About us Login Get email updates
Research
Print

Joe Klein on Bill Clinton in the White House: "[T]here's a kind of, something that's spiritually skeevy about it"

January 28, 2008 1:46 pm ET
image

11 Comments

During the January 28 edition of MSNBC Live, Time columnist Joe Klein discussed Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's (D-NY) presidential campaign and the possibility of the Clintons' return to the White House and said, "[T] the question of whether you want them back is -- it's not illegal, it's not unconstitutional, but there's a kind of, something that's spiritually skeevy about it, you know, having him [former President Bill Clinton] back in the White House."

From the 9 a.m. hour of the January 28 edition of MSNBC Live:

KLEIN: I think that what we're looking at here, if you step back just a bit, is that during the two weeks -- the past two weeks since New Hampshire -- Bill Clinton has redefined his wife's candidacy.

Up to that point, I thought she was doing pretty well. In fact, I thought she was handling [Sen. Barack] Obama [D-IL] very well in the debates all by herself. And when I thought about her as a candidate, I thought, "Well, she has a lot of really good substance, a lot of really good programs she's proposing. She's got a lot of experience in national security and foreign policy, which Obama doesn't," but that was -- but I was only thinking about her.

Now, when you think about her, you have to think about them. And the question of whether you want them back is -- it's not illegal, it's not unconstitutional, but there's a kind of, something that's spiritually skeevy about it, you know, having him back in the White House.

And I think that the Bill Clinton that we saw during the past week wasn't the Bill Clinton who everybody remembers as the first black president, to be sure, or a guy who did a pretty good job as president.

The Bill Clinton we saw last week was the guy who couldn't figure out what the definition of "is" is and who pardoned Mark Rich. He just seemed to be a pretty, you know, political, very political sort of politician.

Expand All Expand 1st Level Collapse All Add Comment
    • Author by ultrasanktpauli (January 28, 2008 1:54 pm ET)
         
      Skeevy

      Skeevy?

      A little help here...

      Skeevy?
      Report Abuse
    • Author by tbone (January 28, 2008 2:08 pm ET)
         

      He just seemed to be a pretty, you know, political, very political sort of politician.

      Just the sort of nuanced, in-depth analysis I expect from Time and Joe Klein in particular.

      Report Abuse
      • Author by Si_W (January 28, 2008 4:02 pm ET)
           

        He just seemed to be a pretty, you know, political, very political sort of politician.

         Shouldn't all our politicians be, er, sort of political?

        Report Abuse
    • Author by ultrasanktpauli (January 28, 2008 2:09 pm ET)
         
      hey alright! thanks for the help dude. I guess he's all down on the 'urban tip'...it must be like Mit talking to some 'darkies' in south carolina when he got to comment on their 'bling bling'. I see how it works now...
      Report Abuse
    • Author by eweston8542983 (January 28, 2008 3:12 pm ET)
         

      I think Klein's brain has scurvy.

      Oh he rides a skeevy pinto, and I don't mean the four legged kind.

      Report Abuse
    • Author by tex (January 28, 2008 3:20 pm ET)
         

      1. FIRST, can anyone point to where Kline wrote, spoke, or told ANYONE about his personal insights about Hillary (before Kline decide her husband was DEFINING her)? I don't recall seeing that column.

      2. SECOND, "spiritually skeevy" has to be a job requirement for today's so-called "journalists", of which Kline is a prime example.

      3. Clinton had NO TROUBLE "figuring out what the definition of 'is' is". Clinton knew exactly, as it was the PRESENT TENSE question, to which the answer, to be accurate, should be also in the PRESENT TENSE.

      The people who had TROUBLE with the word "IS" are those who wanted the "IS" question to include every possible "WAS" in the answer. They were pissed that the right question WAS not asked. THEY had the definitional problem, NOT Clinton. And THEY seem to include Kline, confused about the present tense. 

      Report Abuse
    • Author by mdm40398218 (January 29, 2008 3:42 am ET)
         
      Well, at least Clinton is not the guy that lied us into a war and then used the conflict to divide the nation. He is not the guy that spied illegally on Americans and illegally tortured terrorism suspects. He is not the guy that ignored Katrina victims, nor is he the guy that decimated the Justice Department making it resemble that found in a banana republic.  He is not the guy who created deficits as far as the eye can see with tax cuts that benefited the top 1% of Americans. Clinton is the guy who parsed the definition of the word "is."  How shameful!
      Report Abuse

my.MediaMatters.org

Login  Sign Up

Push Back

Phone calls, emails and letters from the public do make a difference. Remember that to be effective you must be polite, and professional. Express your specific concerns regarding that particular news report or commentary, and indicate what you would like the media outlet to do differently in the future.