11 happened.

    by slaney black on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:34:49 AM PDT

    •  Damn! Too many acutally's!!!! eom

      by slaney black on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:41:07 AM PDT

•  no offense.

  but this is really stupid.

  the "marc rich" bomb dropped after to 2000 general election. it had nothing to do with gore's defeat.

  it's called a timeline.

  by strangeman1969 on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:27:33 AM PDT

  •  Not what I was saying.

    We lost our advocate.  The election was stolen, Clinton was making some noise, and then he was shut up.

    by Ouroboros on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:42:57 AM PDT

•  Read your own diary

  Get over it.  

  by Must Have Been The Roses on Mon Mar 10, 2008 at 10:36:41 AM PDT