Clinton and Dole: Such Good Friends

— -- It seems like just yesterday that President Clinton and former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole were duking it out on the campaign trail, but now the two former rivals can’t seem to get enough of each other.

By Josh GersteinABCNEWS.comW A S H I N G T O N, July 3 — It seems like just yesterday that Sen. Bob Dole was denouncing President Clinton as “power hungry” and accusing him of presiding over “endless violations of public trust.”

But now the acerbic ex-Senator and his one-time Democratic opponent can’t seem to get enough of each other’s company. In the last few weeks, Dole has turned up at four different events where Clinton was the main attraction. Some of these encounters have been at the most unlikely venues. In fact, two have been at fundraisers for Democratic candidates.

Electorally, Dole proved no match for Clinton. But as the two have shared the stage more recently, it’s clear that when it comes to deadpan wit, the senator still holds the upper hand.

The Great Viagra Debate

Earlier last month, the two men found themselves at a tribute to Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., at a Washington hotel. The president was just back from a weeklong trip to Europe and Dole managed to slip in this backhanded slap at Clinton’s globetrotting.

“I want to congratulate you for having this on a night when the president is visiting the United States,” Dole quipped.

Dole, who has spent some of his time since 1996 making TV commercials, also mentioned one of the products he has endorsed.

“I’m told a Viagra side effect for some men in their fifties is that their hair turns gray,” Dole said before turning to look directly at the gray-haired Clinton. The room broke up with howls of laughter.

A short time later, Mr. Clinton returned fire. “If it weren’t for me, he’d be just like all us gray-haired 50-year-olds, he’d have to pay for his Viagra,” Clinton declared.

Just three nights later, Dole and Clinton found themselves together again. This time, it was at a fundraiser for District of Columbia Mayor Anthony Williams. The mayor is a Democrat but the event drew a number of prominent Republicans, including Dole and his 1996 runningmate, Jack Kemp. No new quips were traded, at least while reporters were present. Clinton did say he found the joke about his foreign travel pretty funny. “I took it pretty well considering I was jet lagged,” he said.

The relationship between the former senate majority leader and the president is not all about jokes and jabs. Clinton broke the ice with Dole soon after the election by awarding him the nation’s highest civilian honor, the presidential medal of freedom, at a White House ceremony. The president also tapped Dole to oversee a U.S. effort to look into the fate of people who disappeared during the fighting in the former Yugoslavia.

Dole has also called in a few chits, getting Clinton to schedule a White House tribute to those supporting a new memorial for World War II veterans on the national mall in Washington, D.C. Clinton not only hosted the fundraisers and donors for the memorial, but said he’d be willing to bend the rules to bring in some more cash for the project. “I know this violates some law the counsel’s office gave me, but we still need a little more money. So somebody else is going to have to give,” the president told the crowd gathered in the East Room. Some who remember Dole’s attacks on Clinton’s ethics found their heads spinning.

Dole says he and Clinton can spend so much time together now because he long ago came to terms with his loss and the president’s victory.

“I decided I was not going to be a Clinton critic for four years,” Dole said Thursday in the White House driveway. “That’s the way it worked and that’s the way it should work.”

The two men still don’t seem entirely at ease with one another, but the obvious thaw in their relationship had the lame-duck president talking last week about joining forces with his former rival. “When we get out of here, I’d like to make commercials with you,” the president told Dole. “I’ll be your straight man.”

Polling Chutzpah

In a new riff he has begun to work into his speeches, President Clinton expresses his outrage over Republicans’ use of — brace yourselves — polling. On six different occasions in recent days, he has denounced the GOP for having pollsters advise them on what language to use in the debate over prescription drugs.

“They’re so afraid of this prescription drug issue they have hired pollsters to tell them what words and phrases they should use to convince you that they’re for giving affordable prescription drugs to our seniors, even though they’re not,” Clinton said at a fundraiser in Washington last week.

In various appearances, the president has called the practice “bizarre” and “astonishing.” Clinton also drew on his own polling expertise to explain further. “This is not what you normally hire a pollster for. At least, I don’t. Normally, you hire a pollster to figure out how you’re doing in an election, whether what you believe in is flying, and not to change your positions, but to change your campaign, emphasize other issues some.” On another occasion, he declared, “I never saw anything like it in my life.”

Some may have trouble getting into as much of a lather about this as the president has. Even if one accepts his central assumption that the GOP really doesn’t want to offer seniors a serious prescription drug plan, the president is a very imperfect messenger to be criticzing others for misusing polling. After all, wasn’t it Clinton who sought poll numbers on such issues as whether he should tell the truth about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky? And what about the poll on taken in 1996 on where he should vacation so as to please the greatest number of voters? It’s hard to tell if the president is being completely sincere in his expressions of surprise or if he is shocked in the same way Claude Rains was in Casablanca. But this is one argument Clinton may want to consider dropping from his road repertoire.

Explosive Language

It’s probably not yet time to call the ATF, but the president seems to be suffering from a strange obsession with dynamite. The first public indication of this was at a Democratic Leadeship Council event in San Jose in April. Mr. Clinton told that group a joke involving a man who was so upset with his friend hitting him in the pocket that he took the cigars out of the pocket and put dynamite in their place. (You had to be there.)

At another event last week, he turned again to explosives to make his point. “A lot of people act like … you could take dynamite to the New York Stock Exchange and it wouldn’t mess it up,” he told a Democratic gathering in D.C. And at two other events, Mr. Clinton said Republicans are arguing that the economy is rolling along so nicely that even an explosive charge couldn’t derail it. “They think this economy is rocking along so well, you couldn’t mess it up with a case of dynamite,” the president told a group of union workers meeting in Philadelphia.

He has also used a similar but unfortunate metaphor to describe two members of Congress whose fundraisers he attended recently. A fundraiser for a California congresswoman prompted this odd compliment: “You probably couldn’t beat Ellen Tauscher with a stick of dynamite out there.” An event at the Trump Tower brought forth this comment about New York Congressman Ed Towns: “You’re here for him and we couldn’t beat him with a stick of dynamite with this one.” Not sure exactly what he’s getting