FROM CNN's "Late Edition" of Nov. 20:
Frank Sesno: On this Sunday before Thanksgiving, it may seem like Bill Clinton doesn't have much to be thankful for. But Bruce Morton found something.
Bruce Morton: Well, the holiday is coming, thank heavens, and kind of a turkey-time last word, Frank. The leaves have turned. The political tides have turned. And all we have to look forward to this week is being officially thankful. The Republicans must be thankful. They won, and they haven't had to experience yet how much harder it is to govern than to oppose. The Democrats who survived must be thankful like the GIs who look up after a #F firefight and realize they're still alive. President Clinton survived. He may spend the next two years running for his life, but he can still run. The Senate must be thankful. Half of it will spend the next two years running for president. Some have started already. Newt Gingrich may be running for emperor.
He might enjoy that.
And then there are the powerful who don't run for re-election, the executive branch appointees in charge of this program or that, the lobbyists who raise money for this program or that. They may keep power after all the vote-seekers are gone. They are one reason why it is harder to govern than to oppose.
And then we might wonder a little about the rest of us. The national mood this year has been angry. "Things aren't working," people tell pollsters. "We're not happy. Cut our taxes. Let us spend more of our money. Crack down on those welfare bums," or maybe those subsidized corn farmers or tobacco growers or the ranchers getting free use of federal land; harder to be thankful, of course, if you're one of the groups getting crunched.
And last of all, we might recall those tough moral first thanksgivers, not asking for more or even less government because they just didn't have much government; just thankful probably that the crops had come in and they weren't at war with the Indians. What in the world would they make of us? High-tech, televised, CD-ROMs and discontented. Maybe we should be thankful we don't know.
Sesno: So, Bruce, what should the public be thankful for?
Morton: The election's over. That's always good news. The new one has started. That's bad news. But you can't have everything is my theory.