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The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History With The President (2009)

by Taylor Branch(Favorite Author)

3.8 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

1416543333 (ISBN13: 9781416543336)

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Simon & Schuster

review 1: THE CLINTON TAPES feels like extensive notes for a subsequent history of the Clinton administration, thanks largely to the circumstances under which it was produced: Taylor Branch, while writing his three volume history of the civil rights movement, agreed to discreetly interview Bill Clinton in order to record his more-or-less unguarded views for posterity. This eventually produced nearly a hundred tapes for the Clinton library, the transcripts of which remain sealed until the end of Hillary Clinton's career in politics. Branch based this volume on his own personal notes, which he recorded while driving back to his home in Baltimore after the interviews concluded.As an interviewer, Branch saw his role as permitting Bill Clinton to present himself as he wished, since histo... morery might find significance in what topics Clinton chose to discuss and what he chose to ignore. He also wrote THE CLINTON TAPES as a memoir, not a fully researched history of the administration, so he generally presents Clinton's view as best as he can reconstruct it from his notes rather than seeking to balance it with the views of other political figures from the era. Branch's notes are generally stronger on Clinton's psychology and his assessment of other historical figures than on the intricate policy details that Clinton reveled in.So largely what THE CLINTON TAPES is good for is a sympathetic portrait of Bill Clinton the man, and Branch is very good on that subject. Branch (as a personal friend of both Bill and Hillary Clinton) was privy to more personal access than many observers, and some of the more domestic moments reminded me that after all, Clinton was still a middle-aged dad who liked to play Oh, Hell or Hearts after dinner for hours while encouraging all manner of trash talk, who had embarrassing, daddish opinions on pop music (at one point comparing Joan Obsborne's "One of Us" to Bob Dylan), who was worried about his daughter going to college and worried about not smothering her while she was there.Clinton is very much the shrewd operator with the encyclopedic command of detail that he was reputed to be, and Branch often records him giving a run down of election results by county with ethnic breakdowns, or idly sketching out how to fix the mess of California regulation of electricity. What's probably more surprising, given his Slick Willie reputation, is how Clinton saw himself as a JFK-style idealist who was always being trivialized by observers while he tried to restore honor to public service. He also loved the game of politics, and respected those who felt a political need to trash him. (At one point, he even encouraged Pope John Paul II to attack him along with other world leaders on abandoning the poor.) Paradoxically, this came along with a pronounced tendency towards self-pity, which led him to spend hours complaining about how the press was undermining and trivializing him at every turn.The book is also worth reading for Clinton's stories and his insights into any number of other politicians, including a now famous anecdote about Boris Yeltsin slipping away from his handlers while drunk and wandering the streets of DC in his underwear trying to order a pizza. I also enjoyed the story about Clinton convening a meeting of sitting presidents, including Ford, Bush Sr., and Carter, and finding that the one thing they all shared was a boundless contempt for Ross Perot. I was also surprised to learn that Clinton had a tender regard for Richard Nixon, who got access to the White House for the first time in decades and served as a foreign policy back channel until his death in 1994. Another observation of his, made during the 2000 Republican convention, seems uncannily prescient:"Bush and Cheney were political twins. They both projected a cocksure manner with an economy of words. Like gunslingers in movies, they promised to cut through palaver and get things done. While submitting to democratic norms for the election season, they talked down to voters with a disguised autocratic streak. Clinton thought their governing approach would lean heavily to command over partnership."Obviously this book won't substitute for a full history of the Clinton administration, although to my knowledge nothing has come out yet with any real claim to being definitive. I think it's worth reading regardless, if you're interested in American politics, just because Clinton is an indelible character and this kind of perspective is all too rare. Maybe it's unfair to compare fact and fiction, but I found myself thinking how thin and two dimensional fictional politicians seemed compared to the raw complexity of the real thing. Give me Bill Clinton over Jed Bartlett any day of the week.
review 2: With former President Clinton in the news lately, we thought it would be a good time to look at the most recent book covering his White House years, `The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History with the President' by Taylor Branch. The first thing that bears mention, is that this is not a book of transcripts of secret (or not so secret) White House tapes made in the Oval Office a la Nixon or even LBJ. The book is rather the recollections of Pulitzer Prize winning author, Taylor Branch (`Parting the Waters' about the rise of Martin Luther King) who was hired by Clinton to conduct a series of late-night interviews with the then president to chronicle his years in the White House; tapes that Clinton himself, has held onto for his own posterity, library, book, etc... While not nearly a direct transcript, Branch's deckle edged book is based on a series of detailed recollections from his discussions with Clinton that revel the president's insider views and opinions on all the major issues of his two-term presidency. The range of topics is wide, moving adroitly from issues of a domestic nature (health care, gays in the military, campaign finance reform, the environment, the media and his major work on behalf of the economy and the balanced budget amendment) to foreign affairs (the middle east peace process, Bosnia, Somalia, Iraq, Haiti, etc.) to politics (the mid-term elections, the contest with Bob Dole in 1996 and some harsh words reserved for Al Gore in the wake of the 2000 debacle, as well as relations with the House and Senate Republicans and their pestiferous leader, Newt Gingrich). Some of the best and worst moments are those reserved exclusively for the Clintons, where Branch's affinity for his former campaign worker friend (they knew each other from George McGovern's presidential run 20 years earlier) show a certain favoritism for giving the Clinton's at least the benefit of the doubt. Subjects like Whitewater, Vince Foster, Paula Jones and Monica Lewinsky are tempered by the more personal stories involving Clinton's golf game, Hillary's various social issues as well as the close relationship of both parents with daughter Chelsea. In all, what emerges from The Clinton Tapes is an intimate look at a man who is a deep analytical thinker, a leader that is well schooled on his job and who considers the down-the-line implications of every move much like an experienced chessman. Once Clinton finally decides to release the tapes, we should have a window into even more of the nuances of the issues chronicled here, but until then, The Clinton Tapes serves as a rare window into a complex and issue filled eight-year term at the top. Also available as an audio book. less

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