President Clinton Back in the White House, Fielding Questions

at an impromptu press conference after meeting privately with Obama.

And Obama, the current president, leaves in the middle of the press conference to attend a Christmas party (or go see his wife, whatever).

And as usual, Drudge Report has the best photo and title:



What was he thinking?

When Obama said he got to go attend another Christmas Party, the only person who did a courtesy giggle was Clinton. But Obama stayed on. As Clinton droned on and on for more than 7 minutes, Obama got increasingly impatient but he continued to stay. 7 minutes 45 seconds into the press conference, President Clinton started to field the questions from the reporters. Obama continued to look on Clinton as if to say "Oh just shut up."

Clinton may be an attention hog, but he is also a much better and more engaging speaker than Obama, and unlike Obama, Clinton knows what he is talking about and he can speak without teleprompters and he can answer questions. When he talks, he talks, not lectures like Obama. He connects with the reporters. It looks like Obama got jealous and left the stage in a huff, after standing next to Clinton for 10 minutes.

Thin-skinned and amateurish, I have to say, not to mention lazy. MSNBC called Obama as he looked on Clinton, after he declared he would have to leave for a party "a demoted beauty queen. "

And Clinton, hardly missing the beat and not even seeing Obama off, continued to field questions on the tight credit situation, party politics, structural deficit, "principled compromise" (sorely lacking ever since Obama became the president) for another 20 minutes. He was clearly enjoying the occasion.

Here's the press conference vid. It is 33-minute long. I ended up watching all of it, and found myself wishing Clinton were at the White House. I suspect many of the reporters there wished the same thing. When he said "I care about my country and want this economy to get going again", it was more believable than the current occupant of the White House.

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"We're gonna either row or sink. I want us to row."

I do too, even though I probably don't agree with any of the Clinton's ideas or positions.

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