Clinton and Me: How Eight Years of a Pants-Free Presidency Changed My Nation, My Family and My Life
"The same week William Jefferson Clinton was sworn in as head of our national family, I became a father." And so begins one columnist's journey through the Clinton presidency. For humorist and political commentator Michael Graham, the trip is a hilarious tour de farce of America at its most ridiculous, and its most real. In the tradition of H. L. Menken (after whom his son is named) and P. J. O'Rourke, Michael Graham lets fly his lampoons on deserving targets across the American landscape. From Al Gore on the left ("the ideology of Ralph Nader, the ethics of Richard Nixon") to Strom Thurmond on the right (campaign slogan: "Getting Out of Bed for More Than 94% of a Century!"), Graham casts his merrily cynical eye and sees all.
Graham begins this collection of contemporary humor with an overview of the Clinton years and how they have changed him as a citizen, a father, and a writer ("What other president could turn the phrase 'face time' into an instant punchline?") He proceeds to take us on a joyous ride through the peaks and valleys of the pants-free presidency.
It's all here: Filegate, Travelgate, the Buddhist Temple and, of course, The White Fluid Scandal, starring Monica Lewinsky, who turned "Hailing the Lil' Chief" into an international cause celebre. According to Graham, this was a seminal (no pun intended) moment in the Clinton years, when Bill Clinton suddenly morphed into President O.J. "We all know what he did; we just wanted to see if he could get away with it."
In Clinton and Me, it's Michael Graham who gets away with it -- telling us the all-too-painful truth about ourselves -- by keeping us laughing all the way.
