The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton

Author - Joe Klein ... [Goo?] [Posters]

This Paperback Book item from Broadway was reviewed on 25-Oct-2008.

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1) Paperback Book The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton by Broadway. Joe Klein takes a detailed, dispassionate look at the Clinton Presidency. He takes great pains to put it in perspective, both generational (Baby Boomers take over from the WWII Generation) and international (pre-9/11). He acknowledges that it took Clinton a while to get a handle on being President, and bemoans how much was opportunity was squandered because of the President´s own failings. Yes, Klein opines (and I agree) that Bill Clinton is one of the most staggeringly bright and naturally gifted men to ever hold the White House. But he also nails Clinton on character issues, even beyond Monica Lewinsky (once referring to the President as "a bimbo when he comes to flattery"). When you´re done with the book, you appreciate all the nuanced things Clinton accomplished, but you´re heartbroken over what he could have done, if not for the inexcusable distractions.¤

2) Paperback Book The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton by Broadway. This short, fast-moving book on Bill Clinton forsakes a historian´s detailed and measured treatment to get at the essence of this man´s presidency. Because it´s more like a magazine article than a doorstop, you´re likely to actually read it, maybe in one sitting.

The book has become timely again, in light of Hillary Clinton´s presidential bid. The "Hillaryland" liberal faction split the White House of her husband, elected as a "Third Way" moderate. Her premature insistence on addressing health care was the most grievous policy error of her husband´s presidency. And Hillary´s unbelievably complicated proposal, concocted in secret, showed no political sense. Aides described how Hillary could drive Bill, with a phone call, from a good mood to a staff-chastising tantrum, and how they distinguish those tantrums by the tone of his shouting.

She comes across as the more conspiratorial and paranoid of the two, an uncompromising liberal true-believer pursuing a scorched-earth policy against enemies. Sort of like, uh, that president she helped impeach, Richard Nixon. You wonder how she, and this country, would fare with her in the Oval Office.

Klein does not see this as a sham marriage, though. While ever aware they might be playing him, he sees them as devoted to each other.

One of his best chapters describes how Washington´s culture of political warfare began with Watergate, intensified through the endless Iran-Contra investigations and the attack-ad era and culminated in the Gingrich speakership and the relentless Whitewater, Paula Jones and Lewinsky investigations.

Clinton failed his potential for several reasons. The placid Nineties were too tame for a truly great presidency. After the healthcare miscalculation, he never seized another opportunity to remake major domestic policy. And the impeachment scandal fatally distracted him in 1998 when he had the budget surplus and standing with Congress to make a real mark by fixing Social Security.

Like a charcoal sketcher, Klein has a fine eye for quick but telling detail. He sees Clinton as needy of praise and human contact. He´d keep dazed listeners awake into the wee hours, talking more and more intensely, unwilling to let the moment go.

Klein describes bowling with him one midnight just before the New Hampshire primary, after the candidate enters but finds the emptied-out joint devoid of hands to shake. Klein, awaiting his turn in the lane, would find Clinton standing so close he pressed up against him, seeming to crave human contact. Clinton´s intense but flawed humanity is what makes him interesting, and endlessly so.¤

3) Paperback Book The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton by Broadway. The book shows that a journalist wrote it. That wasn´t meant to be as backhanded as it seems. The stories about Clinton et al are those we can recall, this isn´t a back room exposé full of conspiracy theory.
A good journalist (at least) writes as if he has something to tell you. Only in the last chapter does Klein really subject the reader to an opinion piece.
If you were alive at all for the eight years of Clinton´s presidency then...no, none of this is really "new" or "insightful" but I, for one, found it none the less interesting.¤

4) Paperback Book The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton by Broadway. I have to admit that Klein´s book about the Clinton presidency is one of the most objective accounts of Clinton I have ever seen. Although friendly with the ex-prez, Klein pulls no punches and presents Clinton´s presidency warts and all. In the end we all know what Clinton did, but Klein gives us more insight as to the "whys" of his actions. Is Clinton the greatest president of all time? No. Is he the worst? Not even close. If all books on presidents were written as objectively as this one, we would all have a better understanding of what makes these men tick.
Is Clinton a better president than W? You tell me: peace and prosperity vs. war, a declining stock market, and skyrocketing gas prices.¤

5) Paperback Book The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton by Broadway. I got the impression that Mr. Klein just threw together a bunch of odds & ends he had left over from another book and notes -- the way they made the movie "Midway" out of edit-outs from "Tora, Tora, Tora!"¤

6) Paperback Book The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton by Broadway. Joe Klein, best-selling author of Primary Colors and one of our most brilliant political analysts, now tackles the subject he knows best: Bill Clinton. Astute, even-handed, and keenly intelligent, The Natural is the only book to read if you want to understand exactly what happened–to the military, to the economy, to the American people, to the country–during Bill Clinton’s presidency, and how the decisions made during his tenure affect all of us today.

Much has been written about Clinton, but The Natural is the first work to cut through the gossip, scandals, media hype, and emotional turbulence that Clinton always engendered, to step back and rationally analyze the eight years of his tenure, a period during which America rose to unprecedented levels of prosperity. Joe Klein puts that record into perspective, showing us what worked and what didn’t, exactly what was accomplished and why, and who was responsible for the successes and the failures.

We see how the Clinton White House functioned on the inside, how it dealt with the maneuvers of Congress and the Gingrich revolution, and who held power and made the decisions during the endless crises that beset the administration. Klein’s access to the White House over the years as a journalist gave him a prime spot from which to view every crucial event–both political and personal–and he sets them forth in an insightful, readable, and completely engrossing manner.

The Natural is stern in its criticism and convincing with its praise. It will cause endless debate amongst friends and foes of the Clinton administration. It is a book that anyone interested in contemporary politics, in American history, or in the functioning of our democracy, should read.


From the Hardcover edition.¤

7) Paperback Book The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton by Broadway. Primary Colors author Joe Klein offers a nonfictional take on his favorite subject, Bill Clinton, whom he describes as both "the most talented politician of his generation" and "the most compelling." Klein is of two minds when it comes to the man from Hope: he is at once disappointed by Clinton´s failure to achieve greatness, but also a defender of what Clinton did do. He can be unremittingly harsh about the 42nd president´s personal shortcomings: "Bill Clinton often seemed the apotheosis of his generation´s alleged sins: moral relativism, the tendency to pay more attention to marketing than to substance, the solipsistic callowness." Yet he also credits Clinton with running "a serious, substantive presidency" whose chief success was dragging "Washington toward a recognition that a revised form of government activism might be appropriate in the anarchy of an instant economy." Klein is a smart and engrossing writer, and The Natural is an honest liberal´s best effort to explain eight controversial years. Readers who supported Clinton will discover new insights into why he didn´t accomplish more; those who opposed him will gain a sharper understanding of why he remained so popular with the public. --John Miller¤

Page Updated: Robert N. Goolsby, 22-Nov-2008, 07679141209780767914123, 170-640-490-060-200-180-8

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