And Clinton was like that - he saw the whole playing field. He didn't just see the event that he was at or the circumstances of that week or that month. He saw the whole playing field all the time.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The thing about looking back over Clinton's presidency, and probably anybody's presidency, is that when you look back, the events all line up in a way that makes sense. At the time, you don't know where it's going.
I think he could have made most of the trips and gone to most of the fund-raisers if he would have avoided the partisan rhetoric and talked to the country as President in each of these appearances rather than to the narrow partisan audiences.
In the time it takes to heat a TV dinner, Clinton had convinced me that he was the smartest person in the room and that I was the center of his attention. In the next 25 years, I would see countless others fall just as quickly to the Clinton Touch.
I think Clinton, after getting into office and into Washington, was shocked at being bludgeoned. So he spent time trying to be all things to all people - one way guaranteed not to be successful or respected in a lion's den. You can't just play around with all those big cats - you've got to take somebody on.
My view was that the campaign had been a sacred thing, that it had been a real compact, because I was there and I saw the connection that Clinton made with people, and the connection that they made with him.
But I think what happened was that Clinton knew how to fight back. And the way he fought back was on the issues - being tough in staying on the things that mattered to people in their lives.
Throughout his presidency, Clinton made a point of getting close - physically and emotionally - to the people whose problems his administration was working to solve.
Clinton's fakery was so deft and deeply ingrained that it was impossible to tell where it ended and the real Bill Clinton began. This constituted a kind of political genius.
Clinton saw himself much more as the steward of alliances and of consensus that moved in the right direction. He didn't see himself as someone who could change the overall thrust, I think, of global policy.
The Clinton paradox: How could a president so intelligent, so compassionate, so public-spirited and so conscious of his place in history act in such a stupid, selfish and self-destructive manner?
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