The Clintons and Whitewater

 

The Clintons and Whitewater

Peter Schultz

 

                  The Clintons and the Whitewater hearings were much ado about nothing. Clinton supporters say that this was the case because the Clintons were innocent of wrongdoing regarding the Whitewater project. There was nothing they could be charged with, at least not successfully.

 

                  Ironically, though, even if the Clintons could have been successfully charged with contributing to the failure of the Madison Guarantee S&L, and/or profiting from that failure, the results would not have been destabilizing in the sense of undermining the Clinton presidency. Why not? Because the legitimacy of the Clinton presidency did not ultimately depend on the corruption or the lack of corruption of the Clintons. Proving or disproving the Clintons’ culpability was, strictly speaking, irrelevant with regard to the president and the legitimacy of his administration.

 

                  Official proceedings such as congressional hearings are politically stabilizing whatever their outcomes. The Watergate hearings, even though they led to Nixon’s resignation, proved to be stabilizing and were praised as such because “the system worked.” But even if those hearings had exonerated Nixon, the result would have been the same, viz., an illustration of the fact that “the system worked.” Congressional hearings like Watergate and Whitewater, while being seen as a way of exposing political misconduct, which they do, do it in a way that reinforces the status quo, making the exposures of misconduct ultimately irrelevant. As a result, such exposures of culpability do not undermine the system. Ironically, they strengthen the system.

 

                  From this, we may learn something important about politics. Politically speaking, the Whitewater hearings were, in fact, much ado about nothing. Ditto with regard to the Watergate hearings. Exposing Nixon’s culpability and eventually forcing his resignation proved to be politically insignificant insofar as it did not change the prevailing political arrangements. Ditto with regard to Whitewater. As a result, even though some thought the Clintons were “guilty as charged,” such thoughts proved to be irrelevant when it came to judging the Clintons politically.

 

                  In other words, the worth of political systems is to be judged not by the character, the morality of its actors. It is not the morality or immorality of political actors that determines the worth of a political system. Political systems or “regimes” should be judged not by such moral standards but by political standards, e.g., by their justice and their humanity.