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by Mac MacArthur

TUESDAY, AUGUST 3rd, 1999 -- BOSTON -- Okay.  I was not going to write a word about Hillary Clinton's revelations to Talk magazine, Tina Brown's latest addition to layers of crap upper-middle-class Americans can choose from to wile away the hours at their favorite day spa.

But I happened to be in Boston last night, and with little to do, took in a full two hours of pap dished out by Geraldo Rivera and Chris Matthews concerning Hillary's soul-searching with Talk writer Lucinda Franks -- who appeared on television more frequently than Lucille Ball reruns yesterday.

It was Rivera who showed the frustration felt by Clinton supporters at Mrs. Clinton's foolish agreement to speak all-too-candidly with Tina Brown's writer -- all because the publisher was so eager to launch her new "snailzine" with the "interview of all interviews" despite New York's Il Duce Mayor Rudy "Con Frutti" Giuliani's nixing Tina's planned fête at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

I have only one question for the First Lady: What ever happened to "It's none of your business!"???

It worked well for stealth adulterer George Bush Sr., and seems to be working for Baby Bush -- at least thus far.

But no.  The First Lady, who seems to have received bad advice from some of the worst staffers to hit Pennsylvania Avenue since "Citizen" Cohn, decided to bare all, trust her "buddy" Tina, and supposedly "deflect" press interrogation on the Lewinsky-et-al scandal by doing so.

Sorry, Madame Senator, no cigar... and excuse the pun.

What the First Lady succeeded in doing was creating nothing less then a furor and a mainstream -- and not-so-mainstream -- feeding frenzy, led by journalistic midget Matt Drudge who, in that American paradigm of fame, now has his own "sin"-dicated radio show, to which no one listens save the House Managers who hope Drudge can deliver them from the congressional welfare line each faces after the next round of elections.  Drudge, who writes nearly all his "World Exclusives" by reading world wide web editions of leading US newspapers every night at 2 AM and then rewriteing those stories claiming they are his through embellishment, is having a field day with the POTUS and the FL -- and egging on his entourage of egg-sucking losers to do just the same.

By now, you all know that the First Lady's words were carefully twisted by Brown and Franks into a sour, not-so-subtle hit piece on both Hillary and Bill -- and article that coaxed out the pond scum of television gasbags on every program from Equal Time to Chris Matthew's aptly named HardBall.

Tina Brown did her job, all right -- but at the expense of the Clintons.

Gennifer shows the "$ofter $ide" of her alleged talents for the camera. We were not impressed.

Matthews, reputed to be a sonofabitch to his own staff and the kind of guy who would slap his mother for asking him to change his wet bed, had none other than Gennifer Flowers as his lead guest last night. Flowers -- a wretched-out nudie centerfold B-girl lounge act (and, to be just a shade less subtle, quite simply a disgusting washed out pig of a woman) who seemed completely zonked out on something akin to crystal methamphetamine -- told Matthews that she has a list of everyone the President has "murdered" on her web site if only people would go there and check. Chris kept baiting her on this statement. Flowers, like Juanita Broaddrick, is angry because Hillary didn't give her enough ink in the Talk piece on husband Bill.

Matthews -- who cannot be described by anyone close to him as much more than a self-serving guttersnipe who Sister Wendy would enjoy torturing with razor blades and matches jjust for the fun of it -- prodded Flowers to explain the Clinton murders over and over while trying to cover his own ass (although not very well), hinting that "The Clinton Chronicles" (published with some cooperation from Rupert Murdoch and Ed Koch son-in-law-from-hell Chris Ruddy, we suppose) has been disproved.

Of course, Matthews should have simply told the whacked-out Flowers to take a hike the minute she alleged that Clinton was a homicidal maniac.  But no.  The scum-sucking blonde buffoon CNBC anchor, so reminiscent of Adolf Hitler's top Gestapo operatives, kept leading her on as if she were even microscopically relevant or sane.

A midstream commercial saved Matthews -- during which time he must have received a call from whichever GE lawyer has to suffer through his non-stop and designedly vicious libel and slander five nights a week on CNBC.

On return, Matthews made some mealymouthed, whimpering statement about how he was then and there "disassociating" himself from Flower's statements that the President is a murderer, and Flowers -- visibly frightened by his 180-degree turn -- began to backpedal (sort of), claiming she had never "actually heard" President Clinton order the murder of Vince Foster, Ron Brown, or a friend of mine, Vic Raiser, along with 80 others.

She changed her story yet again again after the second commercial break -- inferring that Clinton's friends simply murdered people in their zeal to protect him.

Believe me, Flowers is not a woman you might want to risk having a casual drink with.

Matthews, disappointed that Gennifer didn't get even more outrageous than she was, obviously thought that his continuing attempts to draw out Flowers could be construed as a "journalist" attempting to trap a guest -- he actually called himself a journalist more than once, invoking the sacred shield of the First Amendment and pretending he was merely trying to get to the bottom of the story.

Sure.

Now, how did this conversation begin, you ask? Well, of course, in defense of Linda Tripp -- who has told the press and others that she is in fear for her life because she knows about President Clinton's "hit squads," most probably from the Chris Ruddys and Chris Hitchenses as they were both on their way back to Neptune, the planet they call home.

