Christopher Hitchens The Triangulations of William Jefferson Clinton

Christopher Hitchens The Triangulations of William Jefferson Clinton

Christopher Hitchens The Triangulations of William Jefferson Clinton

When Bill Clinton was President, people attacked him from both ends of the American political spectrum. The Right asserted that his policies were too liberal, citing his stance on issues such as national health-care and partial birth abortion, while the Left claimed the opposite, citing as examples his support of welfare reform and opposition to gay marriage. About Clinton's behavior--his frequent lying, his repeated adultery, his draft-dodging, and so on--the Right shouted in vain for eight years, with no consequences for the President's approval rating. When confronted with these issues, liberals and moderates usually either looked the other way or defended Clinton, fearing that anything short of full support could give credibility and maybe even the executive branch to the Republicans.

Christopher Hitchens, a man of the Left on most issues, was an exception. No One Left to Lie To: The Triangulations of William Jefferson Clinton is his 1999 attack not just on Clinton's policies but also his ethics. Hitchens blasts Clinton for enacting policies that are essentially Republican, such as "welfare reform," which stole from the Republicans a key election issue while stranding the liberals who had no alternative but to stick with the President. Clinton has such a conservative record, Hitchens says, that it's a mystery why so many people on the Right hate him as much as they do (81). The Democrats are used to dissent in their ranks about whether Clinton was liberal enough; after all, a significant number of Democrats in both houses of Congress voted against "welfare reform." But not a single Senate Democrat voted for Clinton's removal, and Hitchens objects strongly to this kind of unconditional Democratic/liberal support for Clinton's behavior. 

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Christopher Hitchens The Triangulations of William Jefferson Clinton