Clinton and Ike:
This will raise hackles, but there's more that connects Bill Clinton and Dwight Eisenhower than one might imagine. Don't be too quick to
dismiss this in the belief that "Ike" was moral and dour, whilst Clinton
was hornier than a bunny rabbit in April. Eisenhower biographers don't like to
hear it, but Ike probably had a long-term affair with his military chauffeur Kay Summersby. Harry Truman claimed
Eisenhower considered divorcing Mamie and Ms. Summersby made a disputed deathbed
confession. Still, if collecting conquests were the sole criterion, Clinton
would be matched with the greatest Lothario in White House history: John F.
Kennedy. But wait… there's more.
How they are similar:
Both were great disappointments to ideologues. Eisenhower
took office after the long FDR/Truman reign that instituted social, economic,
and cultural reforms that drove archconservatives to despair. They dared hope
that Ike would repeal New Deal, end "social engineering," cut taxes
for the wealthy, support anti-communist witch hunts, and unleash the private
sector. They badly misjudged their man. "Moderate" is usually a
hollow term used by politicians seeking to hide the fact they've been forced to
"compromise," but Eisenhower is as close to being moderate as one can
imagine. Famed as the World War Two general in charge of D-Day, Ike's political
views were so little known that both
parties courted him in 1952. He easily defeated liberal Adlai Stevenson twice,
but Ike was not a conservative poster boy. He quietly (but effectively)
isolated the loathsome Joseph McCarthy, resisted big ticket budget items,
spurned big tax cuts, and left most remaining New Deal programs intact. There
were three big moments associated with his domestic polices, each of which demonstrated
Ike's moderation. He signed the Interstate
Highway Act in 1956, but it wasn't a liberal moment; it was subsumed within
a Cold War defense bill and justified
as a way to move troops and materiel quickly in a national emergency. Ike's
signature on the 1957 Civil Rights Act
is another case in point. It came on the heels of a showdown in Little Rock, Arkansas, in which
Governor Orval Faubus refused to integrate public schools per the 1954 Brown v. the Board of Education
decision. Eisenhower reluctantly sent troops to Little Rock, then signed the
Civil Rights Act, but only after assuring it was so watered down that seven
years later it was rewritten. Eisenhower once baffled Americans with his advice
that the great challenge of the age was to "take the straight path down
the middle," but he practiced what he preached. He had four net
appointments to the Supreme Court—Charles Whittaker resigned just a year into
his term: John Marshall Harlan III and Potter Stewart, both conservatives; but
also two great liberals: Earl Warren and William Brennan. 
Clinton took over after the Reagan/Bush I interregnum to a
hail of misplaced enthusiasm. Liberals hoped he'd be another FDR and African
Americans proclaimed him "America's first black president." Oh dear!
Clinton's MO was "triangulation," a purposeful attempt to steer a
middle path between liberals and conservatives; hence we got a bit of both.
Liberal: repeal of Bush I family planning restrictions, cutting taxes for
low-income earners, the Family and Medical Leave Act, a diverse Cabinet,
several child healthcare bills, Megan's Law, AmeriCorps, a clean water bill…. On the other hand, one could call Clinton
the most effective Republican
president since Ike: NAFTA, DOMA, a bill protecting religious education, curbs
on illegal immigration, welfare reform, shrinking the federal bureaucracy, the
Telecommunications Reform Act, draconian crime bills, and repeal of the Glass-Steagall
Act, the last of which paved the way for the Bush II recession. On balance,
Clinton averages out as a moderate—just like his Supreme Court appointees, Ruth
Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.
Both men were parsimonious. Eisenhower warned of a
"military-industrial complex" and sought to starve it; Clinton
produced the first balanced budget since Lyndon Johnson. Both ruled over
periods of outward economic prosperity. Eisenhower was in office for the
longest period of economic expansion in U.S. history, while Clinton saw the end
of the Bush I recession and enjoyed years of Stock Market growth, low
unemployment, and minimal inflation.
Neither Eisenhower nor Clinton had unqualified success in
foreign affairs. As a Cold War president, Eisenhower maintained needed calm
during the Suez Crisis, attempted rapprochement with the Soviet Union, and isolated
extremists during a period of global tension and Red Scare. His time in office
was marred by periods in which his administration elevated that tension—the
issuance of NSC-162, the articulation of the (now discredited) Domino Theory,
the cancellation of free elections in Vietnam, the uncertain culmination of the
Korean War, nuclear testing, the U-2 incident, and the Bay of Pigs plan.
Turning loose the CIA in places such as Guatemala, Iran, and the Congo proved
unwise in the long run.
Clinton wasn't much interested in foreign policy, but he
charmed foreign leaders. He left what is, at best, a mixed record. Bungled:
Bosnia. Success: Kosovo. Bungled: the immediate response to the 1993 World
Trade Center bombing. Wise: His warnings on Osama bin-Laden (and Saddam
Hussein). Bungled: the response to US
Cole bombing. Success: Bombings of Afghanistan and Sudan. Bungled: Rwanda.
Success: the Israel-Jordan Treaty. And so it goes….
It's tempting to say that Ike was saddled by the Cold War,
and Clinton was the first post-USSR president, but if one considers Clinton the
first Age of Terrorism POTUS, that difference dissolves.
How they are different:
Mainly in style. Eisenhower was grandfatherly and dull;
Clinton was Elvis crossed with Kennedy. You'd definitely rather have beers with
Bill.
It is fair game to say that whether or not Ike had an
affair, he was a choirboy compared to Clinton. Whitewater, Travelgate, lying
under oath, and his sexual peccadilloes turned out to be more smoke than fire,
and the attempt to impeach Clinton ranks among history's smelliest foiled
vendettas. That said, seldom has America seen such a skilled politician with
such a broken moral compass.
Rankings:
Eisenhower is enjoying reassessment and currently ranks 9th
(of 42). This rating is assuredly over-zealous revisionism that confuses the
postwar economic boom with Ike's actual accomplishments. Clinton is currently #
20 and would be higher, were it not for his personal flaws. Twenty sounds about
right for each.
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