Photo-op patriotism: President Bush's artfully choreographed speech aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln was a brazen propaganda stunt worthy of Bill Clinton. (Executive Branch).

Robert "Buzz" Patterson, a retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force, served in the Clinton White House as the military aide in charge of the nuclear "football"--a briefcase containing the launch codes for our nation's nuclear arsenal. Patterson was thus given the dubious privilege of observing Bill Clinton and his staff in unguarded moments when what passed for their character was clearly revealed. As Patterson's memoir Dereliction of Duty reveals, this spectacle was somewhat less than edifying. Summarizing the attitude of Clinton and his handlers, Patterson observes: "This presidency was all about them."

Many observers of Bill Clinton's presidency concluded that Clinton was an individual driven entirely by ego, appetite, and personal ambition. Those traits were nauseatingly on display during Clinton's notorious "victory walk" before his speech at the 2000 Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. In this narcissistic exercise, the television camera followed Clinton during what seemed an endless swagger through the bowels of the Staples Center, as on-screen captions listed his supposed achievements.

Such self-aggrandizing spectacles were quite common during the Clinton era, and many of them used the military as props. In late 1995, for instance, Clinton staged a photo-op on the White House lawn in which he strutted at the head of a group of GIs who had recently returned from Bosnia. In his book, Patterson describes a White House attempt to stage an even more ambitious photo-op during the November 1996 Asian Pacific Economic Conference in the Philippines.

As Patterson recounts the event, a young White House political staff member, a "Cecil B. DeMille type when it came to orchestrating events' requested that the U.S. Navy divert a battle group from Australia into Manila Bay. "Then ... we could helicopter the president out for a quick 'grin and grip' with the sailors on the flight deck," enthused the political hack. "It would be awesome."

Since Patterson was the military aide in charge of arranging the logistics for Clinton's visit to the Philippines, it fell to him to shoot down the young aide's idea. "I was finally able to convince him that whatever political hay he might make through the resulting CNN sound bites would be greatly outweighed by the cost in dollars and common sense," Patterson relates. "His dreams dashed, slump-shouldered and with a defeated look on his face, he agreed."

That unnamed Clinton flunky can take a measure of satisfaction knowing that his proposal--like many other dubious Clinton-era initiatives--has been acted on by the Bush administration. President Bush's May 1st visit to the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, ostensibly to deliver a post-war speech, was essentially a more grandiose version of the abortive Clinton photo-op in the Philippines.

Needless Delay