On the other hand, I was the President; I was supposed to lead, and we had already cut the deficit by a third with no Republican support. Starr had already issued subpoenas to a number of White House staff people and for our records. I have no way of knowing what they told him, though the Saudi ambassador, Prince Bandar, later told m Gingrich had been threatening since April to shut the government down and put America in default if I didn’t accept his budget.
He wasn’t the only Vietnam combat veteran in Congress who felt that way. When the budget debate heated up after Labor Day, we put up new ads targeting the proposed Republican cuts, especially in Medicare and Medicaid. Hillary had been briefing members of Congress from both parties for weeks and getting rave reviews. Barak didn’t want to meet alone with Arafat; he was afraid that they would fall into the old patterns where Barak did all the giving and Arafat made no response in kind.
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