Monday, May 3, 2010 - The economy had already produced more...
The economy had already produced more private-sector jobs than had been produced in the previous four yearsInterest rates were still low, and investment was up
Al Gores campaign mantra was coming trueNow everything that should be up was up and everything that should be down was down, with one big exceptionDespite the successes, my approval ratings were still lowOn November 7, in a special Meet the Press interview I did with Tim Russert and Tom Brokaw on the shows forty-sixth anniversary, Russert asked me why my ratings were downI told him I didnt know, though I had a few ideas
A few days earlier I had read a list of our accomplishments to a group from Arkansas who were visiting the White HouseWhen I finished, one of my home staters said, Then there must be a conspiracy to keep this a secret; we dont hear about any of thisPart of the fault was mineAs soon as I finished a task, I moved on to the next one, without doing a lot of follow-up communicationsIn politics, if you dont toot your own horn, it usually stays untootedPart of the problem was the constant intrusion of crises like Haiti and SomaliaPart of it was the nature of the press coverageThe haircut, the louis vuitton knockoffs Travel Office, and stories about the White House staff and our decision-making process were, I believed, either wrongly or overly reported
A few months earlier, a national survey had shown that I had received an unusually high amount of negative press coverageI had brought some of it on myself in mishandling press relations earlyAnd maybe the press, which was so often called liberal, was in fact more conservative than I was, at least when it came to changing how things were supposed to work in WashingtonCertainly they had different notions of what was importantAlso, most of the people covering me were young, trying to build their careers in a system of twenty-four-hour news coverage where every story was expected to have a political edge and there were no kudos from colleagues for positive storiesThis was almost inevitable in an environment where the print and network news media faced more competition from cable channels and where the lines between traditional press, tabloids, partisan publications, and political talk shows on TV and radio were being blurred
The Republicans also deserved a lot of credit for the fact that my poll ratings were worse than my balenciaga blue performance: they had been effective in their constant attacks and negative characterizations of the health-care and economic plans, and they had made the most of my mistakesSince I had been elected, Republicans had won special USenate elections in Texas and Georgia, governors races in Virginia and New Jersey, and the mayoral races in New York and Los AngelesIn each case, the outcome was determined by decisive local factors, but I sure didnt have much positive influencePeople didnt yet feel the economy getting better, and the old anti-tax, anti-government rhetoric still had a lot of juiceFinally, some of the things we were doing that would help millions of Americans were either too complex for easy consumption, like the Earned Income Tax Credit, or too controversial to avoid being politically damaging, even when they were good policy
November offered two examples of sound policy and questionable politicsAfter Al Gore plainly bested Ross Perot in a heavily watched TV debate on NAFTA, it passed the House, 234200Three days later the Senate followed suit, 6138Mark Gearan reported to the press that Al and I had called or seen two hundred members of Congress, and the leather chanel bag cabinet had made nine hundred callsPresident Carter also helped, calling members of Congress all day long for a weekWe also had to make deals on a wide range of issues; the lobbying effort for NAFTA looked even more like sausage making than the budget fight hadBill Daley and our whole team had won a great economic and political victory for America, but like the budget, it came at a high price, dividing our party in Congress and infuriating many of our strongest supporters in the labor movement
The Brady bill also passed in November, after the Senate Republicans backed off a filibuster inspired by the National Rifle AssociationI signed the bill, with Jim and Sarah Brady in attendanceEver since John Hinckley Jrshot Jim in Hinckleys attempt to assassinate President Reagan, Jim and Sarah had crusaded for sensible gun-safety lawsThey had worked for seven years to pass a bill requiring a waiting period for all handgun purchases so that the buyers backgrounds could be checked for criminal or mental-health problemsPresident Bush had vetoed an earlier version of the Brady bill because of the intense opposition of the NRA, which said it infringed on the constitutional right louis vuitton new bags to keep and bear armsThe NRA believed the brief waiting period was an unacceptable burden on lawful gun buyers and declared that we could achieve the same result by increasing the penalties for illegally buying gunsMost Americans were for the Brady bill, but once it passed, it was no longer a voting issue with themBy contrast, the NRA was determined to defeat as many members of Congress who voted against them as possibleBy the time I left office, the Brady background checks had kept more than 600,000 felons, fugitives, and stalkers from buying handgunsIt had saved countless livesBut, like the budget, it exposed many of those brave enough to vote for it to harsh attacks, which were effective enough to drive several of them from office
Not everything positive I did was controversialOn the sixteenth, I signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which was intended to protect a reasonable range of religious expression in public areas like schools and workplacesThe bill was designed to reverse a 1990 Supreme Court decision giving states more authority to regulate religious expression in such areasAmerica is full of people deeply committed to their very diverse chanel black bucket tote bag faiths
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