All Too Human: A Political Education

by George Stephanopoulos

  Unlike Morris, Clinton understood the implications of the budget numbers, especially in programs like Medicaid that he had administered as a governor. “I know a bit about this,” he'd say. “Poor kids are going to get screwed; that's what I feel passionately about.” While Clinton was willing to give the Republicans a balanced budget with tax cuts, he refused to accept what he called their “below the line” goal: an end to activist government, especially in health care and education. “We're going through Stockman's revenge,” he said at a September budget meeting, referring to Reagan budget director David Stockman's insight that even if supply-side economics didn't balance the budget, the deficits created by their tax cuts would create persistent resistance to all government spending. “They're using the deficit to destroy government.”

  To me, this observation was a sign that we hard-liners had the president's other late-night adviser on our side. “Stockman's revenge” was a phrase I'd often heard Hillary use, and the fact that Clinton repeated it after a morning at home was surely no coincidence. Although she was less visible now, devoting large blocks of time to handwriting revisions of her book It Takes a Village, the first lady was still the most powerful liberal in the White House. The combative side of her that had hampered the health care effort and backfired on Whitewater in 1994 was exactly what we needed in the budget showdown of 1995.

  My relationship with Hillary was going well. Her Woodward fury had passed, and I had helped myself by how I handled affirmative action. Although she was instrumental in bringing Morris back, she also sensed the need for a liberal counterweight to him inside the White House. Several times a week, she'd call to check in and buck me up — often as she exercised. “How're we doing today, George?” she'd ask, her measured breathing and the hum of the treadmill serving as background for my morning updates. If she called in the afternoon, I might be on the StairMaster in room 11 of the OEOB. The phone by the machine would signal me with its distinctive ding-dong chime, and, trying not to break stride, I'd give her my take on the budget and get hers, tell her what Democrats were saying on the Hill, pass on an interesting story from the television news. She no longer watched — too infuriating, too painful. One late-September day, however, she called to console me on my latest bout of bad headlines and revealed how she was coping with her own.

  A few nights earlier, I had been arrested in Georgetown. The charge was “hit and run”; the truth was that I couldn't maneuver my car out of a tight parking spot on M Street. When I scraped the bumper ahead of me, an excitable police officer who happened by recognized me and made a scene — patting me down as a crowd gathered around. More bad luck, I had carelessly let my license expire. He cuffed my hands behind my back and called in four cars to take me to the station. Although my car never left the curb, I was cited for leaving the scene of an accident. Several hours later, I was released with an apology from the station chief, and the charges were dropped. But the damage was done: Video footage of my arrest was all over the morning news.

  “I'm glad to see you've overcome your problems with the police, George.” Hillary laughed. “You know, I've been thinking about what happened to you” (and herself). Both of us got plenty of ink for things we didn't do (like throw a lamp at her husband); both of us made even better copy when we really did screw up (like throwing a temper tantrum at a treasury official). We bonded again — two liberals, two lightning rods, Boy George and Saint Hillary — commiserating about the press and our other shared enemies, musing about how being caricatured drives you crazy and the futility of trying to fight it. Whimsical and bitter, wistful and shrewd, she signed off with praise for how I had left the station house — head held high, a calm smile on my face. “That's what I've learned how to do,” she explained. “Whenever I go out and fight I get vilified, so I have just learned to smile and take it. I go out there and say, ‘Please, please, kick me again, insult me some more.’ You have to be much craftier behind the scenes, but just smile.”

  It was a lesson we both had learned from her husband — the master of the public smile that masks private rage. That fall, one man was increasingly the source of Clinton's foul moods. His book was a bestseller, his poll numbers were soaring, and his potential presidential run had pundits swooning. General Colin Powell was pissing the president off.

  “The press is going to give him a pass.” Clinton scowled from behind his desk as he scanned one more fawning clip about his presumed rival.

  “I don't think so,” I replied. Though I was equally anxious about Powell, I believed that if he ran for president, the press would do its job. “Once he gets into the race, despite the fact that they love him and despite the fact that they may want him to win — and I agree with you, Mr. President, they do want him in the race — they will feel compelled to cover him like any other candidate.”

  I should have stopped there. Whatever I was saying wasn't working. The president was standing now, staring down at me, unsmiling, both hands pressed on his desk. But since I fancied myself an expert on the media and I had a captive audience, I continued my lecture. “The structure of campaign coverage will override their personal feelings, which I grant, you're right, they like him more than they like you. …”

  His right forefinger flew off the desktop, heading straight for my face: “You're wrong! You're wrong! You're wrong! They'll give him a ride, even though he wouldn't do half the things I've done as president. They're just going to give him a free ride.”

  The president tried to hide his frustration. Everywhere he went, he was asked about Powell, and he responded with the requisite pablum (“I've worked with him and like him. … He's a very appealing man … got a very compelling life story”). But his public remarks also hinted at private resentment (“… he's gotten a lot of favorable publicity, much of it well deserved”). Sooner or later the bile would come spilling out, and I was particularly worried that it would happen at the annual dinner of the Congressional Black Caucus in late September. This was the heart of Clinton's political base, but Powell was family, and he was being honored. C-Span was televising the event live, and our press corps was buzzing because it would be the first head-to-head matchup between the two potential rivals since Powell's presidential boomlet began.

