Bill Clinton's Angry Confrontation With Voter (VIDEO)

[Amerigo Vespucci]

From "CBS News RAW": While campaigning in Fayetteville, W.Va., Bill Clinton argued with an audience member over claims made by Hillary Clinton that she improved health care during his administration.

Video clip HERE: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/09/bill-clintons-angry-confr_n_100972.html

[CreekDog]

1. they didn't deliver, but Hillary DID try

I didn't hear what the lady in the audience was yelling, but what she said in interview afterwards was totally wrong.

[DefenseLawyer]

8. What I saw

In the interview afterward was the woman saying, to paraphrase, that the Hillary and the administration tried to get their healthcare plan passed, they failed miserably, and from that point on they never again even attempted to try again, and from that point on we never saw Hillary have a public role in any policy initiatives, much less on health care. I'd have to say that is my memory of it as well.

on edit: I looked at it again and she said "I remember she campaigned like crazy for healthcare". If she was referring to their attempt at reform as her "campaign" then I think she is right that they never tried again. If she is saying they campaigned to get elected and then did nothing, well as Hillary would say, she is saying something that I know not to be the case.

[CreekDog]

12. they totally bailed on it after 1994, that's true

they only meekly supported incremental ideas afterwards.

[karynnj]

15. The woman is wrong, but wasn't totally wrong

She is saying that she didn't hear Hillary make the case for health care. The fact is that HRC clearly worked hard on health care, but much of it was behind closed doors. You could argue that a key mistake was not including Congress more in the process - rather than shutting them out as well. However, even had she done that there would still have been little seen by the public at large. (How many people would have watched hearings of Kennedy's HELP committee in 1993.

As it was HRC DID go to Congress and introduce the plan she had and it was televised and very very widely reported on. There never was a bill that came out of it and HRC did NOT go to the American people with a series of rallies, speeches etc. trying to put pressure on Congress to do something they didn't want to do. The woman is clearly speaking of HRC using her popularity, position as First Lady and visibility to actively and conspicuously lobby for health care. I think it was BILL's decision not to actually introduce a bill and fight for it. (from reading both their autobiographies) Rather than responding in anger to the woman - he could have spoke of HIS decision that it could not be done and that HRC could NOT have unilaterally continued to fight for it.

The later healthcare accomplishments came out of the Senate and - at least on S-CHIP she joined a group of former First Ladies who lent their names to efforts in support of it and HRC lobbied her husband to keep it in the bill. If you think that accomplishment was important to Bill - you might be surprised by the index in his book. (Not to mention in the bizzare 2 pages discussing the Weld/Kerry race - he doesn't mention as a reason to support Kerry, who was already the Democratic nominee months before the editting ended, - that Kerry and Kennedy had written the precursor bill to S-CHIP based on a program in MA passed over Weld's veto.

[CreekDog]

17. well i remember Hillary speaking and chairing semi-public meetings of her task force

yes, her mishandling of health care reform is the stuff of legend, but she was out there doing it.

[karynnj]

22. That's exactly what I was referring to and said the meeting was

very well covered - it was before the Senate. That is why I said the woman was wrong - but I said not totally wrong as it seemed that what she expected and wanted was an extraordinary, activist, take it to the people - get them to tell their Congressmen to support this effort with rallies around the country. A congressional hearing - much as I love watching them - is NOT a public appeal.

In reality, a First Lady could have done that ONLY with the encouragement and support of the President - and certainly not when he decided not to even have the bill go to the floor of the Senate.

[gateley]

2. This has been posted and I responded then and will now --

that this woman is wrong.

She says that Hillary didn't work on Health Care and that's just not true. She did. Unfortunately she did it behind closed doors and didn't consult with enough people, and presented us with a fait accompli which didn't work, but it's unfair to say she didn't work on the issue.

And Hillary has never claimed she improved health care during Bill's administration -- she admits the effort was a failure.

And, required disclaimer these days, I'm an Obama supporter.

[CreekDog]

9. I support Obama too, and I agree with you

And the Clintons can rightly claim credit for supporting SCHIP expansion --not them alone, but they deserve credit nonetheless.

For all the Clinton faults, the 1990's were a hell of a lot better with them in charge.

[closeupready]

3. But the woman is correct that they promised they would reform health care, and they didn't deliver.

That is absolutely 100% true. They did indeed try, but they also did indeed fail.

[doc03]

6. As could Obama if he doesn't get an overwhelming

majority in the House and Senate.

[CreekDog]

10. 100% true, but it's only 50% of what she said

and the other half was wrong.

[closeupready]

19. I wasn't counting the wrong 50% in my 100% which was true.

:rofl:

[CreekDog]

21. i know, and i gave you credit for that

i no longer know what i am talking about. :rofl:

[doc03]

4. You know I think Hillary would be ahead if she just told

Bill to go chase after some interns and stay out of her election. Sometimes I wonder if maybe he has intentionally torpedoed her campaign for fear if she is elected she would be a better President than him. He could have gone down as one of the greats if he could have controlled his zipper.

[kevinbgoode]

11. I agree. . .

I think he's done more harm than good. It's quite telling that with a former President campaigning, a former First Lady campaigning, and a daughter with automatic name recognition, this campaign has struggled.

[bluetrain]

5. Good for him. /nt

[tpsbmam]

7. Gotta side with Bill on this one....

They (she) went about the health care fight wrong (IMO) but she did work hard on it. And I don't care that he argued with the audience member -- he had every right to do that. I didn't find his response at all inappropriate.

[CreekDog]

13. i agree, and though he was argumentative, he was not disrepectful to her

:hi:

[invictus]

14. Red-faced, lying, finger-in-the-eye Bill ... a very familiar sight.

Remember this whopper: "I did not have sexual relations with THAT woman, Ms. Lewinsky." Does anyone actually want that creep back in the White House?

[CreekDog]

16. i have an issue with one random person in large audience appropriating this kind of event

...for themselves.

lots of people came to see the former president speak and for one person to interrupt just seems bad to me. it's not like she was confronting him with evidence he killed somebody.

when I saw Bill Clinton speak in 2000 in Oakland, over 10,000 were gathered in the plaza to hear him speak and a bunch (well, 3 or 4) of Nader supporters erupted, interrupted and made it hard for all of us to hear and when we booed them and glared at them, they shut up. But that kind of thing is just wrong. We didn't go to hear them and as Democrats, we were constantly hearing from them.

It's bad form to say the least.

[tularetom]

18. It isn't so much whether the woman was right or wrong

The red faced finger pointing tirade by clinton is what people are going to remember about this confrontation. And it is what people will remember about his role in this campaign.

He appears to have lost his dignity and his performances have been unseemly.

He's taking this way too personal.

[Alcibiades]

20. They did fight for it

But not nearly as hard as Clinton has for this nomination. It was more like "Oh well, the insurance industry has run some commercials, time to give up now."

I wish they had fought as hard for health care as she's fought for this nomination. I would have voted for a Clinton again, hands down, no problem.