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Sir--In your comments on President Clinton's character (leader,
June 8), you cite the recent misappropriation of Republican issues
as one indication of his "disposition to slither shamelessly
from one policy to another." This is a wild mischaracterization.
Bill Clinton is for balanced budgets, tax cuts, and work-for-welfare
schemes not because he's copying Bob Dole; these have been core
issues for Clinton at least since his 1992 campaign. He is the first
president since Lyndon Johnson to preside over a reduction in the
annual budget deficit, while at the same time expanding tax relief
for lower-income families (via the Earned Income Tax Credit). And
Bill Clinton campaigned heavily on the work-for-welfare idea in
1992. How soon they forget: his administration submitted a welfare
reform bill in 1994, but it was too conservative for his fellow
Democrats, who then still controlled Congress, and it unfortunately
went nowhere. And the Republicans, led by then-Senate minority leader
Dole, were dead-set against giving the president any legislative
victories, even for a program they otherwise would have liked. Who
was lacking character in that tussle — the earnest president
or the cynical hack minority leader?
I can't speak for how the White House has conducted issues of "perception."
Perhaps its denizens were too busy pushing through the ultimately
fruitful 1993 budget (which has helped foster economic conditions
far better than the biggest optimists forecast), passing NAFTA,
GATT and landmark anticrime legislation, and promoting easier access
to higher education.
The '93 budget and the deployment of U.S. troops in Bosnia are
examples of where, contrary to his slap-happy image, Bill Clinton
has taken enormous political risks. He may from time to time appear
to seize on "popular" causes for their own sake (e.g.,
teenage curfews) or compromise issues of principle seemingly to
avoid political risk (gay marriages), but these are small potatoes.
On the big issues, Bill Clinton has shown an unerring willingness
to work hard and sacrifice political capital. I call this "character."
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