Vanity Fair - November 2007 White House Civil War
Promised real power as Bill Clinton's vice president, Al Gore found he had a rival for that role: the First Lady. And when Hillary decided to run for the Senate, a tense competition got ugly. In an excerpt from her new book about the Clinton White House years, the author reveals how conflicting agendas—the triangle of a scandal-ridden lame-duck president, the wife he'd betrayed, and his designated successor—sapped Gore's 2000 campaign as the bond between two couples dissolved into distrust, anger, and resentment.
Excerpted from For Love of Politics—Bill and Hillary Clinton: The White House Years, by Sally Bedell Smith, to be published this month by Random House, Inc.; © 2007 by the author.
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Rival CampaignsBill and Hillary's seventh year in the White House brought a dramatic shift in their relationship, with the center of gravity moving from his realm to hers. He was the lame duck, crippled by scandal, and she was the rising political star. Having saved his presidency by publicly standing by her man after the revelations about Lewinsky (first by proclaiming his innocence and then by attacking the enemies who sought to punish him), Hillary now had the upper hand, and his legacy was tied to her political fortunes. At the same time, Hillary's ascendancy had a significant impact on the presidential prospects of Al Gore, diverting attention and resources from his candidacy and adding to the growing tensions between the Gores and the Clintons over Bill's involvement with Lewinsky.
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Gore officially announced his candidacy for president on June 16, 1999, at the Smith County Courthouse, in Carthage, Tennessee, his family seat. Bill and Hillary were in Europe on a nine-day trip with their daughter, Chelsea. For Gore, the announcement provided an opportunity to redefine himself and to create some distance from Bill's personal problems. Since the Lewinsky scandal had broken, Gore had expressed his dismay about Bill's conduct to a small circle of advisers but had kept quiet publicly.
While polls showed the president's job-approval ratings holding at around 60 percent, questions about his character were taking a toll on Gore. A study by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press conducted in April found that "personal image problems and fallout from Clinton administration scandals are contributing to Al Gore's declining favorability ratings and his poor showing in early horse race polls." The study reported that Gore's favorability rating was 47 percent, down from 58 percent the previous December. Seventy-four percent of those polled were "tired of all the problems associated with the Clinton administration" —an alarming phenomenon that became known as "Clinton fatigue." Only 29 percent of Americans would have welcomed four more years of Bill Clinton, and 52 percent said they liked Gore better. In a hypothetical race between Gore and George W. Bush, the Texas governor led 54 percent to 41 percent, up several ticks since January.
At his announcement, Gore was surrounded by Tipper, his four children, and his mother. He repeatedly stressed the importance of family values and referred to the president only twice. Later that evening, Al and Tipper sat for an interview on ABC's 20/20 with Diane Sawyer. Asked about the Lewinsky affair, Gore said, "I thought it was awful. I thought it was inexcusable. But I made a commitment to serve this country as vice president." He added that "as a father" he felt the president's behavior "was terribly wrong, obviously." Seeking to differentiate his character from Bill's, he said, "It is our own lives we must master if we are to have the moral authority to guide our children." When Bill heard Gore's words, he erupted, "What the fuck is this about?" Moments later, in a call to Tennessee from his Paris hotel room, he praised Gore's announcement speech. "Nice job," said Bill.
As a sitting president, Bill was in a unique position to boost his vice president's candidacy by scheduling White House events to highlight his achievements. But in 1999 those resources were diverted from Gore to Hillary "in a big way," said one member of the Gore team. "The Clintons come first. That was their basic framework." From June through December, Bill and Hillary appeared at 20 events under the aegis of the White House, including a celebration of Hillary's 52nd birthday, where in typical style Bill larded his tribute with statistics on welfare, poverty, crime, and economic growth as he touted his wife as a "genuine visionary" needed by the Senate—the ultimate confluence of the personal and political. During the same period, Gore was featured only at a White House Conference on Mental Health — with Bill, Hillary, and Tipper.
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This is a small part from an extented book extract.
You can read the whole text here:
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/11/clinton200711?currentPage=1www.algore.com :patriot:
www.algore.org
www.draftgore.com
www.americaforgore.org
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