Rating: 
Summary: The case against Clinton
Review: Believe it or not, in today's day and age, as our country is fighting a global war on terrorism, there are still those that look back at the era of Clinton for "peace and prosperity" and consider him one of the best presidents ever. Clinton's record is based on myths and spinning and Rich Lowry gets to the bottom of this with a great objective approach and a witty writing style.People give credit to Clinton for the economic boom of the Nineties, but Lowry shows how the economy was already on the upturn prior to Clinton's inaugeration. The budget was balanced because the Republican-controlled Congress wouldn't pass many of his extra programs and truly did limit his spending (if Clinton had his way, Hillary's healthcare initiative would have passed, raising the already great deficit). Welfare and crime? Republican triumphs. Clinton signed welfare reform under pressure and never truly delivered on his campaign promises. As for crime, hardly anything Clinton did can be attributed as the cause for the decrease in crime. Lowry really shows how Clinton was truly a "waffle" as depicted by cartoonists. He never took a strong stand on everything and constantly switched his position on everything (the issue of a balanced budget is a great example). Clinton was absolutely lacking in morality. He did not lie about "just" sex, but truly, it got to deeper fundamental issues. However, in the most powerful section, Lowry exposes Clinton's meager foreign policy and how he let global terrorism spread while refusing to take on the serious issues facing the world. From the Middle East to the few wars to the actual issue of terrorism worldwide and how Clinton refused to take on terrorism and make the world a safer place. Under Clinton, America enjoyed short-lived "peace and prosperity" as a cover, not realizing what was happening underneath. Once September 11th happened, America had to strongly re-examine Clinton and his policies. Who let terrorism run so rampant? Why is the global situation a mess? Who let these corporate crooks, like those at Enron, get away? Why did the economy drop so rapidly after Clinton left office? The answers all point to Clinton and his bitter legacy.
Rating:
Summary: "A Monstrous, World-Shaking Failure"
Review: Looking over the one-star reviews, I get the feeling the people responsible for them haven't read one page of LEGACY and instead choose to attack it with a hysterical desperation that calls their intelligence into question, perhaps their sanity. The very few who attempt to address LEGACY's damning verdict of the Clinton presidency might lose their sanity if they skim through the sources in the 100-plus pages of Notes: Lowry quotes Sydney Blumenthal, Dick Morris, Robert Reich, George Stephanopolous and Hillary Clinton herself (among other Clinton associates). Surely none of them could be accused of being part of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy.
Well, maybe Dick Morris is.
I always felt that history would be unkind to Bill Clinton. He always appeared to be an astoundingly self-centered man, ridiculously reckless with his personal life and unabashedly shameless with his own greed and lies. As a columnist said near the end of his term, "Clinton may not have been the worst president we ever had, but he was certainly the worst person to have ever been president." In Rich Lowry's LEGACY, we see just how terrible the price America's paid for this president's "politics of personal destruction."
This book actually serves as good overview of the Clinton years since many other books exist about each scandal. THE YEAR OF THE RAT by Edward Timperlake & William Triplett and BETRAYAL by Bill Gertz take detailed looks into the campaign finance scandals and Clinton's willingness to please the Chinese. SELLOUT by David P. Schippers (a Democrat who voted for Clinton twice) covers the impeachment mess, as well as Peter Baker's THE BREACH. The late Barbara Olson, who died on 9-11, wrote two books about the Clintons as well as Ann Coulter's HIGH CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS. Even "liberal" authors were appalled: NO ONE LEFT TO LIE TO by Christopher Hitchens and HOW I JOINED THE VAST RIGHT-WING CONSPIRACY (AND FOUND INNER PEACE) by Harry Stein both manage to summon more contempt than your average "Clinton-hater." To quote Lowry: "The administration left the world a more dangerous place. It winked at weapons proliferation around the globe, got diplomatically outdueled by Saddam Hussein, ignored a growing threat from Islamic extremism, coddled the lunatic regime in North Korea, and generally projected an image of American weakness at what should have been a moment of unparalleled strength." (pp. 217-218)
Can any sensible person argue with any of this?
I don't believe that Bill Clinton is evil and that he deliberately hurt his country during his term as president. But I do think he was woefully unqualified for the job and his mistakes have and will haunt us for a very long time. Maybe we'll get to the day when we can laugh at the absurd and ridiculous circus of Hillary throwing lamps, Bill shaking that finger at us while lying his face off, and Monica blubbering on tape about her possible future with the Big Creep.
But, for now, there's just too much fire, smoke and blood.
Too much we're still paying for.
