The 'Natural' Wraps Up His 8-Year Run

By RICHARD T. COOPER and JACK NELSON

Jan. 14, 2001 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITERS

WASHINGTON —

Whenever he campaigned for governor in rural Saline County, Ark.--out west of Little Rock--Bill Clinton made such a point of visiting the Pickard place that young Steve finally asked his father why he liked Clinton so much.

“Son,” the elder Pickard replied, “he’ll look you in the eye, he’ll shake your hand, he’ll hug your wife, he’ll hold your baby and he’ll pet your dog--all at the same time.”

Today, as history begins to take the measure of another departing president, Pickard’s view of Clinton as a bred-in-the-bone politician is shared by almost everyone. And whatever Clinton’s legacy as a policymaker, friend and foe alike now consider him the most gifted politician of his age. Indeed, he is widely seen as a tragic figure whose gargantuan personal weaknesses denied him the greatness that his political genius seemed to promise.

Yet future scholars may reach a different conclusion about what sets William Jefferson Clinton apart: Instead of seeing him as “a natural” who wasted his gifts, they may conclude he was one of the greatest students of the presidency ever to occupy the Oval Office; a classic example of a chief executive who learned the job on the job--and learned more from failure than he ever did from success.

In the course of eight painful yet often exhilarating years, Clinton achieved a transformation so complete that it’s hard now to remember the undisciplined, disaster-prone bumbling of his early White House years: the ill-timed fight over gays in the military, the health care debacle, the Somalia disaster that cost 18 U.S. soldiers and hundreds of civilians their lives.

“Clinton studied the job of being president. He had an impressive ability to learn from his mistakes and, if not to reinvent himself, to reinvent the way he performed as president,” says historian John K. Alexander of the University of Cincinnati.

What future generations may find fascinating about Clinton, more than his policy record or the sex scandal that nearly derailed his presidency, is the extraordinary personal qualities that allowed him to change--and the broader achievements that such adaptability made possible.

Faced Adversity Early in Life

In a sense, Clinton’s life from the beginning was about finding a way to survive and prevail. His father died in a car crash before he was born. His early childhood was a tug of war between a young, often absent mother and an angry, dominating grandmother. Later came an alcoholic and abusive stepfather. Against such odds, Clinton won his way to Georgetown University, a Rhodes scholarship, Yale law school, and a meteoric political career in Arkansas.

Measured against his backwater beginnings and the obstacles along the way, Clinton’s rise to national prominence bespoke remarkable talents. Even more stunning, he became the first Democratic president to win a full second term since Franklin D. Roosevelt, as well as the second president in history to be impeached and survive.

Special Connection to the Voters

What accounts for a life that reads like a Russian novel?

To Clinton’s detractors, it’s primarily naked ambition: a determination to advance himself no matter what the cost to others--or to honor and dignity. “Most men find a self-centered attitude to be a great weight on them, but Clinton has made it an asset. It’s made him overcome crises,” says Marlin Fitzwater, who worked in the White House with Presidents Reagan and Bush.

But to his admirers, Clinton’s success stems from hard work, a brilliant mind, an unsinkable spirit and the ability to convey a sense of caring about ordinary people. “He’s the toughest person on the inside that I’ve known,” says former Sen. Warren G. Rudman, the New Hampshire Republican who has seen Clinton up close as a member of the National Intelligence Advisory Board. “He’s just powerful, powerful.”

And even opponents pay tribute to his special touch with voters. “Clinton has an ability to connect with the common man better than any politician I’ve known,” Fitzwater concedes. “He’s the best.

“In some sense, Reagan and Clinton both reflect the kind of general views of the country, the common man’s concerns and aspirations. Both come from basic beginnings. Both had alcoholic fathers and came from poor, small towns.”

Clinton likes to say, quoting Woody Allen, that “90% of life is just showing up”--in a word, persistence.

And he likes to tell aides about the athlete who said: “The harder I work, the luckier I get.”

There is a tugboat quality to Clinton, a capacity for chugging ahead, day after day, hauling the weight no matter what the weather. A popular joke among his staff has been: “If Clinton were the Titanic, the iceberg would sink.”

“Bill Clinton’s like an old kudzu vine. There’s no way you can kill kudzu,” says former Sen. David Pryor (D-Ark.), who has known the president since they were teenagers. “He’s just possessed with enduring and succeeding.”

Clinton would take an immediate drubbing, for example, if he thought the end was worth it. His willingness to lavish personal time on fund-raisers continued unabated even after excesses such as cultivating overseas contributors and letting top donors sleep in the Lincoln Bedroom brought investigations and an avalanche of bad publicity.

In part, the president kept on because he loved hobnobbing with the rich and glamorous. More important, he refused to give Republicans the huge advantage in political spending they would have gained had he pulled back. He would take the hammering because, he calculated, it would hurt less in the long run than failing to stay competitive financially.

Another quality that helped the president was always looking ahead, looking upward. For most politicians, the campaign theme song is a soon-forgotten frill. For Clinton, Fleetwood Mac’s “Don’t Stop (Thinking About Tomorrow)” lies near the heart of what propels him. (Only last weekend, at a farewell party, Clinton mentioned it again. When he finished his remarks, he was astonished to see the ‘70s rock group burst onstage and strike up the song.)

And from his mother, Virginia Kelly, Clinton acquired an ability to compartmentalize his mind and emotions that amounted almost to self-hypnosis.

“Inside my head, I construct an airtight box. I keep inside it what I want to think about, and everything else stays beyond the walls,” his mother wrote in her 1994 memoir, “Leading With My Heart.”

