Archive [March 1999]

President Clinton thinks his presence in the Oval Office provides America with a unique opportunity … one that comes around only once a century. We know that because he said so. Throughout his tenure, this President has used near-messianic terms to describe himself. Lately, he has focused the energies of his lofty self-regard on the year 2000. He is, after all, the Bridge to the 21st Century.

On January 25, he and his wife hosted one of those intellectual confabs — according to an AP report, it was “a discussion of what the momentous millennium event meant 1000 years ago and what it might mean just months from now.” The President explained: “We have to find some way of organizing our thoughts and our plans against the mysteries of time and timelessness.” He’s just the guy to help us do that.

After the audience in the East Room of the White House was treated to lectures by a couple of theologians and scholars of medieval history, Bill Clinton closed the event as follows:

“I would just like to leave you with this one thought. You all know that I am a walking apostle of hope and progress.

“The question is, how do you pursue it without arrogance, with appropriate humility and without a definition that is too narrow?”

A good question. Although it appears humility is not really an option. Clinton continued: “Feel free to write to me about the things that you’re most worried about and the most hopeful about, and what you think I ought to spend my time between now and the millennium doing for you and the rest of the world.”

But you’ve done so much for the world already, Mr. President!