The Rolling Stone interviews - Jann Wenner [170]
I don’t think it was probably necessary for someone to have been to Las Vegas to illustrate that story. I mean, the visuals were kind of “internal.”
Yeah. But there was no more communication with him for, like, three days. We were all a bit nervous. And I would say, “Don’t worry, he said he would do it.” But his heart was full of hate. In about three to four days, a long tube arrived at the office. Great excitement. I was there when some messenger brought it in: a big, round thing. And we went to the art department. It was huge. Very carefully, we pulled the stuff out and unrolled it. And, ye gods, every one of them was perfect. It was like discovering water at the bottom of a well. Not one was rejected; not one was changed. This is what he sent.
Here’s a question: Are you religious? Do you believe in God?
Long ago, I shucked off the belief that the people I was dealing with in the world, the power people, really knew what they were doing at all. And that included religion. The idea of heaven and hell—to be threatened with it—was absurd. I think the church wanted it to keep people in line. I’ve kind of recently come to a different realization that I’m in charge, really. That it comes down to karma. Karma is different things to different countries, but in the Orient, karma comes in the next generation.
And ours comes in the mail.
I’ve kind of updated Buddhism. In other words, you get your rewards in this life, and I think I’ll be around again pretty quickly. Karma incorporates a measure of behavior, and in my interpretation, like everything else in this American century, it’s been sped up—you know, the news, the effect of the news, religion, the effect of it. The only kind of grace points you get there is, they let you rest for a while sometimes. I may be sent back. I see myself as a road man for the lords of karma, and I’m not worried about my assignment. Of course, a lot of people have good reason to worry.
I think I know several people who are probably walking around as bugs right now.
Three-legged dogs on a Navajo reservation. Yeah, Pat Buchanan coming back as a rat on the great feeding hill in Calcutta. In Buddhism there is an acceptance of the utter meaninglessness and rottenness of life. I think Nixon got his karma in his time.
BILL CLINTON
by Jann S. Wenner
December 28, 2000
You’re the youngest retiring president since Teddy Roosevelt. Do you compare yourself much to Roosevelt?
The time in which I served was very much like the time in which he served. His job was to manage the transition of America from an agricultural to an industrial power and from, essentially, an isolationist to an international nation. In my time, we were managing the transition from an industrial to an information age and from a Cold War world to a multipolar, more interdependent world.
Then, when Roosevelt got out, he felt Taft had betrayed his progressive legacy. So he spent a lot of the rest of his life in political affairs. He built a third-party political movement and was a very important force. But I think the impact he might have had was tempered by his evident disappointment at not being president anymore. That’s not an option for me. I can’t run again, because now there’s the Twenty-second Amendment.
If there wasn’t the Twenty-second Amendment, would you run again?
Oh, I probably would have run again.
Do you think you would have won?
Yes I do. But it’s hard to say, because it’s entirely academic.
Do you think the Twenty-second Amendment is a good idea? Is it really consistent with democracy to have this kind of term limit on a president?
On balance, the arguments for executive term limits are pretty compelling. I mean, I have an extra amount of energy and I love this job; I love the nature of this work. But maybe it’s better to leave when you’re in