Matthews -- an absolutely hairless platinum blonde rabid Chihuahua  who could be sued successfully over and over again for the words that emerge his big fat sloppy frog-like mouth -- posed as a true psychopath while he and Flowers exchanged veiled insults aimed at the President under the guise of aiming them at each other.

If you missed it, it's worth the $29.95 to order a tape from Burrelles.

But Geraldo Rivera took the cake last night by inviting certified "psycho"-babbler and coke-whore-impressionist-cum-congressional-candidate-cum-"constitutional lawyer" (puh-leeeease!) Ann Coulter -- who looked as she'd explode if she didn't get laid within the hour.  She was on, of course, solely for the purpose of calling Hillary Clinton "a liar" no fewer than three times.  "She's a liar!, She's just a plain liar," spewed Coulter from her dry mouth desperately in need of an Altoid.

"She's a liar!" Coulter repeated -- at which point she began babbling in some incoherent drug-like stupor about the President masturbating in the sink, which she claims is an little known "fact."

We didn't have a photo of Jonah, so this will have to do. Note the hairstyle.

Poor Lanny Davis and the male-model-cum-House Judiciary Committee Minority Counsel who were on the show had to battle not only Coulter but Bob's Big Boy clone Jonah Goldberg, whose greasy bouffant hairstyle was only eclipsed by Geraldo's own dry one.

Seriously Geraldo, you need to see your barber more often.

Goldberg was, however, more reserved than I've seen him recently -- most likely because he knows Jonah's mom Lucianne, who already has volunteered to serve Linda Tripp's jail time (only because she may be serving her own for aiding and abetting Tripp as well as engaging in what's called misprision of a felony before and after the fact), was already on the hottest of hot seats and is almost assuredly going to be called to testify at the Tripp trial.

I feel for Jonah -- imagine trying to launch a career with a woman like Lucianne for a mother. I wonder if Jonah is a womanizer?

Coulter, who I expected at any moment would whip out a syringe and frantically inject herself with a "speedball" on national television, was wildly irrational as she engaged Lanny Davis in a cat fight.  Davis gave a performance that must have disappointed even the most ardent Clinton supporter. The President would be wise to recruit a new spokespundit unafraid to call Jonah Goldberg an interloping, untalented, third-rate writer and mama's boy, and Coulter a frustrated deer-in-the-headlights poster girl for mega-Ally-McBeal-style bulimia who needs to be outfitted with a shock collar -- at all times -- especially when loose on the streets.
 

Ann Coulter -- wigging out so intensely her eyes were practically popping out of her head.

Coulter, who must stun her dinner dates with regularity, is really a piece of work. She should certainly have her own show on Fox television for people to laugh at -- even South Park seems too tame by comparison. I, for one, would watch her pupil-filled eyes and zoned out persona any time, day or night, simply for the entertainment of betting on when she would stroke out, vomit or twirl her head on its socket - live and in color.

Geraldo, always the gentleman to a fault, pretended that Coulter is a respected constitutional lawyer. Well, she is a lawyer, but calling her respected is kind of like labeling Adolf Eichmann "a decent guy." She is nothing less than a paid ultra-right-wing embarrassment.

But, as Dr. Gonzo my pal always says, I digress.

Just what was going through Hillary Clinton's mind when she sat down with Ms. Franks and told her "The Intimate?"

Either Hillary is not as politically savvy as people say, or her own meanderings are getting in the way of her basic political horse sense.

What she did resulted in headlines like "Clinton denies he was physically abused as child," and sub-heads like "Spokesperson says President had a wonderful life" -- and that was from CNN!

I hear that the National Enquirer leads with "Was Bill Clinton Abducted by Aliens?!" next week.

The President has now forced White House spokesperson Joe Lockhart to look dumbfounded (if not just plain dumb) as he has to explain to reporters that just love to imply the worst that the President denies physical abuse between his mother and grandmother as they fought over his little body in childhood.

Is this a sick scenario, or what?

One can only imagine ten-year-olds studying American democracy for the first time in fifth grade and coming upon a chapter heading in their textbook: "Cheap Thrills on the Backs of Presidents Past and Future."

Pat Robertson hits up the trailer park crowd.

And don't think The 700 Club -- Pat Robertson's answer to The Reader's Digest for trailer park denizens -- will ignore this story. Robertson already has a Flowers-like Clinton Murder Page on his own money-grubbing web pages, and will soon be asking his television parishioners to consider the President a nuclear-armed psychopath ready to launch missiles if he doesn't get fellated ASAP.

We can only wonder what the House Manglers -- with their own web page as well -- will say about this one.

It's a rotten shame, because obviously there was much more going against young Bill Clinton then just one argument between the two older women in his life. If one takes a look at Mother Clinton's autobiography one can easily see that little Bill Clinton accomplished nothing short of a miracle entering college -- let alone the White House -- and staying there for two back-to-back terms while dealing with the monkey on his back that was his past.

I can empathize with the boy, trying to mix in well at Yale while worrying about Mom in one "awkward" situation after another.

