BILL CLINTON: SELF-PRESERVATION AT ALL COSTS

The most delicious moment of last weekend's extraordinary events in Washington came following the stunning announcement by Speaker-designate Bob Livingston of Louisiana. Echoed by White House spokesmen, and summoning their most sincere tones, Democrat after House Democrat urged Livingston to reverse course and not to resign from the House of Representatives.

Well, of course. To be sure, these ferocious partisans didn't like the contrast with the thoroughly dishonorable president their party has foisted on the country. These Democrats had just been stunned by an extraordinary act of personal sacrifice, a flawed man admitting his error and selflessly stepping aside in the larger interest of his party, his House and his nation. And then come these pleas against resignation from the folks who, just minutes before, had been loudly clamoring for the same Mr. Livingston -- to resign. What a laugh.

The Wall Street Journal offered this devastating summation:

President Clinton "has used any person or institution of this government to save him from his reckless follies and crimes. He let his lawyer play the fool, his secretary the procurer and his secretary of state the false pleader. This past weekend he used the whole Democratic Party as his protectors, smiling on the White House lawn while his vice president called him `one of our greatest presidents,' hugging Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, who had just gone down fighting for a censure resolution calling for the president's civil and criminal prosecution on leaving office."

This harsh judgment isn't disputed by the president's defenders. It is undisputed even by the high-price lawyers who presented not a single fact witness in his defense, preferring instead haughty Ivy League law professors to lecture the elected representatives in one of the most arrogant displays in American history.

And what of last week's four-day action against Iraq, the first in American history ("Operation Desert Fox") to bear the same name as the famous Nazi general of World War II? It is a measure of the dishonor that stains the office of Washington and Jefferson, of Lincoln and Roosevelt, that Mr. Clinton was reduced to relying on his secretary of defense and joint chiefs chairman to vouch for his motives and timing.

Let's be clear: That military action is justified against the villainous Saddam Hussein isn't disputed by serious observers. But such was the case last month, last summer and last year, for that matter. In all these cases and more, this president stood down, placing faith in a feckless United Nations inspection process that now appears truly a dead letter. Recall that last August, three days after the president's perjurious grand jury testimony, this president ordered the infamous attack on terrorist installations in Afghanistan and the Sudan. Then, for the next four months, essentially no one in this administration had anything to say about the continuing war against international terror. This isn't how serious administrations conduct the business of the greatest power on earth.

By late Saturday, the Clinton White House issued the following statement from the only elected president ever to be impeached: "We must stop the politics of personal destruction. We must get rid of the poisonous venom of excessive partisanship, obsessive animosity and uncontrolled anger." This from the man who unleashed James Carville to make "war" -- his word -- on a prosecutor going about the lawful duties of his office. (Carville spent Sunday morning's precious TV time re-issuing these ugly threats against anyone who stands in the president's way.) This from the president who hired private investigators to trash every person who dares criticize the Clintons -- an operation that looks a lot like the Nixon-era plumbers.

In all this, Mr. Clinton has earned his place in history, a unique niche where he has literally written his own name in dishonor. Congratulations to every member of Congress who displayed the character and fortitude to defy the polls and to vote for impeachment.