THE CLINTON COMEDIES:     

… Must read: “Hillary's expertise” – subhead from yesterday’s “Inside Politics” column in the Washington Times. Excerpt from Greg Pierce’s report: “We're not making this one up, folks. In a video snippet you can play for yourself on the NY1 News Web site, Hillary Rodham Clinton accuses the Bush White House of ‘a coverup at the highest level,’ the Wall Street Journal says in an editorial at www.OpinionJournal.com.  'What transpired in the White House?' an angry Mrs. Clinton asked this [past] week from the steps of New York's City Hall. 'I know a little bit about how White Houses work. I know somebody picked up a phone, somebody got on a computer, somebody sent an e-mail, somebody called for a meeting, somebody, probably under instructions from somebody further up the chain, told the EPA, 'Don't tell the people of New York the truth,' and I want to know who that is. Mrs. Clinton's coverup accusation was prompted by a report from the Environmental Protection Agency's inspector general, which says the Bush Administration prodded the EPA to issue reassuring reports about the air quality in Lower Manhattan after September 11. She's not buying the argument that, in the chaotic aftermath of that day, no one really knew what was going on with air quality. Maybe the first couple of days, Mrs. Clinton allows. 'But a week later, two weeks later, two months later, six months later? Give me a break. They knew, and they didn't tell us the truth,' she says. This, of course, comes from the same woman who as first lady thought it understandable that her long-subpoenaed records could suddenly materialize in a room right next to her White House study. 'I think people need to understand that there are millions of pieces of paper in the White House,' she told Barbara Walters, 'and for more than two years now people have been diligently searching.' Recall that she also dismisses the collection of hundreds of FBI files of Bush and Reagan appointees as a 'bureaucratic snafu' by innocent newcomers 'who did not recognize the mistake.' And who can forget her classic disavowal of any responsibility for the sacking of staffers in the White House Travel Office?” the newspaper asked. We suppose Mrs. Clinton's explanations have to be taken on faith. So if the honorable junior senator from New York now wants to argue that she knows a coverup when she sees it, because she knows all about how these things work, who are we to argue?”

… “Hillary Clinton should join Dem race” – headline on Mark Steyn’s column in the Chicago Sun-Times. Excerpt: “Driving through Lebanon, N.H., the other day, I accidentally veered off on to the shoulder and just missed slamming into a huge billboard proclaiming, ‘HOWARD DEAN--THE DOCTOR IS IN!’ Not the way I'd want to go. But the sign's right. Dr. Dean is ‘in.’ The Democratic presidential candidate is raising a ton of money on the Internet, and he's taking it in itsy-bitsy $20 donations, a rare distinction in a party that's become far too dependent on big contributions from a small number of wealthy donors. A presidential campaign has to have an element of romance, and right now Howard Dean is the only guy in the Democratic field providing any. Even those of us who've spent enough time watching him govern Vermont to dismiss him as a mean, thin-skinned, low-down, unprincipled, arrogant no-good have to salute the canniness he's shown in running his presidential campaign. A year ago, no one outside New England had heard of him, and the famous fellows were all the senators--Joe Lieberman, John Kerry. Now everyone's heard of Dean, and Lieberman and Kerry are getting more obscure by the hour. With the California recall election sucking all the attention away from the presidential midgets for the next month and a half, these fellows will be lucky if they're still in the game at all by Oct. 8. All this was predictable. In the modern era, governors make the best candidates and senators the worst…As I said a couple of months back, Dean's on course to kill off two big-time rivals in the first two votes: Dick Gephardt in Iowa, John Kerry in New Hampshire. By Jan. 27, he could be the nominee. In the last week or two, he's started behaving like he already is. Dean's suddenly ceased pandering to the party's anti-war base, and begun equivocating his way back to the center. Meanwhile, the previously relatively sensible candidates he's tugged to the left over the last few months are now beached out on the fringe: Sen. Bob Graham of Florida, a hitherto sober chap with a solid foreign policy reputation, was last heard of threatening to impeach Bush over Iraq…If you think Bush is unbeatable (as incumbents generally are), then it's just a question of picking out who you want to nosedive into oblivion with. Going for, say, Dick Gephardt, the terminally dull congressman who's been around way too long, would guarantee you a genteel, respectable defeat--like Bob Dole in 1996. But, if you're going to flop anyway, wouldn't it be more fun--and maybe better for the long-term health of your party--to take a flier on Dean? And that brings us to the second possibility: What if Bush is at least potentially vulnerable? Despite the Democrats' most fervent prayers, the economy refuses to collapse. But it's a pretty freaky world out there, and who knows what else might happen in the next 14 months?… Which brings us to the third scenario: What if you seriously believe that Bush is defeatable? Who's the best candidate to do that? Dean? Hmm. Gen. Wesley Clark, the former NATO supreme commander and lion of Kosovo, currently playing electoral footsie with the Dems? I don't think so. The one to watch is the candidate who polls better than any other against the incumbent: Hillary Rodham Clinton.  The Clintons didn't get where they are without being bold: No experts thought Bush Sr. could lose in '92, but an obscure Arkansas governor did; no experts thought a sitting first lady could run for office, but Hillary did. They had plenty of luck: Ross Perot vote-splitting in '92, and the pre-9/11 Rudy Giuliani going into emotional meltdown in 2000. But fortune favors the brave, and if Hillary was to shoot for the big one, I wouldn't be surprised if some equally unforeseen breaks go her way. The way to look at it is like this: What does she have to gain by waiting four years? If Bush wins a second term, the Clinton aura will be very faded by 2008. And, if by some weird chance Bush loses to a Howard Dean, she's going to have to hang around till 2012. Logic dictates that, if Hillary wants to be president, it's this year or none. In her reflexive attacks on Bush over the war and the blackout and everything else, she already sounds like a candidate. The press will lapse into its familiar poodle mode (‘Do you think you've been attacked so harshly because our society still has difficulty accepting a strong, intelligent woman?’ etc.). And, more to the point, when the party's busting to hand you the nomination, you only get one opportunity to refuse. Realistically, Hillary has to decide in the next eight weeks. If the meteoric rise of Howard Dean has stalled by then, the answer's obvious. And, even if it hasn't, you need an awful lot of $20 Internet donations to counter a couple of checks from Barbra Streisand. This is Hillary's moment. You go, girl.”