Words to Live By Since 1993 A SPIFF Publication Vol. 2, No. 22 If you aren't the lead dog, the view never changes. Let's Hear It for Kentucky! In the latest of a long string of victories since President Clinton and Bill took office, Republican Ron Lewis won the special election to fill the vacancy in Kentucky's 2nd Congressional District. The seat was vacated by the passing of ex-posterboy for term limits, William Natcher. The victory was surprising because the second District had been held by a lib for 120 years, (Most of it by Natcher) and Lewis is a bigoted, right-wing, Christian book store owner. The national libs were stunned that a good guy such as Lewis' opponent, Joe Prather, could lose to a bigoted, right-wing, Christian book store owner. After all, Prather was a former chairman of the Democrat Party, and had cut a huge number of backroom deals in the state capitol. In other words, he is a perfect Democrat. The response from Washington was typical. President Clinton had no comment. Bill had no comment. Owl Gore had no comment. The only comment came from National Lib Chairman David Wilhelm. His comment was that the GOP and right-wing groups conspired to get Lewis elected. You see, when lib groups join together for a cause, it's beautiful. When Republicans and Conservatives do the same thing, it's a conspiracy. How did Lewis really win? He won because he tied his opponent directly to President Clinton and Bill. Lewis declared from day one of his campaign that this election would be a referendum on Clinton policy. Clinton policy lost. Take note, all of you candidates out there. The voters of Kentucky have taught you a valuable lesson. Stand by your principles and convictions and you win. Calgon, Take Me Away! Wednesday of last week was one of those days that we here at Spiff just like to sit back and enjoy. Let's review what happened: The fallout from the Lewis win in Kentucky was just beginning, Bill Clinton had to trudge, once again, up to Capitol Hill to beg for passage of the Clinton Comprehensive Care Plan (CCCP), and the administration (led by President Clinton) began backing away from Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski at light speed. Why? Isn't this the same fellow that Bill Clinton accompanied to Chicago to support in his Democrat primary just last month? Didn't Bill say that the voters of Chicago should return Rosty to Washington because he is indispensable to the cause of socializing medicine? My, how times have changed! It has now become apparent that Rosty's career is over as chairman of the committee that writes (read "raises") our nation's tax policy. Word out of Washington is that he may face jail time even if he cops a plea. It is nice to see someone who so blatantly abuses his office finally get what's coming to him. As you may know, Rosty has been implicated in charges of fraud and embezzlement at the House Bank, the House Post Office, and now the House Stationery Store. Employees that have already pleaded guilty to assisting Rosty in exchanging stamps for money, have fingered him in court testimony. The noose is tightening. So, now that Rosty is on the ropes, where is the administration that lavished such praise on him only a month ago? President Clinton, speaking to reporters on Wednesday, said that the Congress would have to deal with the loss, but it would not hamper the march toward government control of health care. Such loyalty is touching. Peking Chicken A few weeks ago, we laid out the options available to President Clinton and Bill in the touchy area of trade status with China. As we have seen countless times before, Bill managed to back himself into an awkward corner by saying that he would link the continuation of China's Most Favored Nation trading status to improvement of that nation's record on human rights. We honestly don't know if he believed that threats from the mighty and terrifying Bill Clinton would really have any impact at all on how China treats its people. We do know that we never thought it would. The choices were simple; do not renew MFN and lose all hope of constructive dialogue with the only nation that has any influence over the renegade government of North Korea. Or, Bill could have (again) swallowed his pride, showed his foreign policy to be a game of chicken that we always lose, and renewed MFN. Well, guess what he chose. We are (again) embarrassed to report that we have threatened, blustered, bluffed, and backed down. Why do we have to keep talking about this? Do these people have any idea what they are doing? We got into this mess because Bill was trying to show us how knowledgeable he was on foreign policy during the 1992 campaign. He decided to try to score a few points on President Bush by claiming that he had a better policy for China than Bush's heartless approach of renewing MFN status for China. As is the case with so many of the administration's other promises, and to Bill's great annoyance, the people remembered his promises. (Middle class tax cut anyone?) When he arrived in Washington, the more-liberal-than-him liberals demanded that he follow through. So, he tried to implement his ill-conceived, not-thought-out, play-to-the-cameras foreign policy and we now have the worst relations with China since President Nixon opened a dialog twenty years ago. Thank you Bill! You've seen it all before, in Bosnia, Somalia, Haiti, North Korea, and a host of other places. We are now getting reports that the Bosnian Serbs are closing in on the town of Goradze, in preparation to shell that helpless town again. But, President Clinton and Bill still refuse to break the arms embargo and allow the Bosnians to defend themselves. Bill announced three weeks ago that we have again changed our policy in Haiti, but we have not put the new policy into effect. We don't know where all of this will lead, but we have to be concerned and disturbed by this game of chicken that we play with each of these other countries. America always seems to be the one that turns away at the last minute. If we ever do clash with a country that poses a strong security threat, will we turn away again? Quote of the weak: "If government doesn't work, it ought to be the Democrats who fix it because Democrats invented government in the first place." Eleanor Holmes Norton Quote of the strong: "Conservatives must recapture the spirit of 1980, when we sought not to blur, but to sharpen our differences with those in power." Pat Buchanan Words to Live By is published every week at about this time by Spiff. You can send a fax to us here in the Spiff Executive Plaza, towering over beautiful downtown Donelson, Tennessee at 615-883-0435.