Tabloid trash: Bill Clinton's mounting problems.

• Author: Hazlett, Thomas W.

Braced by polls indicating that 57 percent of the American people will believe anything President Clinton chooses to tell them, provided he looks right into the camera and clenches his jaw a little bit, the White House elected to deal with the "Flytrap" affair (Slate's contest-winning name) by hunkering deeper into denial than O.J. The instant popularity of this approach was revealed in a groundswell for the libertarian view that Bill Clinton's moral choices are between him, the Missus, and his Maker.

We've been watching the prez for going on six years now, and the idea that he regards personal characteristics as off-limits for public discourse is a makeover on the order of Geraldo's becoming a serious newsman. Bill's private life is all he has ever offered up for electoral consumption. He rose to the highest office in the land not on any recognizable policy platform or coherent philosophy of government but on the emotive yelp, "I feel your pain." He billed himself as "The Comeback Kid," the triumphant son of a broken home.

In 1992 he proudly hurled his married life to center stage with the offer: "Buy one, get one free." He boasted to 60 Minutes. "If a man's got sense enough to over-marry, it's...evidence he might be good enough" to be elected president. Please, Governor Clinton - not so personal!

Aw shucks - soccer Morns just ate it up. Clintonites took notes. The subtext of each carefully crafted soundbite, speech, gesture, and photo op in the Clinton White House has been: "I care." This was a Bushism - but poor George, a similarly philosophy-less president, could never even remember the price of a quart of low-fat. Out of touch is the opposite of I care, and we now know, perhaps, how out of touch Mr. Clinton hasn't been.

Is it mere coincidence that, in the era of Bill Clinton, Jerry Springer has surpassed Oprah in the daytime talk ratings war? Springer scours the nation for the most sensational trash America has to offer, sets them up in gaseous conflict, strikes a match - and is blown back in mock terror as women pummel women, women pummel men, men pummel men, men pummel women. An awesome spectacle to behold; H.L. Mencken referred to such freak shows as the American's "libido for the ugly."

You've heard of instant gratification. Think of Springer as instant sanctification. Bounding out of the violence is always a moral, and salvation is never more than a commercial break away. No matter his failings (or high crimes and misdemeanors), a...