Rating:
Summary: "Just the facts, ma'am"
Review: Wow. Rich Lowry dismantles the Clinton spin and gives us the cold, hard, honest truth about the Clinton "legacy". This is compelling work that is well documented. Clinton fans, I'm sure, will shriek cries of unfair hate speech while burying their collective heads deeper in the sand. This "president", and I use that term loosely, was the worst of the modern era. Our country should hang it's head in shame over electing him not once, but twice. Thank you, Mr. Lowry, for bringing the light of truth to bear on one of the most sordid and shameful occupants of the Oval Office.
Rating:
Summary: What Legacy?
Review: I came [legally] to the United States in May of 1993. To me White House, Clinton, Washington DC, politics, all those were distant terms. I wasn't preoccupied with them I was more concerned with learning the language, and settling in my new country. Secondly, as a nineteen-year-old I was not paying attention to politics, to me it was something that only old people, the ones over fifty, were "indulging" in. In October of 2000 I became a US citizen, and as most new citizens, I voted Democratic. Was it because I was un-educated voter? Or was it because to me Republican [as to many new immigrants] was equal to "Evil?" Most likely both, then came September 11. Few days later, I was happy that I lost in the previous election. I could not put this book down even for a minute. Every single page, every single chapter is filed with a compiling evidence that Clinton should have not been the President of this once beautiful country. Legacy is a proof of what one "inspired" individual can do to a worldwide superpower in as little as eight years. Here is the book that should once and for all prove to the people that "the truth and the facts are the same thing." Legacy by Rich Lowry should be recommended:
To the people who blame George W. for the economy,
To the people who say that the current administration is lying to the nation,
To the people who accuse President Bush of knowing about Sept. 11, before it happened, and not doing anything about it. Read the facts, it's all there, backed by 108 pages of references, similarly interesting, just as the book itself. In the end, I am just blown away, that somebody [Clinton] who did so much damage to this country, is still a free man. Finally, I want to point out that if you are writing the review of the book, please do write about the book, do not attack the author. I believe that would be classified as a genetic fallacy, ad hominem abusive to be exact, which just to refresh everyone's memory goes something like: "...attempt to disparage the character of the person presenting the argument, to deny that person's intelligence, or to question his/her integrity, while not addressing the statements or arguments being presented..." Wow, one learns something new everyday.
Rating: 
Summary: Hindsight can be 20-20
Review: In Legacy, Rich Lowry has done an excellent job of researching the goings-on of the Clinton white house, and avoids the name-calling employed by many other political writers. This is certainly the least hysterical book about Clinton's shortcomings that I've read. One of the criticisms often made of Clinton is that he could have prevented September 11. The problem is that before the events of September 11, most people - myself included - were inclined to think of terrorist groups as criminals, not as military enemies. It took a truly enormous event to get people to change their minds, and send the signal that the law-enforcement perspective - which we had employed for decades - was incorrect. Did Clinton make the wrong decisions about bin Laden? Yes, but there was probably no way to see that from where Clinton stood. Chances are, many of us would have made the same calls he did. It's easy for us, three, five, ten years down the line to look at something that happened during the Clinton administration and say, "if Clinton had done X instead of Y, we wouldn't have problem Z now". This is a problem common to books like this; for the people making the decisions (i.e., Bill Clinton in 1993 after the WTC bombing) the cause-effect relationships are much less clear. Lowry says that Clinton tried to look at all sides of a problem; this is both praise and critique. On the one hand, Clinton was trying to make the best, most informed or most rational decision possible - but on the other hand, it often led to over-analysis and the appearance of dithering - and also to some missed opportunities. Today, however, we have 20-20 hindsight to help us evaluate the cost of those missed opportunities. This isn't to say that 20-20 hindsight analysis of someone's actions isn't of any value - after all, how are we supposed to avoid making mistakes in the future if we don't make an attempt to understand the mistakes of the past?