  Early that Saturday evening, I went up to the residence to work on the speech with Clinton. Sitting in the second-floor den, surrounded by family photos and his collection of ceramic frogs — with a cigar in his mouth, bifocals perched on the tip of his nose, and papers spread on the card table before him — the president was happy. But he still wanted to take “a little dig” at Powell.

  At the Arkansas dinners where Clinton learned his trade, taking “a little dig” at opponents was what you did. But in Washington, a president is permitted to poke fun only at himself. Before ritual roasts like the White House Correspondents dinner, we usually struggled with Clinton's sarcastic side to get him to deliver the self-deprecating jokes in his script. Tonight, he wanted to score a direct hit. Apparently he had heard somewhere that Powell had criticized the Black Caucus for losing “their vision and their way.”

  “I want to take him on, tell them they've never lost their way,” he said, a formulation that would manage to merge a pander and a put-down in a single sound bite.

  “Mr. President, if you say one word that looks in any way, shape, or form like criticism, everyone is going to say that you're afraid and obsessed, and they're going to jump on it,” I replied. “It will be a huge story. Just be generous, be gracious.”

  “You're right, I know,” he said. “But this draft says too many good things about Colin. We have to shorten it down.”

  “Fine, shorten it down.”

  I could tell right then that the dinner would be fine. By the time Clinton got to the podium, he'd be adding praise. It was getting late, though; he had to leave. As Clinton fiddled with the text, we discussed the upcoming Million Man March (“You can praise the values behind the March if you want,” I said, “but keep Farrakhan out of it”), and I us
ed my privileged position that night to push my pet project (“If you want to dig Colin, the best way to do it at the Black Caucus is to whack the Republican budget”). The words were new, but the routine was familiar. Just like early mornings during the campaign, with me sitting on a twin bed in a small motel room, reading headlines and reviewing the day's events as the candidate cooled down from his jog.

  Except the candidate was president, I was his senior adviser, and we were in the White House. The navy valets who served every president were laying out a fresh tux in the master bedroom. The doorway framed a portrait of Alice Roosevelt, and Lincoln's bedroom was down the hall. Even now, I could be startled by the setting if I stopped for a second to think about it. While the president shaved (using a plastic razor and no foam on his light beard), he started singing scales to loosen his diaphragm and told me that before a big speech John Kennedy “used to go into the bathroom and bark like a dog.” Then he barked. Clinton was conscious of being in a stream of presidents. I was conscious of being in a stream of presidential assistants who had listened to their bosses and done their jobs while leaning against that bathroom door.

  As I left, I felt like I'd done a good day's work. Clinton was psyched. Confident. He'd left his demons in the locker room and was about to do what nobody — not even Colin Powell — did better: feel a crowd, feed their hope. “I'm gonna give a hell of a speech,” he said. “They may take me down, but they're going to say, ‘He's not going down without a fight.’”

  The fight Clinton was anticipating didn't materialize that night. Both the president and the general took the high road. But for the next month, the “Draft Powell” movement sucked in all the oxygen in the political atmosphere. The broader American public, however, was preoccupied with the fate of another black American. In the White House, we calculated what the O. J. Simpson verdict would mean for Clinton and the country — and prepared for the worst.

  On Monday, October 2, Gene Sperling and I were in my office when CNN's “Breaking News” logo lit up the television that was always on. Caught off guard by the fact that the jury's deliberations had taken less than four hours, Panetta hastily called a meeting in his office. The president would need a statement responding to the verdict, and the Justice Department was preparing for possible riots in Los Angeles. We naturally started out, however, by speculating on the verdict, and each person's guess was a window on his character.

  Leon, a former prosecutor and strict disciplinarian, went straight to guilty. Morris went straight to the polls: “Eighty percent of the blacks in the country think O. J.'s been framed or that there was police misconduct. With that many blacks on the jury, I'm telling you, he's innocent.” Carville phoned in a prediction from his gut: “He's guilty. I feel it; they'll find him guilty.” My own conclusion was more a wish than a prediction. “Guilty,” I said. The president refused to play, saying only that he was surprised at how quickly the verdict had been reached. Morris had an answer for that too: “That kind of impetuousness is characteristic of blacks.”

  Early the next morning, we met with Justice Department officials to review their contingency plans. Their Community Services Task Force reported that African Americans in Los Angeles were on tenterhooks and focused on Mark Fuhrman. They feared a guilty verdict would set off riots in the streets and were coordinating with the LAPD and community leaders to keep the situation under control. Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick told us that once the verdict was announced, the Justice Department would pursue a civil rights complaint against Mark Fuhrman and investigate allegations of misconduct against the police — a move that would be especially crucial if O. J. was found guilty. We all agreed that the president's statement should be as neutral as possible.

