Clinton Soars in the Polls

WASHINGTON: Bill Clinton should get impeached more often. In the latest CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll, Clinton’s job approval ratings spiked 10 points to 73 percent, an all-time high. The Republican party, meanwhile, took the corresponding hit -- 31 percent now approve of their overall handiwork. And only 30 percent think the Comeback Kid should give this one up and resign. Numbers like those assuage Clinton’s greatest fear -- that no one really cares whether he stays or goes -- and stoke the latest Beltway craze: healing.

Today, it is former presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter in the New York Times who are taking up the call, pleading for bipartisan censure by the Senate to make “Americans proud of their leaders, their institutions and themselves.” Clinton and most Senate Democrats wholeheartedly agree, as do Americans themselves. But GOP Senate leaders such as Trent Lott and Mitch McConnell are bolted to their seats, they know Americans talk a lot more than they vote, and, quite frankly, they’ve never been all that crazy about bipartisanship to begin with. For Clinton, there’s one upside to a trial that could eat up the rest of his presidency: At the end of it all, he’s likely to be more popular than ever.