http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/22/opinion/22SAFI.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnistsThe Clintons decided that the Democratic primary campaign was getting out of hand. Howard Dean was getting all the buzz and too much of the passionate left's money. Word was out that Dean as nominee, owing Clintonites nothing, would quickly dump Terry McAuliffe, through whom Bill and Hillary maintain control of the Democratic National Committee.
That's when word was leaked of the former president's observation at an intimate dinner party at the Clinton Chappaqua, N.Y., estate that "there are two stars in the Democratic Party — Hillary and Wes Clark."
Meanwhile, the four-star general that Clinton fired for being a publicity hog during the Kosovo liberation has been surrounded by the Clinton-Gore mafia. Lead agent is Mark Fabiani, the impeachment spinmeister; he brought in the rest of the Restoration coterie. When reporters start poking into any defense contracts Clark arranged for clients after his retirement, he will have the lip-zipping services of the Clinton confidant Bruce Lindsey.
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As a boot-in-mouth politician, however, Clark ranks with Arnold Schwarzenegger. He began by claiming to have been pressured to stop his defeatist wartime CNN commentary by someone "around the White House"; challenged, he morphed that source into a Canadian Middle East think tank, equally fuzzy.
Worse, as his Clinton handlers cringed, he blew his antiwar appeal by telling reporters "I probably would have voted for" the Congressional resolution authorizing Bush to invade Iraq. Next day, the chastised candidate flip-flopped, claiming "I would never have voted for war."
Clark's strange explanation: "I've said it both ways, because when you get into this, what happens is you have to put yourself in a position." He put himself in the hot-pretzel position — softly twisted.