The President now finds himself in the unenviable position of having to take the entire blame for his wandering eye and protecting his beloved spouse, her political career and his legacy at the same time. Another man might have grounded his wife after such a naive performance in front of a magazine that had tens of millions of dollars and Tina Brown's chequered reputation at stake with its first issue.

Without a raving headline story, Talk might have emerged with a whimper rather than a bang. Hillary Clinton ended up being the dupe that provided those fireworks.

Shame on her staff for allowing the First Lady to be had in the first place.

Here's another clue: the President may have trouble in the "fooling around" area -- but any good observer of humanity (like you, for instance, dear reader) might find it easy to remark that most men suffer the same "infirmity" although most don't have women practically flinging themselves at them every hour.

Bill Clinton's problem is not so different from any rock, movie or political star whose name is a household word. Women and men are attracted to power. It's a human thing. They want to sleep with it. It's basic Psych 101. Depending on one's level of sophistication, power can be interpreted as having "a cool car" or a "superior intellect."

Bill Clinton has a pretty cool car, a Boeing 747 or two, and even looks pretty darned good to most women -- or so the polls say.

That's truly his problem -- one shared in part with any high school boy lucky enough to drive a newish Porsche.

What Tina Brown and Ms. Franks did was lift the First Lady's words out of context -- at least somewhat -- and focus on those words that are often the tiny but bitter remnants of severe disappointment with a spouse -- no matter how long ago one forgave him.

Hurt is hurt -- and it must have been easy for the Talk editors to xero in on "interesting" words and discard tha uninteresting ones Such is the nature of "infotainment," and that's what Talk magazine is about.

"There was terrible conflict between his mother and grandmother. A psychologist once told me that for a boy being in the middle of a conflict between two women is the worst possible situation. There is always a desire to please each one," Mrs. Clinton told Franks.

You're darn right -- and I can vouch for that.  I was in a similar position when my own father was killed in a car crash one Christmas Day and I found myself, at 13, being pulled from mother to grandmother to aunt -- which resulted in some horrible consequence to my own psyche, and theirs as well I'm sure.

So, was Monica's Lewinsky the President's Mother or Grandmother? And what role did Hillary play? Those are the idiotic questions mainstream reporters and cable big-mouths like John "The Ghoul" Gibson will be posing while simultaneously perverting what psychologists say about fatherless boys.

But it isn't role playing that's at issue -- its the fear of abandonment that every child suffers when losing one or the other parent at a young age. And tragically, it is this same fear that makes someone a great political leader. If a politician needs one talent, it's simultaneously the ability and the need to be loved, to be worshipped -- by everyone.  Not only his wife and friends, but everyone.

If the mainstream media did its homework, I'd wager that they might discover that more than 75% of successful politicians came from severely dysfunctional families where they too felt uneasy about their place.

While the interview with Talk may have provided a much needed catharsis for Mrs. Clinton, the political fallout might be devastating to her senatorial goals. That is a tragedy in and of itself, because she told Franks with candor that the primary action bringing the Clintons back to each other was her eagerness to be her own person and to exercise her personal political options and his encouragement to do so.

She may be denied at least one of her goals -- the New York senate seat she is seeking.

Mrs. Clinton is quoted as saying, "I want independence. I want to be judged on my own merits. Now, for the first time, I am making my own decisions. I can feel the difference. It's a great relief."

I bet it is. But the irony is that the statement itself demonstrates the truth that no two people coupled to each other as Bill and Hillary obviously are can be independent. Everything the other does or says irrevocably impacts their lives together and separately -- and any attempt to divorce one from the other rings false, as, by definition, it must.

For those of you who may be quick to judge the President unfit for office because he feels insecure, I might remind you that your own insecurity is manifesting through such a judgment. There is no reason to believe that a man who wishes to be loved is ipso facto a poor risk as a leader. History teaches us that just the opposite may be true.

Despite the Ann Coulters and Linda Tripps of the world -- two absurd women who have been constantly and serially rejected for their very being -- most Americans agree that as President, Bill Clinton has done a superb job.  Most people also feel that Hillary Clinton has far outdistanced most first ladies and most women in her role as chief wife, homemaker, mother and confessor.

Top Clinton traitor George Stephanopoulos was one of the first to say that Mrs. Clinton was unwise and made a mistake telling Franks what she did. Despite my absolute and unending disgust with Stephanopoulos, he is correct in his assessment -- not because the President has a "weakness," but because people just like Stephanopoulos will attempt to capitalize on this weakness as somehow "unpresidential."

While Hillary Clinton's interview may cost her votes, in the end I hope that people might consider other things she said in that piece.

She told Franks "we share simple pleasures... talking and watching old movies in bed. We just have a deep connection that transcends whatever happens."

Mrs. Clinton's words remind me that most married couple share vows that promise to deliver transcendence "whatever happens" -- to either of them -- during their lifetime together. Perhaps if more ultra-right-wing Republicans admitted this, their focus on family values wouldn't appear such a hypocritical sham.

And for those comments I say bravo to Mrs. Clinton for speaking her truth while loving her husband, and bravo to the President for loving her and himself despite that truth.