You’re Not Getting A Thing

There’s one thing Democratic mega-fund-raiser Terry McAuliffe wants you to know: He’s The Man. Not just any old extremely successful Washington operator. He’s got the gumption, the go-get-’em, and Goshdarnit, people like him! Especially the once and future presidential couple Bill and Hillary Clinton.That, at any rate, is the spirit of Mr. McAuliffe’s new “What A Party!” (St. Martin’s, 416 pages, $24.95), which is less an autobiography than a sales pitch for the author and for Mrs. Clinton’s coming presidential campaign. Readers expecting an insider memoir in the tradition of Harry McPherson’s epic “A Political Education” about the Johnson administration should put this co-authored (probably heavily co-authored) book back on the shelf.The hyperactive Mr. McAuliffe will likely play a central role in Hillary’s campaign, so it’s little surprise that a book he authors would be something of a networking tool and a publicity vehicle. It took me 15 minutes to count the people Mr. McAuliffe thanks by name in the afterword. There are 603, which must be some kind of record in the annals of ingenious, shameless self-promotion, even for a famous busybody like Mr. McAuliffe.“What a Party!” is mostly partisan red meat for the Democratic base whose message goes something like this: The Democratic Party is the party to trust with America’s future; being in the White House is fun; the Republicans are mean, elitist, and tell a lot of lies; the author can tackle any job thrown his way and loves to work all night, or party all night, as required; Mrs. Clinton would make a great president — did I mention that Mrs. Clinton would make a good president? — and so forth.The single instance of non-Republican bashing has nothing to with Mr. or Mrs. Clinton — it’s targeted at Sentator Kerry, over his campaign’s inexpicable failure to spend down his last $15 million in campaign money in 2004. “Unf—— believeable!” Mr. McAuliffe writes. The Kerry people, of course, shut Mr. McAuliffe out of their plans that election season.Otherwise, the book is a litter of celebrity names, late-night soirées, fund-raising gimmicks and a selection of White House anecdotes — only the favorable ones. At least Mr. McAuliffe is candid about the self-censorship: “This is my book and obviously I’ve done my best to make myself look good.”That’s fair and to be expected in a political memoir, but at some point it’s tedious, or worse. What’s the point of reading a memoir if there’s nothing new of interest? One can put up with 400 pages of preening and self-promotion if there’s a reward at the end. “What a Party!” doesn’t have it, at least not in the big picture. In the absence of anything new, one can only tolerate so much “I love Hillary because of her toughness and her big heart, the qualities that would make her a great president,” or, “I like to think of [Mr.] Clinton as the Babe Ruth of American Presidents: Not only one of the greatest ever, but also a man of remarkably diverse talents.”At least there’s the entertainment value of a big politico’s oblivion as to how others perceive him. This book repeatedly calls Republicans elitists. Then there are passages like this: “Among my more memorable trips were taking my son Jack wild boar hunting in Hungary with a group including Prince Andrew, and wild bird hunting with King Juan Carlos in Spain, who is a terrific guy.”There’s Mr. McAuliffe recounting of his wife’s trip home from the hospital following childbirth — it was interrupted by a fund-raising pitch to a big Democratic donor. Or the somewhat hilarious instance of give-me-this-office telegraphing which makes clear that Mr. McAuliffe is owed an ambassadorship to Great Britain. Bill had planned to appoint him near the end of his second term; Mr. McAuliffe recounts the episode with a level of detail only an aspiring political appointee could savor. But a faltering Democratic convention in Los Angeles which required his rescue efforts prevented him from getting the job.A Washington memoir doesn’t have to be a banal, overtly political act. At least when it is, there’s some entertainment value to gawk at.As for insights on Hillary’s campaign or on Bill, this book proceeds as if to say: Tough! You’re not getting a thing.Mr. Conway is a writer at the Washington Times and a Phillips Foundation journalism fellow.

You’re Not Getting A Thing

You’re Not Getting A Thing

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