Scam a Little..... or "Scamalot"?

Author: Jim Guirard

Source: Word Warrior Distribution Lists - June 2003

Now that Hillary Clinton's "Living History" has re-opened the window of history on the Clinton-Rodham-Gore era, it is time that this scam-filled decade of the nineties be given an appropriate legacy label -- the Decade of "Scamalot."

Either intentionally or otherwise, virtually all attention has been focused on the former First Lady's personal reaction to then-President Bill Clinton's multiple infidelities. The ubiquitous question has become "What did she know and when did she know it?" And what did she "feel," and why did she not "throw him out," etc.

Completely ignored by the media and largely side-stepped or avoided completely are the sordid details of all variety of completely non-personal and non-peccadillo crimes, deceits, schemes and scams, many of which Hillary herself was involved:

• the Whitewater-scam,
• the S&L/Resolution Trust scam,
• the Tyson Cattle Futures scam,
• the Castle Grande billing records scam,
• the White House Travel Office scam,
• the Vince Foster "disappearing files" scam,
• the Hillary Healthcare "secret consultants, secret meetings" series of scams,
• the thousand personal FBI files scam,
• the Lincoln Bedroom for dollars scam,
• the John Huang/Lippo Chinese money scam,
• the Hubbell hush-money scam,
• the Chappaqua "routine home mortgage" scam,
• the Clemency for Puerto Rican terrorists scam,
• the "Hasidic Four" pardon scam,
• the million missing e-mails scam,
• the White House and Air Force One petty lootings scam -- and about a dozen more, too numerous to be listed here.

And have we already forgotten even to ask about the equally numerous and equally cynical tactics by which these scams were covered up, either in whole or in part?

• the categorical false denial scams,
• the qualified false denial scams,
• the sophistry (slick non-answers) scams,
• the ubiquitous media "spin" and "spiking" scams,
• the demonize Ken Starr scams,
• the intimidate and smear the witnesses scams,
• the shred the evidence scams,
• the lose the files scams,
• the no specific memory scams,
• the alleged partisan political attack scams,
• the alleged politics of personal destruction scams,
• the alleged irrelevance and/or private behavior scams,
• the alleged lack of proportionality scams,
• the alleged lack of material evidence scams,
• the Hubbell-type "hush money, hush jobs" scams,
• the "this has already been addressed" scam,
• the alleged "vast right-wing conspiracy" scam,
• the multiple dilatory judicial appeals scams,
• the deny a "vast left-wing cover-up" (of all the other scams) scam.

As the nation's airwaves and the print media's news and commentary pages indicate, the world is already hotly debating whether any major part of Hillary Clinton's book is truly believable. Every topic covered -- and every one avoided or understated, as well -- should, indeed, be searched for Clintonesque signs of deceit, fabrication, misdirection, false denial, exaggeration, failure to recall, half-truth, spin and scam.

Prediction: The doubts will dwarf the certainties, and the over-arching question about the Clinton-Rodham-Gore era will remain, "Did these troublesome people scam a little -- or did they scam a lot?"

In the self-evident answer to that question will be found the new legacy label for Bill and Hillary's high-flying but largely ignoble and untrustworthy decade of the 90s: namely, the Decade of "Scamalot" -- an invidious but fitting comparison to the romantic and heroic imagery of John and Jackie Kennedy's beloved "Camelot."

To date, the Bill and Hillary years in power have no legacy label at all. Better, perhaps, for them to have none than to try "spinning" a positive one which might be ridiculed as a transparent scam. (Oh, look!…There's that helpful little word again.)

But now -- irony of ironies!!! -- both Hillary's largely fictional book and an equally suspect one last month, "The Clinton Wars," by left-wing former aide Sidney Blumenthal are proving to be powerful catalysts for the most fitting legacy label of all.

One can already envision a smash-hit musical featuring such tragi-comedic Camelot parodies as "If Ever I'd Deceive You" and "How To Handle A Scandal" and "The Simple Joys of Internhood" -- and, of course, the unforgettable and irrepressible title song, "SCAMALOT."

Neither the retired and fretting King Will, nor the aspiring and self-serving Queen Hill, nor their loyal court "spinners" of yore -- Messrs. Carville, McAuliffe, Begala, Davis and Shrum -- will be even slightly amused.

Jim Guirard -- TrueSpeak Institute 703-768-0957 Justcauses@aol.com