LETTERS: HIS LAST DAY IN OFFICE WAS CLASSIC CLINTON

To the editor:

The ending was classic Bill Clinton. The day before he leaves he cops a plea to charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. Never mind that the wording of that final statement was designed to be so obtuse it would obscure what had actually transpired. Actually, the admission was one last lie about past lies, with this most shallow of all presidents trying to cast his perjury in terms of technical inaccuracy.

Then Clinton spent his last morning in office doing his best, it appeared, to steal the thunder from the incoming president. Just before President Bush is inaugurated, Clinton pardons 170 felons, including half-brother Roger, a convicted cocaine dealer.

Now we learn the King of Sleaze may have had other motives. Maybe he hoped his pardons would be lost amid the hoopla of a new president, for among them was a pass for fugitive multimillionaire Marc Rich. One of the allegations against Rich is that he grew wealthier trading with the Iranians when they held our hostages. Such trading was illegal.

And so it ended, at last, with many of us breathing a sigh of relief. Democratic Party pollster Pat Caddell, asked for his reaction to Clinton's final bet of effrontery, summed it up best: "In Arkansas they have a phrase for this kind of person. They call them white trash.'"

Harsh, but a fitting finale regardless.

BILL ZELLMER

Cape Girardeau