Mr. President, You’re No Bill Clinton

Former President Bill Clinton is slated to deliver a prime-time address at the Democratic National Convention. No doubt, he’s going to give one hell of a talk. The man is on his game, enjoying the highest favorable ratings he’s seen since 1993; a robust 66 percent of Americans think highly of the former president.

It’s a politically astute choice by Barack Obama, as “there isn’t anybody on the planet who has a greater perspective on not just the last four years, but the last two decades, than Bill Clinton,” David Axelrod explained to The New York Times. “He can really articulate the choice that is before people.”

He sure can. Or, rather, he sure could, if he felt like it. Problem is that if Clinton actually used his perspective, he’d be giving a rousing convention speech on the benefits of free trade and free markets at the Republican convention. After all, if the man from Hope has taught America one thing, it’s that even a power-abusing letch can be great for prosperity if he just leaves the economy alone.

It’s likely that Clinton never really believed that the era of big government was actually over — or going to be over — or that it should have been over, but it is nearly inconceivable to imagine him telling voters that government was the primary source of progress and prosperity or arguing that the central reason for entrepreneurial success is not smarts or hard work or even luck but rather the yeoman’s work of bureaucrats who cobble together much-needed wind farms and such.

More