The Next-to-the-Last Hurrah

By MARGARET CARLSON

Every politician knows to kiss a baby, but most avoid holding one for very long to escape blame for the inevitable burst of tears. Last Wednesday, after the President graciously accepted the hand-off of Representative Gregory Meeks' rambunctious one-year-old, instantly captivating her with a hybrid game of patty-cake and applause on cue, he seamlessly delivered the rationale for continuing what he had started in near perfect political, historical and emotional pitch. "It takes a long time to turn a country around," he said, after ticking off the achievements of his Administration, and noted, "This is the chance of a lifetime to build the future of our dreams for our children."

Too bad the venue was a dreary hotel conference room in lower Manhattan, preaching to the saved, and not a battleground state, appealing to the undecided. Too bad Al Gore has put his party's most potent weapon in a lockbox. Too bad for Democrats there's a 22nd Amendment that keeps Clinton from running again. In a speech after the debates, Clinton gave a far more lucid rebuttal than Gore--and without the sighing. His job-approval rating surpasses Ronald Reagan's in his final days.

At the tail end of a second term, most Presidents are old or otherwise spent. Clinton thinks he's neither. Sadder for facing the wages of his sin and wiser for having faced down four Congresses, seven budgets and one impeachment, Clinton commands, even from his detractors, a grudging respect. In the past few weeks, the Vice President's reluctance to use this rich resource has risen to a public drama. But Hillary's embrace of her husband down the stretch may put her in the record books: the first First Lady to abdicate the White House to win a Senate seat from a state she had previously only visited as a tourist. Meanwhile, Gore, who won't share a stage with Clinton, finds himself in a dead heat for an office he should take in a walk. The couples were together for the first time since the Democratic Convention, attending the funeral of Governor Mel Carnahan. There were the obligatory air kisses and handshakes, followed by awkward efforts to get away from one another as fast as possible.

The relationship has never recovered from impeachment. Peter Baker reports in his book The Breach how former deputy chief of staff Harold Ickes approached several Democratic Party leaders about urging the President to resign. Gore's resistance to such feelers may have saved the country from an even greater trauma, but it deprived him of sailing into the election as an incumbent. And it left him susceptible to attack, as if Monica had delivered that pizza to him.

It's an upside-down world when your Vice President takes your marital infidelity more personally than your wife does. Friends say the Gores were dumbstruck by Clinton's reckless dalliance. Hillary's long-standing bargain with her husband might not have sanctioned extramarital affairs, but their life together taught her how to survive them. Tipper, who danced so merrily with Hillary at the '92 convention, took to mumbling that Monica was younger than her own daughter and virtually vanished from the scene.

So the Clintons and the Gores trudge separate campaign trails these days. It is something to see Clinton enter a room--upstate New York in Johnson City, where he raised $50,000; at an Elton John benefit concert in midtown Manhattan ($300,000); or hauling in $530,000 in a day of hectic campaigning, as he did last week. At Hofstra University he told an audience chanting "Four more years!" that he was there because it was Hillary's turn now. Instead of retreating to her singsong speech, Hillary picked up her husband's rollicking riffs, asking of her opponent, Rick Lazio, when he says "Eight years is enough," "Where is he living and who is he representing?" She embraces the record Gore can't even bring himself to acknowledge. The Clintons' togetherness peaked at her 53rd birthday party at Roseland ballroom (haul: $2 million), headlined by Cher, Tom Cruise and Robert De Niro. True to form, Clinton wiped away a tear at the height of the festivities, while Hillary feigned surprise with her trademark raised eyebrow and shocked "Ooh" when spotting a familiar face in a room full of them. Yet against all you think you know, when they hugged, there seemed to be something more than naked ambition at work.

It took Reagan's ardent campaigning for his Vice President to push Bush Sr. over the finish line. If Gore gets over his desire to keep the President at a distance, the Happy Warrior is ready to roll. On his way to meet Hillary in Queens, Clinton stopped at the Jackson Hole diner for its renowned Burger Deluxe (peppers, onions and mushrooms with a side of fries), signed a T shirt for a waitress's daughter and posed with everyone from grill man to busboy to fellow patrons. He dropped three quarters in the jukebox, selecting Elvis' Don't Be Cruel, Aretha Franklin's Respect and The House of the Rising Sun. He didn't forget the 20% tip.

Clinton once said that in Al and Hillary he had found spectacular partners. But there is only one lasting union in Clinton's life, as he spends his sunset days in the constant company of the wife who would probably not be running had he not betrayed her. Republicans have warned that if Hillary wins, the most dangerous place in America will be between Senator Clinton and the road to New Hampshire. Bill is at her side. Just as Bush is avenging his father's defeat, Clinton may see his best chance of redeeming himself not with a Gore in the White House but with a Clinton.