Rating: 
Summary: Fringe nonsense
Review: There is a fringe faction in our country right now that wants to find someone to blame for everything evil. We used to say the Commies did it. But they're not around any more. You blame the Arabs, the Muslims, or some similar minority, and civil libertarians will--usually rightly--tell you to curb your racist and ethnocentric biases. The prince of darkness? Well, people who take this nonsense seriously think they've found that Satanic manifestation in Bill Clinton. Mind you, as people who know me will attest, I was never a real Clintonphile. In fact, in some ways, Hillary still ticks me off. But, face it, aside from those who would find anything wrong with any Democrat, or anyone prochoice or the like--or the media who make hay off of contrived scandals--most of us were pretty happy in the Clinton era. The economy seemed to be doing pretty well, we were pretty much at peace (i.e., not breaking international laws with fiascos like Grenada, Panama, Bush I's Desert Shame, etc.) Then Clinton was caught with Lewinsky--after Republican hit men spent years trying to frame him for everything short of the St. Valentine's Day massacre. (See "The Hunting of the President" available from Amazon.com.) That opened the door for this type of balderdash. Now, since Clinton's out of office, these fringe loons blame him and his time and administration for everything. We were too weak (because Clinton doesn't have a military background? Dubya simply didn't show up for his and that's CRIMINAL!); because we were weak, 9/11 was allowed to happen. On and on, more accusations of less merit than the ones preceding them. Lil' Richy knows his audience: those loons who'll take this nonsense seriously. Oh, and as some have pointed out, Richy's young, supported the war, but didn't enlist? Then he doesn't have the right to that opinion. Enlist NOW, Richy, or shut up. Oh, and the stuff for which the Clintons were allegedly responsible, most were found to be either baseless (despite the incredible amounts we taxpayers paid for the "investigations!") or they were acquitted. Yet, Richy insists they were guilty. Maybe the courts are too weak too because of Clinton. At least Franken, Moore, et al admit to be as much entertainers as informers. Richy doesn't have the moral capacity to do that. Rather, he neither entertains nor informs. He just pulls the fringe sludge back into the swamp from whence it came. Don't take this stuff seriously. It's a ploy to cover up that bunch of incompetent, inhumane aristocrats who claim today to be an "administration." And I think Richy knows it.
Rating:
Summary: Legacy of Failure
Review: If you are a "Clinton lover", do not read this book. Rich Lowry writes about the failures, fears and falsehoods of the Clinton years in a very straightforward, unapologetic manner, with concrete examples to back up his assertions that the Clinton Legacy is, in effect, a legacy of failure. If you really want to know what set the stage for today's battles with terrorism, Iraq, North Korea, the Middle East, the economy and other current issues, then you must have the knowledge of what took place during the Clinton years, which is clearly spelled out in Lowry's book. It's not pretty! Liberals beware!
Rating:
Summary: Earth Shattering: the biggest blow to Clinton, yet.
Review: In 1996, my first voting year, I was inspired to vote for Bill Clinton due to the good economy, the promises of a stable world, and my teachers endless harping about the great and glorious Bill Clinton. Well, that was when I was 18 and I now see how and why I was decieved by Bill Clinton. Despite the end of the Cold War, Bill Clinton and his McGovernite generation tried to pretend that a real world did not exist and for the most part, succeeded in convincing the United States that war was on the decline and a thing of the past. Unfortunately, where there is instability, violence is usually what follows. Clinton had an opportunity to preserve the nation's security and take a leading role in the world but Clinton squandered that opportunity. 'Legacy' is hardly an entertaining political satire, such as Al Franken and Rush Limbaugh's work, but is a detailed and documented account of the seriousness of Clinton's crimes against the country. The so-called Monicagate was not about Sex as his defenders claim, but rather was about abuse of power and coaching of witnesses...basically, the same thing that Nixon had to resign over. Looking back, I wish Clinton would have listened to Nixon's parting advice: "The 20th Century will largely be remembered as one of war. Only if AMERICA LEADS, will the 21st Century be remembered as one of peace." Unfortunately, Clinton did not lead and the 21st Century is off to a bad start.
Rating:
Summary: Best Clinton Book Out There.
Review: Rich Lowry's book to me was amazing. I am an 18 year old non partisan college student. I was handed this book by a freind who happens to be a left wing who beacuse of this book converted to a republican. After reading this book I am digusted at the fact that this President even got a 2nd term. Rich doesnt just make a statement and not back it up. He backs his facts up with multiple sources and evidence. I will now not ever vote for a democrat in my lifetime. thank you mr. lowry.
Rating:
Summary: Clinton's real Legacy
Review: While the picture of the book on Amazon does not have the A in legacy in red, my copy did. I think this is the real legacy of the Clinton administration, the Big Red A for Adultry. Why? As the author points out sex was the only thing that Clinton would take risks for. Sex with as the author points out Clinton said was with "hundreds of women". Clinton could not bring himself to risk the presidency, and his power for the sake of the people of the US. So the acts of terriorism, either went unanswered as in the attack on the USS Cole, or a minimal response like the bombings of two embassies with several ineffective cruise missle strikes. He was impotent! He was not up to taking the risk.... only with sex was he ready to take the risk.
A great book! A well thought out book! Example after example of the ineffectiveness of the Clinton administration that directly led to 9/11, the lack of peace in the Middle East and the increase back to prominance of Sadam. You will have little question if you read this book with an open mind, that Clinton had to be one of the poorest presidents this country has ever had.
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