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One last Clinton book post

20 comments on One last Clinton book post

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One last Clinton book post

: Many yearn for a Clinton. Look at the lines to get his autograph.

: Update: I just wandered by the Barnes & Noble on Fifth Avenue to catch the scene. It’s raining hard. But people are standing in line and have been for hours just to see Clinton. I followed the line around. It stretches from the entrance on Fifth at 48th Street all the way down 48th to Sixth, up Sixth to 49th, and all the way back 49th to Fifth again: around the entire city block, three of four thick. And those are just the people who got wristbands to let them in; I have no idea how many were turned away. I snapped the shot above with my camera phone.

There were TV crews and drowned-rat photographers and radio and print reporters trying to mine their nuggets for stories. The pictures will tell this story.

: When I was a kid, my mother took my sister and me to Richard Nixon’s signing of My Six Crises (he hadn’t stopped counting yet) at John Wanamaker’s in Philly. No line. Nobody cared.

Compare. Contrast.

: I bought the audio version of My Life this morning and started listening on the way to work. More later. See, I lied. It’s not the last Clinton book post….

20 responses to “One last Clinton book post”

  1. Keith Avatar
    Keith

    It really depends on what your definition of what “One last Clinton book post” is.
    Would’nt you say….

  2. Easycure Avatar
    Easycure

    It’s embarrassing that a former President is even having an autograph session. It shows (for the 300th time) that he has no notion of the honor of having been a President.
    Write a book: Sure! Make money at it: fine. Whore yourself out to sell more books: What an ass.
    He has, in his actions of both present and past, demeaned the Office of President.

  3. Dexter Westbrook Avatar
    Dexter Westbrook

    Your “compare. contrast” line is truly strange, if not stupid.
    Nixon wrote Six Crises before he ran for president, although he had served as Eisenhower’s vice president.
    Let’s do a better comparison. Do you believe people would be lined up at the NYC Barnes & Noble to get a book signed by Fritz Mondale?
    A better one: Would people be lined up to get Richard Nixon to sign his “tell-all” book, three years after he resigned the presidency?

  4. AndyB Avatar
    AndyB

    Signing books is now “whoring” yourself out?
    Maybe I’m missing something. Is he charging for the signature?
    God forbid regular folks would want to actually have the opportunity to meet a former president.
    Perhaps you’re correct – let’s keep the riff-raff out and limit who can actually meet presidents (ex or current, republican or democrat) to the ones who can afford $1000 dinners.
    At least then, we can preserve the dignity of the office of the president.

  5. Jeff Jarvis Avatar
    Jeff Jarvis

    Well, Dexter, what about the lines for Hillary, then? And I’ll bet Gore (hell, even Gore) had longer lines than Nixon did then. Nixon was not a personality people loved the way they do Clinton; that’s the point. As much as some revile him others passionately like him.

  6. Franky Avatar
    Franky

    The poster above who wrote Clinton had no idea of the honour of the office was spot on. I always thought that Clinton saw the presidency as a step on the ladder, now he’ll send out cvs listing his achievements “governor of arkansas, president of us”, and then one deadly day we’ll hear him say how the office of president allowed to him to grow as a person.

  7. letsee Avatar
    letsee

    So – you have a former president who after leaving office builds houses for the homeless, and works for fair elections and peace worldwide.
    You have another former president who brokers a deal to bring low costs AIDS drugs to third world nations.
    You have another former president who seels his services for millions to open doors to corporations in america looking to do business with totalitarian regimes like Saudi Arabia.
    Which one demans the office of the presidency? Which one has a conscience?

  8. carsonfire Avatar
    carsonfire

    Compare, contrast: what President has had this kind of media rollout to begin with? I see his face everywhere this week.
    And it helps that his supporters think of him as their “rock star” (their words, not mine). I’m not a Clinton “hater”, but there’s something kind of screwy about the way he’s idolized. It seems to have more to do with rapt admiration for what he got away with than anything he actually accomplished.
    OK, Compare, contrast: the week of Reagan’s funeral, most of us were talking about how he stood up to the Soviet Union, how he turned the economy around, etc. This week, we’re talking about Monica and “forgiving my dad” (huh? what?), or in other words, mememememememe. Bill’s a soap opera hero.

  9. shark Avatar
    shark

    Wow, a line for Clinton in MANHATTAN.
    Big woop

  10. HH Avatar
    HH

    I guarantee Bush’s memoirs won’t get the same media coverage and when he gets long lines, that won’t get the same coverage either.
    If they roll your book out on 60 Minutes, any schlub will get a long line.

  11. Easycure Avatar
    Easycure

    I said, “Write a book: Sure! Make money at it: fine. Whore yourself out to sell more books: What an ass.”
    It’s OK to write a book. It’s OK to make money at it. I just think it’s beneath The Office for former President of the United States to States to sell himself in that manner. I didn’t say he was wrong for him doing so, it just looks foolish.
    Besides, when Clinton dies, what are they going to say his great accomplishments were? What? Eight years. What did he do?
    All he did was make it easier for terrorists to hit us and repeatedly raise taxes.

  12. bump Avatar
    bump

    None of you seem to understand this situation. Allow me to explain.
    Bill Clinton is supported by unwashed, draft-dodging, pot-smoking, tax and spend, tree-hugging, sandal wearing, liberals. He is responsible for the war, Osama, Saddam, 9-11, the economy, gas prices, skylab, the Kennedy assasination, the Rosenberg trial, mass extinction and continential drift. Anyone who believes otherwise is an unpatriotic ‘merican who supports terrorism.
    I’m glad I could help everyone out with this clarrification.
    [/helpful]

  13. Mara Avatar
    Mara

    Nixon didn’t hire a crowd. From Sunday’s Times:
    P/T CLINTON BOOK TOUR People needed immed Tu 6/22 & Wed 6/ 23, to work at book signing. Cash paid. 888-824-1575
    http://tinyurl.com/29vsy

  14. HH Avatar
    HH

    http://nationalreview.com/york/york200406220926.asp

  15. Kim Avatar
    Kim

    Compare and contrast…..only because I know how much you love Harry Potter Jeff. In NY with mass transit you can see who is reading what. After the last HP book release I saw that book for at least 4 weeks. (men and women, although men tended to remove the cover) How many will be reading Clinton’s on the commute? So far none on the 1&9. I also heard he’d be over at Hue-Man on 125th in Harlem signing books too.

  16. thedragonflies Avatar
    thedragonflies

    Bill’s only claim to fame is fame itself. An inconsequential president admired by people who are apparently easily impressed. Treating the islamofascist war on Western Civilization as a crime suitable for the courts was such a huge mistake, we pay now.

  17. X Avatar
    X

    What about people reading him on the the 4/5/6?
    Although the 1/9 and 2/3 are probably (as you may be implying) the more interesting lines.

  18. Kim Avatar
    Kim

    X – I only rode the 1&9 yesterday and couldn’t comment on other lines.

  19. Angelos Avatar
    Angelos

    bump, you forgot extinction of dinosaurs.

  20. ralph phelan Avatar
    ralph phelan

    “Richard Nixon’s ….
    Compare. Contrast. ”
    Wow! More popular than Nixon. Whoop-de-friggin-do.
    Setting the bar kind of low here, aren’t we?