Finally: The End of the Clinton Era

PINE BLUFFS – Webster’s Dictionary defines “muddle through” as “to succeed in spite of apparent blunders or confusion. On the political scene, I think that’s what we’ve been doing for the past twenty months or so: muddling through. We’ve seen the Democrats reject “the smartest woman in America” in favor of “the first legitimate black presidential candidate” – forget about Al (Tawana Brawley) Sharpton and the “Reverend” (champion blackmailer) Jesse Jackson, both of whom had previously run for that office – leaving liberal women dazed, confused and a trifle bitter.

We’ve watched the Republicans sift through a field of primary candidates which included an astute evangelical Christian, an attractive Mormon, and a Libertarian, selecting instead a seventy-one year old Senator from Arizona, a Navy veteran and former POW, a sometime conservative whose chief claim to fame has been his reputation as a political maverick, or, as his campaign committee puts it, someone who “displays the bipartisan ability to work with people on both sides of the aisle.”

When we lifted our weary heads from politics ad nauseam, we were treated to the power of a free market’s inherent capacity to adjust to problems in a way that no centrally planned economy can. Stumbling, bumbling, the market dealt with the aftermath – a cruel one, some said – of a housing bubble inflated by greedy realtors, slack underwriting standards, and lots of reckless, stupid and avaricious behavior by both borrowers and lenders, which produced larger than normal default rates on sub-prime mortgages. Borrowers who gobbled up adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) eagerly offered by irresponsible lenders several years ago got their come uppance when their new rates kicked in and they found themselves unable to afford the much higher monthly mortgage payments on their homes. For these people, and for liberals – read bleeding hearts – it’s always someone else’s fault, and no one, absolutely no one, should have to heed the warning, caveat emptor, or be forced to bear the consequences of their ill considered actions. Loud cries for a government bail-out of the sub-prime mortgage industry have been heard, and to a certain extent, they have not fallen on deaf ears in this politically hot election year.

Through it all, the ACLU and its ilk combined with radical secularist judges, have continued efforts to outlaw all references to God, religious symbols, and prayer from the public square. The homosexual movement, with the help of an ultra-liberal California Supreme Court that defied the popular will of 61% of California voters – 4.6 million of them – won a victory which, if allowed to stand, could change the public face of America.

But it’s heartening to see that these societal trends are no longer going unopposed. Groups like Alan Sears and his Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), Newt Gingerich and his Citizens United Foundation, and Tom Fitton’s Judicial Watch, have sprung up and are standing in the breach, while citizens across America are becoming more sophisticated and more ready to defend their traditional values against all comers.

Turning back to politics, I believe one very good thing has emerged from this “long night of our political soul,” to borrow from St. John of the Cross, which will not end until November 2008. What? Could there possibly be a bright spot in all this?

Yes. It’s the end of the Clinton era. Democrat voters across the country appear to have taken a long, thoughtful look at Hillary Rodham (I can’t recall) Clinton’s campaign, remembered that her husband, when he was running for President had once remarked: “You vote for me, you get Hillary,” and realized that if they nominated Hillary for President, the reverse of his comment could become reality. Fortunately for America, they said, “No, thanks!” No thanks to Bill Clinton’s serial adultery, sexual harassments, and even a credible rape accusation, and his perjured testimony in a civil case which led to a charge of contempt of court, a $90,000 fine, and disbarment by the Arkansas Bar Association. They said no thanks to Hillary’s own record of scandals; her mysterious $100,000 profit in the cattle futures market back in the “70s, her legal work for the corrupt Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan, the Whitewater real estate (ad)venture in the “80s, the White House Travel Office caper, which destroyed reputations and lives, and the illegal retention of FBI files in the “90s.

Of course, Barack Hussein (America is a wonderful country. Help me change it) Obama might still bow to pressure from the feminist world and some elements of the Media to create a “Dream Ticket” by selecting Hillary as his running mate, but I really don”t think he’d be that stupid.

So I think the Clinton era is over. “Never! Never again” America’s embarrassment at their hands. There’s just one thing left to say to them as they fade quietly from the scene, as I and many others earnestly hope they will:

Requiescat in pace!