Politics, Society

Clinton: We Don’t Need A President Who WIll Not Tell You The Truth

There are just some lines that politicians should leave to others like Senator Vitter (R., La.) denouncing others as “prostitutes” or former Senator Craig (R., Idaho) denouncing the critics for “pandering” to voters (as hypothetical examples). Bill Clinton reached that point Monday when he asked without a shadow of discomfort or awkwardness when voters really wanted a president who would lie to them with a straight face.

Clinton demanded to know “who wants a president who will knowingly, repeatedly tell you something he knows is not true?” He was not done yet as the irony level began to rise above his waist: “When I was a kid, if I got my hand caught in the cookie jar, where it wasn’t supposed to be, I turned red in my face, and I took my hand out of the cookie jar. You’ve got to give it to Governor Romney. When he gets his hand caught in the cookie jar, he just digs down for more cookies.”

Well, I have to give it to Clinton. Politicians often “transcend” their past votes and scandals. However, to set out to lecture folks on the need for presidents to be fully honest and truthful with the American people is not exactly a strength for our 42nd President. I understand his point. But, as one of the people who testified in the Clinton impeachment hearings, I wonder whether he is the guy who should deliver it.

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85 thoughts on “Clinton: We Don’t Need A President Who WIll Not Tell You The Truth”

  1. He lied about sex. wrong, sleazy but he also left a balanced budget, relative peace and prosperity.

    john5301, said If you are the Commander in Chief and the people that are in your command are held to a standard, then you should be held to the same standard, President or not.”

    Sadly the standard that he was not held to was the one where the media did not report this kind of behavior. He probably relied on past precedent. It was wrong for him and for all the other presidents, down to Lincoln and beyond. He was the only one who was outed, at least while in office.

    In my experience you get rewarded for lying under path.
    (I have used this anecdote before. The docotr who committed malpractice on me perjured himself, the Pa court said so:
    “We have little difficulty in concluding that Dr. Jannetta’s testimony at deposition was different than, or inconsistent with, the testimony at trial.” Levy v Jannetta, CCP Allegheny County, GD 81-7689; appeal -J. A370017/92 Levy v Jannetta et al, No. 00150 Pittsburgh, 1992. settled, 1995
    His “punishment”? Within a month of forcing me to settle, a settlement that does not come near to covering lifetime expenses, the doctor was nominated by Gov Ridge to be Pa sec’t of health, He was confirmed in 1995. (Peter J. Jannetta, 1995 -1996.)
    Perjury? Makes no difference to us, said the governor and all 50 senators who were advised that the doctor was a perjuror whose perjury all involved ignored.

  2. You can say what you want about what Clinton lied about-being none of our business-but the man lied. Why didn’t he just say, “that’s none of your damn business”? Clinton lied under oath… Whoops..

    You can call Romney a liar, but if you have one ounce of respect for Clinton after that comment, you have got to be the village idiot.

    All politicians lie. All of them. It’s like it’s a prerequisite for being in politics. Personally, I don’t believe any of them. Obama is not a good President, Clinton did not have a surplus (ask anyone on Social Security where the “surplus” came from), Bush spent and, in my opinion, put a missile in the Pentagon and called it an airliner, and so on.

    The bottom line-in my opinion: We need people who have zero experience in politics to take this country back. It’s getting out of hand.

    Republican or democrat-who gives a damn. We are being duped more than ever, and people are falling for it.

    Call me what you want, but you don’t take advice about the truth from Clinton. Not a good move.

  3. Bill Clinton’s telling us we don’t need someone who lies. I guess Obama will be telling us we don’t need people who murder ambassadors and lie about it.

  4. I like the first comment posted above by MagginKot. JT does not know the first thing about legitimate rape. Roe et al vs. Wade is one of the most important and controversial cases in our past fifty years. JT jumps all over Todd (Saturday Night Live — Hellooo Tooddd) for bringing up the story of “legitimate rape”. Google “Jane Doe”.

    Anyway, Goodbye Todd! You did not need any help from your pals.

    Dont forget the Democrat Victory Song from the FDR era.

    Happy Days are here again!
    Oh, Happy Dogs are here again..

    etc

  6. Happy Days are here again!
    Mitt is back to Bain my friend,,
    Oh, Happy Dogs are here again.
    Happy Dogs are here Again!

  8. ID 707,

    I try to make the distinction between reflection on our secular world and a rather larger framework.

    That said, it does help to keep our feet firmly planted.

    Your summary of aspects of how we got here rings true.

    When the US became so rich as a nation that the guns and/or butter equation not longer had salience might have been a dividing line . . . or let’s say that the illusion became so. The people as a whole sacrificed and continue to sacrifice essential financial security. The financial masters in fact reap the largesse of what used to be regarded as national wealth — a reasonable distribution of what surplus wealth this blessed country produced not longer obtains.. Why not? They control the dialogue!

    I don’t mean to be longwinded either, and will constrain myself . . . .

  9. Don S.

    I’m sure that I don’t know the interim or final answers to why.
    One thing is apparent. The vets came home in ’46, they educated themselves on the GI bill or got a job.

