Missing from the cosy scene

Not so. For Washington is a spurned suitor, and now it is also a vengeful one. Less than two months ago, there appeared in The Washington Post an article whichdeserves to rank as one of the most revealing pieces of journalism that many of us have ever read. It was written by Sally Quinn, who is married to the Post8217;s legendary former editor Ben Bradlee.

Quinn8217;s article was a cry of pain by a rejected culture. It began with a description of a Washington party to raise funds for spina bifida research.

The party was attended by Democrats like Madeleine Albright and Donna Shalala, by Republicans like Senator John McCain and the new House Speaker Bob Livingston, by the chairman of the Federal Reserve Alan Greenspan and his wife Andrea Mitchell of NBC, and by other journalistic luminaries like Maureen Dowd, Jim Lehrer, William Safire and Judy Woodruff.

These people, Quinn wrote, are an American community not unlike any other small community in the country8217;. The only difference was this. Where other small communities may grow corn or make motor cars, this one does power and influence. They call the capital city their town,8217; Quinn rhapsodised. And their town hasbeen turned upside-down.8217; By Bill Clinton.

This was not the view of just one piqued society hostess. Quinn8217;s article quoted every kind of Washington grandee in support of her conclusion. Quinn says that she interviewed more than 1008242; village insiders. Her article quotes dozens of Washington denizens to support her distress. And then she says this: Independent counsel Kenneth Starr is not seen by many Washington insiders as an out-of-control prudish crusader. Starr is a Washington insider too.8217;

And she concludes: Even those who have to deal with or publicly support the administration do so grudgingly. They say that regardless of whether his fortunes improve, Bill Clinton has essentially lost the Washington Establishment for good.8217;

Quinn8217;s remarkable article was clearly intended as A Major Statement. Unfortunately for Quinn, it was the wrong statement at exactly the wrong time. Quinn8217;s article apeared with exquisitely ill-judged timing on November 2. The following day the American electorate utterlyconfounded the Washington insiders by once again rallying against the impeachers in the midterm elections. These elections produced results which dismayed Washington. Correction. The results dismayed white Washington. Black Washington 8212; the majority of the city8217;s population 8212; remains extravagantly pro-Clinton.

But it took The New York Times8217;s Frank Rich to spot the killer implication in the Quinn lament: Was there a bipartisan conspiracy by Washington insiders to give a free journalistic pass to their fellow club member Starr? Certainly the evidence keeps piling up that Washington media insiders have been almost as blind to Starr8217;s adventures this year as they have been to the anti-impeachment sentiments of the American people8217;.8217;

In Washington eyes, Clinton8217;s crimes are many 8212; and well-rehearsed on a daily basis in the news pages. But at bottom, his fault is to be an outsider 8212; and from Arkansas of all places 8212; who does not show respect for the elders listed in the capital city8217;s Green Booksocial directory.

The Green Book is an annual guide to who8217;s who in the capital8217;s social set. To open it is to see what the Clintons are up against. Time was, a stiff, black-on-ecru invitation to one of the soirees given by the grandes dames of Washington was the premier status symbol,8217; says the veteran New York Times columnist R.W. Apple.

At Evangeline Bruce8217;s or Pamela Harriman8217;s houses, you might meet the head of the CIA or the members of the permanent Establishment, those people who had long outlived the administration that first brought them to town. The Clintons were launched into Washington by a gala dinner at Harriman8217;s, come to think of it,8217; Apple continues. But they have long since turned their backs on most of the people listed in the Green Book.8217;

The Clintons, Apple believes, have substituted their own alternative hierarchy, with Hollywood supplanting Georgetown as the new elite. With Alec Baldwin and Robert De Niro leading the charge on Clinton8217;s behalf this week, he8217;s probablyright.

This is an unforgiving city to those who refuse to take it at its own estimation of itself. Clinton is the President 8212; still 8212; but in Washington he is out not in, down not up. Clinton is, in fact, very much alone, rejected by an elite which he in turn rejected.

Last week, The Guardian office received the annual White House Christmas card. The card, signed by Bill 8216;n8217; Hill, or at least their signature machines, shows a festive picture of the White House state dining room.

There is a fire in the grate. There are lit candles on the table. A chandelier casts a blaze of warm light. Holly and angels deck the windows and walls. A benign portrait of Abraham Lincoln looks down on the scene.

Even at the end of this catastrophic year, the card seems to say, there is inner warmth and comfort at the White House.

And then you notice what this picture really tells us about Bill Clinton8217;s Washington, and the realisation brings chill to the apparent warmth of the scene. For there is absolutely no onethere at all.