In his interview with Chris Wallace on Fox News, Bill Clinton came across as embarrassingly low-class, as in this exchange:

So you did FOX’s bidding on this show. You did you[r] nice little conservative hit job on me. But what I want to know..

WALLACE: Now wait a minute sir…

CLINTON:..

WALLACE: I asked a question. You don’t think that’s a legitimate question?

CLINTON: It was a perfectly legitimate question but I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked this question of. I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked why didn’t you do anything about the Cole. I want to know how many you asked why did you fire Dick Clarke.

When Wallace replied that such questions had been asked, Clinton responded: "I don’t believe you asked them that.”

He did, though, as Patterico documents:

[H]ere is what Wallace asked Donald Rumsfeld on the March 28, 2004 episode of Fox News Sunday:

I understand this is 20/20 hindsight, it’s more than an individual manhunt. I mean — what you ended up doing in the end was going after al Qaeda where it lived. . . . pre-9/11 should you have been thinking more about that?

. . . .

What do you make of his [Richard Clarke’s] basic charge that pre-9/11 that this government, the Bush administration largely ignored the threat from al Qaeda?

. . .

Mr. Secretary, it sure sounds like fighting terrorism was not a top priority.

The difference is that Republican officials like Rumsfeld are used to being asked tough questions; Clinton isn't. Also, Rumsfeld has good answers to those questions. Clinton doesn't.

Posted by John at 07:42 PM  |    |