CLINTON WATCH : Channel Overkill

If all the year were playing holidays, To sport would be as tedious as to work; But when they seldom come, they wished-for come, And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents. Time was, a personal chat with the President of the United States was a rare accident. Even now, many an audience with the President is a moment special enough to be memorialized in a framed glossy photograph. But if Bill Clinton’s handlers have their way, that may change.

Clinton excels at such personal chats and, the greater wonder, at preserving their personal quality before the camera. Ronald Reagan was superb on television, but Clinton performs without a script, the TV equivalent of a tightrope walker without a net.

But word comes now that Jeff Eller, Clinton’s media director, playing aggressively to this strength, dreams of a 24-hour TV channel, covering his boss the way C-SPAN 1 and 2 cover Congress.

If the budget crisis prevents the purchase of new computers for the White House, as reportedly it does, tooling up for round-the-clock TV would seem to be a substantial budgetary question mark if the government pays for it and an insuperable conflict of interest if anyone else does.

All that aside, however, Clinton should question the human wisdom of his high-tech aide. Shakespeare put his thoughts about rationing and even concealing one’s best features in the mouth of a young prince on the way up. The President should reread “Henry IV, Part 1” and rein in overreaching aides.