  When we went to get the president's approval, he opened the meeting with a wan stab at humor: “So, Jamie, are we going to have black or white riots today?” I flashed back to a moment shortly after Simpson's arrest. Clinton was in his dining room, recalling the time he'd played golf with O. J. and reflecting on the anxieties that eat away at a middle-aged man whose greatest achievements are behind him. But now the president was more focused on politics than psychology. The prospect of acquittal made him anxious. He feared it would fuel white resentment and feed the prejudiced notion that “blacks can't be trusted with the criminal justice system.” An acquittal would deepen racial divisions; and while Clinton didn't say it then, he knew it could also mean more “angry white males” voting Republican in 1996.

  The verdict was set for one P.M. eastern time. At the top of the hour, we arranged for Clinton to sign an appropriations bill so we could legitimately claim that the president just “took a break” from legislative work to watch. But we were as transfixed as the rest of the country. Several of us watched in Betty Currie's office, which had the largest television in the Oval Office suite. Clinton pulled a chair up to the console facing Betty's desk. He was uncharacteristically quiet and didn't look up from the crossword puzzle he was working on. But when cowboy lawyer Gerry Spence predicted a guilty verdict, the president muttered, “Good for you.” Then the members of the jury took their seats, and the forewoman announced their decision: not guilty.

  Clinton stared at the screen; we stared at Clinton. For us, the suspense wasn't over yet. No one said a word, as if we were waiting for the president's permission, for official guidance on what to think. After all, at some level, Clinton's reaction would become our reaction; that came with the territory. The president knew that too. A year or two earlier, he would have mimicked Spence — analyzing the decision to death and saying everything on his mind. But by this point in his presidency, he was more aware of being watched and better understood the weight of his words — even the private ones. He struggled to remain silent, but a single disgusted syllable slipped out: “Shit.”

  That was all we needed. As the television displayed a scene of crowds cheering in the streets of South Central L.A., our small room became a babel of anger and invective. Clinton didn't move from his chair, just silently redrafted his public reaction, a single sentence expressing respect for the jury's decision and sadness for “Ron and Nicole.” Mike McCurry took the statement and asked if he had any other thoughts. “Not that I want to say,” he replied. Still sitting, he slowly doubled over, lowering his head into the palms of his hands, grinding them into his eyes as if to keep all those thoughts from escaping.

  Everyone returned to work, and Clinton retreated to the relative solitude of the Oval, leaving the office to Betty — the only African American in the room. We had first worked together in the Dukakis campaign, then the War Room, now the White House. She was a serene presence, quick to offer a piece of candy or a hug when you looked a little harried. As I returned to my office, I wondered about her. Boy, it must have been painful for her to watch that scene, even if she loves the president, even if she's friends with us. Ashamed of my insensitivity, I went back to talk with her about it and asked if she could explain the cheers.

  “You mean, what do they think in the 'hood?” she asked, with just enough of an edge to let me know that my outraged reaction to the verdict had been noted. “Most people feel vindicated by the verdict. It sends the message that the police can't screw around with black people.”

  But Betty, what kind of a message does it send to let a murderer go free? The look on my face gave me away. So Betty brought up a talk we'd had shortly after O. J. was arrested. “Remember, George, when this started, I thought he was guilty and you didn't believe it.” It was a gentle reproach, a reminder to be humble in my judgments, and another sign of the gulf between how whites and blacks viewed the verdict. Several of us spent the rest of the afternoon debating whether Clinton should say anything more, but the president wanted to let the matter drop — a decision Morris ratified with another overnight poll, which found, he said, that “eighty percent of the country opposed a presidential statement” on the Simpson case.

  Perhaps the most significant presidential statement of the fall, however, was one that w
asn't polled because it wasn't meant to be repeated aloud. Morris had indoctrinated Clinton with dogma designed to persuade him that triangulation was his political salvation — a creed the New Republic had labeled “The Explanation.” The president's original sin, it held, was falling in with the congressional Democrats and their allies like me and Leon Panetta. His first-term mistakes were our fault. Whatever the merits of The Explanation (and there were some), it was a guide for contemplation, not ceremony — stage direction, not script.

  But at a late-night fund-raiser in Houston, the president proclaimed his faith with a public confession to a roomful of wealthy contributors. Acknowledging that many of them were “still mad” because “you think I raised your taxes too much,” Clinton added, “It might surprise you to know that I think I raised them too much too.” Most of the frontline White House reporters missed it because they'd skipped the speech and snuck off to a restaurant. After all, Clinton rarely made news at these events, it was past deadline anyway, and you couldn't get good Tex-Mex in D.C. But a Reuter's wire service correspondent filed some copy when she heard Clinton seem to repudiate the central legislative accomplishment of his presidency.

  The next morning, I was startled by the headline on page A-9 of the Washington Times: “Clinton Says He Thinks He Raised Taxes Too Much.” In his speech, Clinton's quotes were wrapped in a fulsome defense of our 1993 economic plan, but wrenched from their context, they looked like Republican talking points. Holding up a copy of the paper folded over to the incriminating story, I announced to the senior staff meeting that “we have a big problem.” But then, I always thought the sky was falling. Pooh-poohing my pessimism was a pretty safe bet, especially when my evidence was a brief wire report picked up only by a conservative rag: “Oh, that's just Clinton being Clinton. … What's new about him trying to get a roomful of rich people to like him? … It'll blow over.”