    There was a need to switch over from war to peacetime economy, and BUT keep the tempo up and the corps making profits.

    The Cold War was very convenient way to motivate weapons production and development too. That ran away from us by the usual “bribe politicians” method, and it gave us jobs too.
    The women could marry and stay at home, produce boom babies, maybe buy a tract house, and all was hunky dory.
    Maybe even a car, before WW2 only doctors and lawyers had those.

    Eisenhower as you note, warned us. Did we even hear or see the warning, not unless you read the NYTimes or the Wash Post carefully everyday. Who wants to rock the boat of defense corporations, besides they pay for adsspace.

    I’ll stop there, but that maybe is how it started.

    Some general noted how many millionaired (worth a billion then) were created by the first world war. And it happened again in WW2. What they had learned about “manufacturing consent and propaganda” from the first war was perfected by 1941.

    You can take it from there. Today, we are so bamboozled by media that it is a wonder we can find the way to the polls. And they fool us there, sending by robocalls us to the wrong address.

    I love to write as you can see, so pardon the longwindedness. We have such a hurry today, that we seldom allow ourselves time to think things through and ventilate our thoughts.

  10. “I am just hoping to avoid 8 years of Romney. ”

    Me too.

    Well, you’re older than me by a few years, but I must say it does seems we both live in a different world than we grew up in (maybe all of us are oblivious to larger forces in our youth, our aspirations, our naivete). Could make the mind reel. Granted the whole world is accelerating, but it does seem that the prophecy of D.W. Eisenhower has come to pass. We are pawns of the MIC.

    It did not have to be this way. Greed, and the manipulation of fear has brought us low.

    . . . not even getting into the conspiracy theories.

  11. DonS,

    I am just hoping to avoid 8 years of Romney. One 8 year idiocy got us into Iraq, which took almost 10 years to get out of. When I graduated from high school in ’54, we were all optimistic. One man could support a family, even a gas pumper at the gas station. I don’t need to describe where we are now.

    Thanks for your straight talk here.

  12. ID 707

    “Still the sleazy pol who accelerated the dem party down the corporatist slope.”

    “‘How can that be. It was already going at light speed since Lyndon lied about the Bay of Tonkin and tripped Congress into starting a war. Took 60,000 lives and over 10 years to get out'”

    Thanks for your response. It could make me sad and angry at the same time. We are indeed a country that is on a wild trajectory. I would like to see us come out the other side, but I doubt I’ll live that long.

    Cheers.

  13. Swarthmore Mom,

    If I promise to be quiet, may I?

    And you?

    I’m hoping that Romney will concede when the East Coast polls close. Hee Hee.

    Are the pollers/networks allowed to declare before that states polls close?

    Watching the Sunday football match on Monday is not so cool, especially if your team has lost. The popcorn doesn’t taste the same.

    No more jokes, I promise.

  14. SWM, I don’t know. I live in St. Louis County, the conservative part, but St. Louis generally votes Dem. I had an uplifting experiance yesterday though which gives me hope.

    I went to the Dirt Cheap liquor and smokes shop to buy a six-pack of beer. I haven’t had a beer in about 6 weeks so I went to buy some beer to celebrate with. Or cry in. Whatever. There was someone wanting to buy a lot of cigs in anticipation of the election which has a tax provision that will increase the price by about a dollar a pack. They can’t sell more than 5 cartons at a time by virtue of all kinds of statutes and vendor agreements. You can get around that but it takes a lot of explaining.

    Dirt Cheap in my neck of South St. Louis County is about the lowest common denominator of the electorate. Dirt Cheap buyers. in general, are about the lowest common denominator of citizens in general. We are the the great unwashed, the common man. I say that proudly. a prol from good peasant stock.

    So, I’m in line and there are 3 other lines around me and all are several customers long and there is this long, detailed discussion by the salespeople to the customer about how to get more than 5 cartons at a time. So one of the older ladies in another line says, ‘yea, he (the customer) thinks the tax will pass’. I say, ‘yea, I do too, people are always willing to tax other peoples vices.’ Another lady in another line says, ‘and that guy, Atkins, wants to end Medicare too, he’s got no sympathy for anyone.’ Then a lady a couple of places behind her says ‘Romney too, no Medicare, (voice rising) NO SOCIAL SECURITY- they want that money for the stock market!’. And another lady says, ‘they (Republicans) want to get rid of everything good for people’. There were some murmurs of assent on as we cycled out of the lines.

    Whoa, I got home and told the better half that I was in Dirt Cheap and democracy broke out- it was GREAT! I was astonished at that spontaneous protest against the Republican agenda and astonished in a very good way. 🙂

    Even if that one lady had his name wrong she had his number and while there were both men and women in the lines the ladies were vocal and had their facts pretty straight. This was in the conservative part of So. StL County. The ladies could sink Romney and Aiken. I was happy, got my 6 pack and will make a couple of big ol’ cheese-burgers shortly as polls start closing. It’s going to be an interesting night.

  17. Blouise, I voted for him the first time but he didn’t keep so many campaign promises and NAFTA were enough for me to not vote him again. I would repeat my vote for someone else, probably a Green.

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