Perspectives column, August 26 issue, Wednesday on the Web

Is Clinton Crazy?

By Phil Brennan

Is Bill Clinton a certified loony two steps away from the funny farm? 
That question has been raised this week, and in view of the First 
Prevaricator's increasingly weird behavior now coming to light it is a 
question that needs to be taken seriously.

Very seriously!

"President Bill Clinton is mentally ill, and he will get worse before he
gets better is the conclusion of a clinical psychologist who has studied 
him and written a book on the subject." Dr. Paul Fick, clinical 
psychologist and author of the book "The Dysfunctional President," 
is in an "I told you so" position now that Clinton has admitted his 
sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky. Previously criticized for his 
diagnosis of the president, Fick is now being deluged with calls from 
talk show hosts for interviews.

Fick says Clinton is a pathological liar and addicted to sex. He lies 
about everything, not just sex, and he is so compulsive that he is 
always thinking about sex -- a distraction preventing Clinton from 
doing his job, says the author."

So says radio talk show host David Bresnahan () in a copyright story on
World Net Daily.

He's not alone. Listen to the Orlando Sentinel's gloriously combative
columnist Charley Rees in an oped piece also posted on Joe Farah's
invaluable World Net Daily :

"To put it plainly, Bill Clinton is a sociopath, a liar, a sexual 
predator, a man with recklessly bad judgment and a scofflaw.

"Clinton has the classic symptoms of the sociopath. That is a defective
human being unable to relate to or feel genuine empathy for another human
being. Though often skilled at manipulating people, the true sociopath is
100 percent self-centered. Other human beings are just objects to be
manipulated to achieve the sociopath's goals.

"The sociopath has only two genuine emotions -- pleasure when he gets his
way and anger when he's frustrated. Love? Compassion? Sympathy? The
sociopath is incapable of experiencing any of these emotions, though he 
can simulate them for manipulation purposes. The sociopath is ruthless 
and incapable of feeling any sense of shame, guilt or remorse....

"Clinton should resign, but, not caring anything about the country, he
won't. Therefore, Congress should quit playing partisan games and impeach
him. Otherwise, he will continue to bring the same recklessly bad judgment
to matters of state."

If these views are correct, we are very much in harm's way, living in a
nation governed by a man who simply cannot tell the difference between 
right and wrong -- a prisoner of his out-of-control lust.

In our Media Monitor section, the Media Research Council cites the ravings
of broadcaster Mike Vom Fremd as he praises Clinton's ability to live in
different worlds at the same time:

"Von Fremd marveled: 'Aaron, it's amazing. Bill Clinton is such a master 
at separating different parts of his life that his team of legal advisers 
and his team of national security advisers were totally in the dark last 
week about what he was doing and saying as he was walking between different
meetings in the White House. Aaron, as the President was preparing for the
most important testimony of his life his legal advisers only knew that they
weren't getting enough time with him.

'And last week while he was simultaneously planning the details of his most
bold military attacks, his national security advisers say that Bill Clinton
never for a moment seemed distracted by his enormous personal and legal
crisis. He has said that his mother taught him how to put different parts 
of his life in little separate boxes in his head and, Aaron, his mother
apparently taught him well.' "

Poor Mike; he has just described a classic symptom of sociopathic behavior
without even the fuzziest notion that he's actually laid bare Clinton's
sorry mental condition.

This brings me to the point of all of this: the media's responsibility for
putting the nation in such peril. From the very beginning they knew of
Clinton's monumental flaws. The evidence of his inability to control his
most base instincts, his apparent disregard for the law, and his penchant
for lying at the drop of a hat. Yet they concealed all this because they
liked him personally, and loved his liberalism.

Faced with the facts in the Paula Jones case, they took Clinton's side 
and went on to slander that courageous lady. For seven months, even 
though all but the most bedazzled Clinton worshippers believed Clinton 
had been playing hanky-panky with Monica, they allowed the White House 
spinmaster's to focus the public's anger at Ken Starr and away from 
the man they knew to be guilty.

