Slam One Dem, You Slam All, MoDo

Like many of you, I’ve watched the quality of Maureen Dowd’s writing dissipate over time. As far as I’m concerned, she has turned from witty and sharply insightful to mean-spirited, petty, illogical, and – worst of all – genuinely uninteresting.

In today’s New York Times screed against Barack Obama (I’m not going to try and dissect all of her attempts to perpetuate the narrative that Obama is inexperienced – he is a bit as a presidential candidate, I’ll grant you that, but he is formidable in his knowledge of both U.S. politics and the world), she offers the following about Hillary Clinton…

In the White House, she botched health care and bungled dealing with special prosecutors — remember that talent she had for losing critical files? And in the Senate, she played it safe and became a Democratic Senator Pothole while helping W. launch his disaster in Iraq.

Yes, her vote on the Iraq war was a mistake, but to be fair, I think we’ve beaten this to death pretty much by now; I’ve read enough statements from her that pass for a mea culpa as far as I’m concerned. And since she was not serving in any official capacity in the White House under her husband’s administration, I cannot recall what Dowd is talking about pertaining to the Ken Starr inquisition.

But as long as Dowd has brought up the Clinton impeachment farce, allow me to provide this excerpt from a 2000 Times column written by reporter James B. Stewart, and I’ll let you determine who was really “bungling” in that mess…

The independent counsel's mission was to get to the bottom of the morass (presumably, with the Whitewater land deal, though it ended up with trying to find out the specifics of the BJ Clinton received from Monica Whatsername). Kenneth Starr and his top deputies were not instinctive politicians, and they became caught up in a political war for which they were woefully unprepared and ill-suited. The White House and its allies relentlessly attacked the independent counsel for what they thought were both illegal and unprincipled tactics, like intimidating witnesses and leaking to the press. Mr. Starr has been vindicated in the courts in nearly every instance, and he and his allies were maligned to a degree that will someday be seen as grossly unfair.

Nonetheless, that the Whitewater investigation cost what it did, took as long as it did and meandered so far afield from its original mission is preposterous. The investigation unfolded with an inexorable logic that made sense at every turn, yet lost all sight of the public purpose it was meant to serve. Mr. Starr's failure was not one of logic or law, but of simple common sense.

And as far as “botching health care,” all I can say is that, if Dowd chooses to blame Clinton for trying to mandate employer health insurance through HMO’s, Dowd should take a look at Willard Mitt Romney’s so-called “Massachusetts Plan,” which mandates the same thing. And to acknowledge the failings of so-called “Hillary Care” without acknowledging that it was a starting point for legislation that could have resolved the mess we currently face (as well as the firestorm of criticism from the health care industry, including the so-called “Harry and Louise” ads – more here) is misleading to say the least.

How sad is it that, when you need to look for a minimum of common sense among the regular Times columnists today, you need to pass MoDo and proceed directly to Little Tommy Friedman?