Bill Clinton == Fred Sanford?

I have largely accepted Dick Morris’ theory that the Clintons do not want Kerry to win in 04 because they want a clear field for Hillary in 08. In my view this is completely consistent with the both of the Clintons’ demonstrated behavior.

The political problem for the Clintons is, of course, that they cannot be seen to be undermining Kerry; after all you cannot command loyalty if you have a reputation for being treacherous.

I was already suspicious of the timing of Bill Clinton’s “chest pains”. For one thing, the doctor-patient relationship makes this sort of situation particularly easy for Bill Clinton to manipulate. The first factor is that Bill Clinton is an inhibited liar. (Please excuse me if I emphasis the obvious but I’m just explicitly listing my considerations.) The second factor is the doctor-patient relationship means the Bill Clinton’s doctors cannot divulge any information that Bill wants withheld. The third factor is that Bill Clinton has never released his medical records; this means that nobody other than his doctors can be sure about his medical history.

This means that Bill has particularly wide latitude to lie about the details and circumstances of his heart condition and be confident that his doctors will not blow his story.

Reason.com just posted an interesting article that is completely consistent with Dick Morris’ theory.

Once again Bill Clinton's personal dramas have taken center stage away from whatever the Democratic Party had planned. The drawback for John Kerry is not so much what Clinton can or cannot do on the campaign trial for the Democratic ticket; that was always of dubious value. What matters is that Clinton's heart surgery managed to dominate the news cycle just as the Republican convention was ending and Kerry seemed poised to offer a rebuttal.

Clinton's health and Hillary's somber pre-op statements led newscasts and soaked up valuable front-page space. Kerry was pushed to the background in almost every instance. …it has made it that much harder for Kerry to recover and go on the offensive as he clearly plans to do.

Unfortunately for Kerry, there is at least one more round of stories to fall out of the Clinton heart woes. Once it is clear that the former president will indeed recover, it will then be permissible to ask how a man with eight years of the world's best health care suddenly developed a 90 percent blockage of a vital artery. In the absence of a plausible explanation to the contrary, the simplest answer is that the blockage is not, in fact, new and instead dates to the Clinton's time in the White House, where it was kept quiet.

If so, if might be a while before Kerry can get a word in edgewise.

Well, I sure have no way to prove this either true or false. An additional indicator that Morris’ theory is correct might occur if Clinton has recurring chest-pain episodes anytime Kerry begins looking like he might begin closing back in on Bush.

Of course it will be too obvious if Clinton grabs his chest like Fred Sanford and yells “I’m coming to join you, Honey!”

Cheers,