All of a sudden it seems to be over. He has been off the screen, out of the headlines, not even in my mind, for almost a week now. I feel a bit like I felt when I gave up smoking many years ago. Hey, I can do without it. But now I am nagged by another question.
Time is cruel to ex-leaders.
Today, and not before time, Clinton is in the past. It is George Bush who commands the airwaves and the daily attention of the media today, as Clinton did for so long. If the Democrats have a figurehead today, it is not Clinton and it certainly is not Al Gore, who has disappeared with far greater grace than his former boss. As a result, right now, the effective leader of the party is Tom Daschle. If you want a sign that things are moving on, then this week's appearance of an article in the New Republic magazine putting the case for Daschle as the Democratic nominee against Bush in 2004 was as good as any.