DEMAGOGUING ABORTION

IN NEARLY FOUR HOURS of preparation for his press conference on December 13, President Clinton devoted only a few moments to reviewing his position on partial-birth abortion. So White House aides were surprised when he mounted a vigorous, lengthy defense of himself on the issue after CNN’s Wolf Blitzer raised it. Clinton was emotional. “Hillary and I only had one child,” he said. “And I just cannot look at a woman” whose unborn child will die at birth ” and tell her that I am signing a law which will prevent her from ever having another child.” He sounded defiant: “One of the things the president’s supposed to do is to look out for the few hundred against the many millions.” But mostly he was cold-blooded and clever.