State of Union Speech Was a Turning Point

Clinton used his own airtight box throughout his career, most spectacularly to separate himself from the Monica S. Lewinsky scandal and the travail of impeachment. At times, of course, he gave way to the expected emotions: anger, self-pity, feelings of persecution. What aides found remarkable was his capacity, at other times, to hold those feelings and pressures at bay and perform as though they did not exist.

For many, the ultimate example of Clinton’s iron constitution and his ability to compartmentalize came in the 1998 State of the Union address. On Jan. 21 that year, the story broke that Clinton had been sexually involved with a White House intern. Initial reports were followed by a torrent of sordid details.

On Jan. 27, however, Clinton rode to the Capitol, strode into a crowded House chamber and addressed the nation as though nothing had happened. He spoke with such power and aplomb that critics--some of whom had publicly predicted he would not last the week--were rocked back on their heels.

It was a stunning performance, one that would be repeated again and again in the months that followed.

“Most Republicans didn’t think Clinton would survive,” says Lyn Nofziger, a longtime Republican operative and onetime Reagan campaign manager. “They would say, ‘Well, we got him this time.’ But he refused to knuckle under.”

It was not just willpower and the ability to compartmentalize. The 1998 State of the Union address reflected another element, as well, another characteristic that set Clinton apart.

Many of his predecessors were unusually smart. Jimmy Carter was a bright, exceptionally knowledgeable president. But he had trouble translating ideas into achievements.

When Clinton put his mind to it, he could not only absorb the intricacies of a policy issue but also think through effective strategies for winning the attendant political battle.

“It matters whether you work smart,” Clinton told an Esquire magazine reporter recently.

In 1998, he had to do more than show up for the speech. He had to frame a message his attackers could not ignore--a message that would force them to deal with him as president, instead of just a man in disgrace. A message that would salvage his presidency.

After intensive pondering, he figured out a way to do it: Early in the State of the Union, he reminded his audience that, if the budget could be balanced in the coming year, the federal treasury would register its first surplus in many a day.

“What should we do with this projected surplus?” Clinton asked. “I have a simple four-word answer: Save Social Security first.”

By linking the budget to Social Security--an issue of prime importance to voting-age Americans--Clinton made it impossible for Republicans to ignore him as a major force. Whatever happened with the Lewinsky scandal or impeachment, they would have to deal with the president on the most important policy issue facing the government.

The iron in his soul got him to the podium. The brain in his head made him a player.

Enjoys Unparalleled Trust Among Blacks

Clinton’s other great strength, his ability to establish bonds with ordinary people, was reflected most dramatically in his relationship with African Americans, some of whom have gone so far as to call him “the first black president.”

In concrete terms, others did more to end discrimination and advance the cause of social justice. FDR began to attack color barriers in employment and the military at a time when segregation was unquestioned in much of the country and, in some places, lynching was still the de facto law of the land. Harry S. Truman ordered the full desegregation of the armed forces. And Lyndon B. Johnson, with the Voting Rights Act and his War on Poverty, transformed national policy and the reality of U.S. politics.

But none enjoyed the unalloyed trust and affection of black Americans that Clinton has.

“Clinton has an unbelievable natural connection with the African American community,” says Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), who marched with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960s and today is one of the surviving heroes of the civil rights movement. “People see him as fighting for them, standing up for them,” Lewis believes. “Many times during talk of impeachment, I’d have people say: ‘Take care of the president, be sure the president’s OK.’ ”

Julian Bond, chairman of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People, recalls one particular scene that reflected the connection: Seated on the dais with Clinton at an awards ceremony for civil rights heroine Rosa Parks were congressional and other leaders, all white, Bond remembers. When the soprano Jessye Norman began singing “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” often called the Negro national anthem, Clinton and blacks in the audience rose as one.

The other dignitaries rose uncertainly, Bond says, but “Clinton threw back his head and sang to the top of the ceiling--and he knew all three verses.”

In August 1998, not long after Clinton went on television and admitted the affair with Lewinsky, Lewis invited the president to participate with him in a church service marking the 35th observance of the civil rights march on Washington. “He was reluctant, and said he didn’t want to come and be a distraction,” Lewis remembers.

“I told him, ‘Mr. President, you must come. You’re the president of all the people.’ ” It was Clinton’s first public appearance after he admitted the affair. “Introducing him, I said, ‘Mr. President, my friend, my brother, I was with you in the beginning and I will be with you to the end.’

“Tears came down his face, and he gave me a big hug,” Lewis says.

Paradoxically, the affection Clinton inspired in many was matched by antagonism in others.

Not long after the House voted for impeachment, Pryor and former Arkansas Sen. Dale L. Bumpers were having supper with Clinton. Pryor showed the president a button that said: “Impeach Clinton.”

“He started laughing and asked where I had gotten it,” Pryor recalls. “I told him I had bought it in Washington--a week before he was sworn in. The animosity was there even then.”

To his friends at least, the positive elements of Clinton’s character and memory will outweigh and outlast the hatred.

“The Clinton haters will always be around and they’ll hate him just like people hated Franklin D. Roosevelt,” Pryor says.

“But like Roosevelt, he’s smarter and stronger than the haters.”

Times staff writers Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Nick Anderson, Faye Fiore and Elizabeth Shogren contributed to this story.

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How Will He Be Remembered?

Americans’ response to a poll on how Bill Clinton’s presidency will be remembered:

Outstanding: 12%

Above average: 32

Average: 32

Below average: 10

Poor: 11