Interview With Former President Bill Clinton
BLITZER: All right. Let's dig deeper now about my interview with the former president, Bill Clinton. Joining us, our CNN chief political analyst, Gloria Borger, and our senior political analyst, Ron Brownstein. He's a columnist for the "National Journal." Gloria, does it sound like Bill Clinton -- I think it does -- would have embraced the Simpson-Bowles Deficit Commission plan. The Obama White House failed to endorse it, as you know.</s>GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: I think it does. If you read between the lines in your interview, Wolf, it sure sounds to me like Bill Clinton liked a lot about the Simpson-Bowles plan, not the least of which was its plan to fix Social Security over an extended period of time. And I think, knowing Bill Clinton's politics as we all do, that this would have appealed to him, because it would have allowed him to tackle an entitlement problem without having to do it very quickly or all at once. And so you know, I've said previously lots of other people have said that, perhaps looking back on it, Barack Obama made a mistake by not embracing the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction plan in his State of the Union last January. I wonder whether Bill Clinton would have endorsed it.</s>BLITZER: Well, that raises a question, Ron, what can, what should President Obama learn from Bill Clinton, the way he negotiated? He had Newt Gingrich, the speaker of the House. Those -- you remember those days.</s>RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Absolutely. First of all in terms of Simpson-Bowles, Obama may have made a tactical choice not to embrace it, which we'll kind of look bad on whether that was a mistake or not. In the end, I think there's no question if John Boehner were to have given him Simpson-Bowles in July and August when they were negotiating, I think he would have taken it in a heartbeat at that point. But the lesson from Bill Clinton is really that there is both compromise and confrontation as part of this process. If you remember, Bill Clinton ultimately reached a very productive balanced budget deal with the Republicans in 1997 that produced three years of surplus and also created the Children's Health Insurance Program, did a lot of good things.</s>BLITZER: Welfare reform.</s>BROWNSTEIN: But that only came after a very sustained conflict in '95 and '96 that led to two government shutdowns. And, of course, his re-election in 1996. So you could argue in some extent, even though Obama has moved toward a more confrontational position, that does not preclude, if he does win re-election and Republicans win control of Congress, then you could see 2013 as an analog to 1997, where both sides realize the voters have spoken, the voters have divided control, and they feel they have to find an agreement at that point.</s>BLITZER: Gloria, what about that? Are there other lessons that this president should be learning from Clinton?</s>BORGER: Well, there are. I mean , I really agree with Ron, though. Because I think what the president is saying is, look, I may have to be more confrontational in order to get reelected. Once I'm reelected, then I can do all of these other things. But the voters, there are a couple of other lessons. One is the voters like to see some kind of accomplishment, some kind of achievement. Two, the base of your party, when it decides it has nowhere else to go, will probably return to you, which is what happened to Bill Clinton. And I also think that he can take a look at Clinton's success in portraying the opposition as too radical. That worked for him. And I think we see Barack Obama getting there. And as we get closer to the election, I believe we will hear the word "extremist" used again and again and again.</s>BROWNSTEIN: Yes. One very -- one very big difference. Clinton was in a stronger political position as '96 went on...</s>BORGER: Absolutely. Right.</s>BROWNSTEIN: ... than Obama is, largely because the economy was recovering. And because Clinton was so strong, that was why the Senate Republicans, Trent Lott in particular, made a decision to make a series of deals with Clinton, first on welfare reform, minimum wage and health care before the election, and of course, in '97 on the budget after the election. They did it because they felt they needed to show accomplishments to maintain their Senate majority. Republicans now, I think, feel that Obama is in a weakened position. I think there will be enormous pressure on the congressional leadership not to throw him any life lines by providing him any accomplishments of significance between now and November 2012. And that's a very, very different...</s>BLITZER: And Gloria, you remember, because all of us covered Bill Clinton, there was something called triangulation. I'm not seeing a whole lot of Obama triangulation. Remind our viewers how Clinton used that very successfully to get himself reelected in 1997, the first year of his second term.</s>BORGER: Well, he made deals with -- deals with Republicans in Congress and at the expense, lots of Democrats thought at their own expense. So this was -- Bill Clinton was somebody who was -- who was cutting deals. But let me -- let me add one other thing, which is the that Bill Clinton had an easier case to make. I think this follows up on Ron's point when he was running for re-election. Because he could say look the jobs are heading in the right direction. The unemployment rate is heading in the right direction. Barack Obama right now has only the case to make that "things would have been worse if I hadn't done what I've done." He tried that argument in the midterm elections. The Democrats tried it in 2010. It didn't work so well for them, because you know, saying that things would have been worse is not a very convincing argument to make to the American public. And that's where Barack Obama could use a little bit of Bill Clinton in him, because if anybody could make that argument, it would be Bill Clinton because he's such a great salesman. And I think Barack Obama has a lot to learn from that, because his argument is going to be pretty tough if unemployment remains over 9 percent.</s>BLITZER: I'm going to find out if President Obama is calling former Bill Clinton for some advice. I suspect not. But maybe that will happen. Ron, thanks very much. Gloria, thanks to you, as well. More news coming up including a major typhoon. It's now barreling down on Japan. We have details of what authorities are urging more than 1 million people to do. They simply need to get out of the storm's way. And what's the most you would pay for a bottle of scotch? The most expensive bottle ever -- ever has just been sold. We're going to tell you how much it costs. Stay with us.