Even now, as Vom Fremd illustrated in his remarks quoted above, while 
still wallowing in the seamiest details of his unprintable activities 
in the oval office, many media stars still attempt to protect Clinton 
from the consequences of his acts.

How many times have you heard network commentators scoffing at Starr's
ever-growing mountain of evidence of Clinton's criminality as being 
nothing more than an invasion of the president's private life? Or 
allowing that army of greed-driven trial lawyers fighting to protect 
their man in the White House get away with the same arrant nonsense?

How often have you heard network commentators sneer that foreign nations
cannot understand what all the fuss is about-- that Clinton's dalliances 
are standard behavior among world leaders and Americans worrying about 
their leader's sex life must have a collective screw loose somewhere ?

And that's an outright lie, as Kim Weissman illustrates in this week's
Congress Action column. Here's a sample of the reaction in the world's 
media which is supposedly vastly amused at our antics vis-a-vis the 
Clinton scandals:

"A sampling:

Rome's L'Unita (before the confession): "If it is demonstrated that 
Clinton has violated the rules...then he has to pay for that. Democracy 
may not be a perfect system, but that's the way it works."

London Times: "The power of the American presidency rests not on
constitutional advantage or public opinion polls but moral authority. 
Once lost, it is almost impossible to recapture. Mr. Clinton has 
exhausted his moral authority. He has brought his fate upon himself."

Germany's national TV channel one: "Cleverly acted, Mr. President, but you
have now forfeited too much: Trust that does not belong to you but to your
office. We do not have to be narrow-minded Puritans to demand a minimum of
discipline from the most powerful man in the world, but this discipline
obviously did not exist."

France's La Croix: "Humiliation for American institutions, destabilized 
by the meaner side of a leader."

Italy's La Republica: "From today the Gore Age begins in American 
politics. It will be up to him...to restore the White House domestic and 
international prestige since it has been dirtied by too many spots and 
by too many useless lies."

Russia's Segodnya: "...as long as a nation can have its president, no 
matter how cynical and wily, explain himself publicly on the matter of 
adultery, it need not be afraid for its future..."

Canada's Globe and Mail: "Bill Clinton is president of the United States,
sworn to uphold its constitution and enforce its laws. His behavior, even
his private behavior, is supposed to set an example for the country. That
does not mean he must be saintly or perfect -- merely law-abiding and
reasonably honest. He has been neither."

Canada's Calgary Sun: "He's a cheat. And a liar. If Bill Clinton truly 
were an honorable man, he'd gracefully step down as president of the 
nation whose trust he has abused."

Spain's El Mundo: "...laughable legalisms, contrived explanations, and a
substantial dollop of arrogance... If he lied then, how do we know he's 
not lying now when he says he didn't obstruct justice? Clinton's word is
worthless."

Hong Kong's South China Morning Post: "It wasn't Mr. Starr who invented 
that 'inappropriate relationship.'... Mr. Clinton's behavior, and his 
disregard for morality, have tarnished the presidency."

India's Hindu: "In the two years remaining of his second presidential 
term, Clinton can no more expect to enjoy the trust of his people or 
that of the world.... By his obfuscation and months of denial of the 
truth, Clinton has betrayed the trust that his people had reposed in 
him, not once but twice."

And Rush Limbaugh reports that the Japanese press is now referring to
Clinton's speech as "The Ejaculation Proclaimation."

Finally, a couple of current observations: that salacious story about 
what went on in the Oval Office between Monica and her aging suitor while 
Yasser Arafat cooled his heels outside and now being suppressed in the 
mainstream press (and here on Wednesday on the Web, as well) raises 
a couple of interesting points our devilish Celtic nature will not 
permit us to ignore:

1. Assuming that our anti-tobacco crusading president has given up 
smoking cigars, the story indicates that he has found other uses for 
his left-over stogies;

2. If an impatient Mr. Arafat's question "Is he coming?" went 
unanswered, we can now assure him; he was!