No Shortage of Ego

DAVID FRUM, CURRENTLY a National Review Online diarist, and for about two minutes a speechwriter for George W. Bush, rivals the New York Post's John Podhoretz as the country's most obnoxious, self-aggrandizing conservative pundit. (I discount other notables like Ann Coulter, who's reduced herself to as much of a caricature as the left's Eric Alterman.) Frum is a lot more on the ball than Podhoretz-a well-meaning goof who word-processes his columns before processing his thoughts-but reading his articles takes some fortitude.

One recent example was Frum's Dec. 10 NRO entry about Newt Gingrich's place in political history. He writes: "I wrote an essay in 1996 for the Times Literary Supplement... suggesting that Gingrich, not [Bill] Clinton, would be remembered as the most important politician of the 1990s. I took a fair amount of ridicule for the view at the time and even more after Clinton survived impeachment-and Gingrich did not. But in retrospect, the judgment looks right, doesn't it?"

Yes and no. It's more likely that historians of the next generation will look back at the 90s as a strange political interlude between the administrations of Ronald Reagan and the younger Bush; a flashy, trashy period after communism's collapse and before Sept. 11. Unless Hillary Clinton is elected president at some point, her husband won't leave much of a legacy aside from his superb political skills in getting himself elected (although typically, hogging the spotlight, unlike Bush, he had no coattails for other Democrats). The 90s will be remembered more for the technology explosion than any of Clinton's accomplishments. (And what exactly were they, aside from capitulating to the GOP's persistence in reforming welfare?)

Bill Gates' legacy will far outweigh those of both Gingrich and Clinton.

Gingrich's contribution, and it is enormous, is obviously the culmination in 1994 of returning the House of Representatives to Republican control, something he plotted for years before becoming a nationally known figure, beloved and reviled, just like Clinton. But Gingrich's Contract with America, an ingenious gimmick, will ultimately be overshadowed by his quick decline once he tasted the media attention, and all the potential he squandered for the perks of notoriety.

Gingrich was like Clinton in many ways: an oversized personality with an insatiable ego that needed to be constantly fed. A wiser and more forward-thinking politician would've taken that seismic political reversal in '94, stepped out of the limelight and planned for defeating Clinton in 1996, including finding a different candidate than Bob Dole. Gingrich had the power and he wasted it, stupidly telling the press that he melted in the Oval Office in negotiations with Clinton, complaining about a lousy seat on the airplane trip back from Yitzhak Rabin's funeral and making a trip to New Hampshire in '95 to test his presidential potential. Making an issue out of Clinton's Monica Lewinsky saga wasn't bad politics, but in light of his own smarmy personal life, he wasn't the right messenger.

Podhoretz, by the way, jumped the gun on Dec. 12 in predicting that Rudy Giuliani's 2008 White House aspirations won't be damaged by the embarrassing withdrawal of Bernard Kerik as Homeland Security director. Giuliani was Kerik's rabbi in selling the tough guy to the Bush administration, and he'll take some of the blame for the snafu. Podhoretz, while correctly writing that Rudy has bigger problems ahead in securing the GOP nomination-his stances on abortion and gay rights-says, "[B]y the time voters have to make decisions about George W. Bush's successor, the words 'Bernie Kerik' will be the answer to a trivia question that even Ken Jennings might not be able to get right."

It's true that primary voters won't remember Kerik, but Bush (who had an uneasy relationship with Giuliani prior to 9/11) and Karl Rove sure will. And, barring a complete repudiation of Bush by the growing GOP base, his political machine will call the shots in pushing for a successor. Rudy has enough problems just hailing from New York, as compared to Virginia Sen. George Allen or media toy John McCain. His role in the aborted Kerik nomination is a serious setback. On the other hand, Giuliani could do a service to New Yorkers by taking on the insufferable Eliot Spitzer for governor two years from now.

Ouch!

BEST HEADLINE OF the year? My vote goes to the Nov. 26 report by the South African Press Association about mating practices in New Delhi. "Date a Muslim?lose your nose," was the teaser about the right-wing Hindu group Bajrang Dal, warning that Hindu gals who dared to go out with Muslim boys would have their noses chopped off.

Go Short on Mussina

AT DEADLINE, THE Yankees hadn't yet obtained Randy Johnson from the Diamondbacks, tentatively settling on Carl Pavano, who before last season had a lifetime record of 39-50. Gen. George and his subordinates are still hunting for more pitchers, and will sign several, but what I found most interesting reading the local sports pages was just how far Mike Mussina has fallen in stature.

The Times' Murray Chass, a hometown booster not quite in the same category as Steinbrenner shill Michael Kay, is apparently dismayed by the Yanks' activity at the Anaheim MLB meetings. He writes (Dec. 13): "The Yankees last season didn't have one starter who was reliable from start to finish? [Kevin] Brown and [Javier] Vazquez are two of the three returning 2004 starters. The overrated and underachieving Mike Mussina is the third."

Also on Monday, the Daily News' Mike Lupica, easily the most skeptical observer of the Bombers, says that if GM Brian Cashman doesn't bring home the World Series trophy this year he'll be fired. That's a safe bet, but Lupica, who insists he likes Cashman, questions the former whiz kid's ability to land productive pitchers. He writes, "So the Yankees have Carl Pavano and [Jaret] Wright and [Mike] Mussina, who was Cashman's big buy a few years ago and has yet to slip a World Series ring on his finger."

As a Bosox fan, I can only hope that the Yanks have a disastrous (for them) season in 2005, miss out on Johnson and Carlos Beltran, can't get Jason Giambi's contract voided, and see Derek Jeter (who inexplicably won a gold glove for shortstop this year) continue to decline offensively. The pure theater could be riveting, rivaling all those Billy Martin, Reggie Jackson and Steinbrenner public feuds of the late 70s.

Not that Boston GM Theo Epstein signing David Wells, making the team's pitching rotation (assuming they bite the bullet and cave into Pedro Martinez's demands for respect, meaning dough) old enough to play in an old-timer's game, strikes me as the soundest expenditure of John Henry's loot.

Will's Just Pissed About Sammy Sosa

SYNDICATED COLUMNIST AND tv personality George Will is, as his regular readers know, a dedicated baseball fan and also a pal of MLB commissioner Bud Selig. I complain, at regular intervals, about The New Yorker's resident baseball-as-a-metaphor-for-life Roger Angell, still referring to players as "gladiators" and other overblown terms, but he's not a patch on Will for disagreeable writing about the game. Will's Dec. 8 Washington Post column is a thrashing of Barry Bonds and other athletes implicated in the steroids fuss, and he predicts the San Francisco behemoth will eventually be forgotten.

Will writes: "To understand the damage that the steroids scandal is doing to baseball, consider this: Probably sometime late in the 2005 season or early in the next one, Barry Bonds, who already has 703 career home runs, will begin a game with 754, one short of Henry Aaron's record. Would you cross the street to see Bonds hit number 755?"

Of course I would, joining millions of other fans.