E-mail a friendJanis Kearney
airdate September 25, 2006
Janis Kearney served nearly six years as President Clinton's White House diarist, the first time in history such an appointment was made. Her résumé includes newspaper publisher, columnist and author. She was also Minority Media Outreach director for the Clinton-Gore campaign headquarters and Public Affairs and Communications director for the SBA. The Arkansas native's books include her memoirs, Cotton Field of Dreams, and Conversations, a look at the 42nd president's years in office.
Janis Kearney
Tavis: Janis Kearney served as Bill Clinton's personal diarist for nearly six years during his time in the White House. The fact that she was even in the White House is remarkable, considering her upbringing. She is one of 19, I said it, 19 children born to sharecroppers in the Arkansas delta. Her latest book is called 'Conversations, William Jefferson Clinton, From Hope To Harlem.' Janis, nice to have you back on the program.
Janis Kearney: It's great to be back, thank you.
Tavis: Let me ask you the same question I asked Rahm. We had planned to have you and Rahm on the program, we didn't plan for Mr. Clinton to do what he did over the last few hours, but he did it anyway. What did you think when you saw this videotape?
Kearney: Actually, I was rooting. Because he was being himself, and he was saying what needed to be said, and he was responding the way that he should have responded. Because over the last almost eight years, I've been hearing subtle and not so subtle accusations being made. And he's a pretty gracious man, he hasn't always responded. But I thought it was about time that he did. And in the way that he did.
Tavis: In the way that he did.
Kearney: Yes.
Tavis: You were okay with the way that he responded, even?
Kearney: I was okay with it.
Tavis: Okay. One of the things I remember about your first book, which I absolutely love and I'm sure you still have it on your wall somewhere, the photo of your family reunion. I mentioned those 19 kids. You can tell the story. You guys had a big reunion. Well, tell the story at the White House, yeah.
Kearney: Right, we had a reunion in 2000 at the White House; my father was turning 94 that year, I think. And the President knew it, and he invited the family over, and everybody was there. There were, like, 200 people at the White House with the President, just celebrating our family reunion. He knew my family from Arkansas, so he was very, very gracious. So I'm sure somebody was turning over in their grave, having all those Arkansans, southerners, there.
Tavis: (Laugh) All up on the White House lawn.
Kearney: Yes, all in the White House.
Tavis: (unintelligible) while they're all outside on the grass.
Kearney: (Laugh) It was amazing; it was wonderful, but so apropos of him.
Tavis: Yeah.
Kearney: That's the kind of man he is.
Tavis: I start with that story, Janis, because that story I think is a nice segue for this book. The book, obviously, is about this special - from Hope to Harlem, this special relationship, this affinity, this unique embrace, if you will, between Clinton and Black America. I wanna talk about the good side and the bad side of that. Let's start with the good side, though. What is it about Clinton and Black folk that makes for such a tight relationship?
Kearney: I think Congressman Louis, who is in the book, probably said it best. That African-Americans or other minorities have this special antenna of knowing whether people are genuine when it comes to issues about us. And he feels that Black Americans had that antenna about Bill Clinton. That there was a genuineness that we're still trying to figure out where it came from, since he came from Arkansas and the south.
But there is a real genuineness. The thing that I do point out is that Arkansas happened to have been just Black and White for many, many years, and he was open and inclusive and embracing of African-Americans, but if it had been any other race or minority, I think he would have been the same way.
Tavis: Tell me how, then, to your point about him growing up in the south, in Arkansas, and Bill Clinton was out of high school onto college before the schools were integrated in Arkansas, so he did not go to integrated schools. So help me better understand how, as a child, he developed this affinity for Black people.
Kearney: Now, he gives all the credit to his grandparents. He grew up with his grandparents, or very early on he lived with his grandmother and grandfather. And he's always told the story of how his grandfather would tell him that you had to accept everyone as human. His grandfather owned a grocery store in the middle of Hope, Arkansas, and many, many of his customers were African-Americans. And he would remember playing with the children and having his grandfather around in the grocery store. And he just gives him credit for just instilling in him very, very early this appreciation for all people.
Tavis: Tell me, first of all, you had a couple hundred conversations with people, speaking of conversations, to put this book together. You mentioned John Louis a moment ago, but was there a particular thread that you found that ran through all of the stories of all these Black folk you've talked to about this relationship, this unique relationship with Mr. Clinton?
Kearney: I think it was the fact that he was different from just about any other White person that any of these people had met. And I interviewed people from...
Tavis: Different in what way?
Kearney: Different in his acceptance of difference. His acceptance of diversity. His believe that diversity was as natural as a person in some of the Asian countries would think monogamy is. So he was different in that he could accept people at face value. And look past the color of their skin. These are people from every background, every level, people who had worked with him, people who hadn't worked with him. They all came away from meeting him with that same idea about him.
Tavis: I raise this only because I wanna show the other side to this relationship. I don't wanna go back and rehash all of this, but you know this as well as I do, 'cause you were inside the White House. I've interviewed the President any number of times over the years, and traveled, as you know, with him. And outside of me, even, there are a number of persons, obviously, who have taken him to task over the years about that relationship.
When he signed the Welfare bill that Rahm a moment ago used as wonderful example, there were a lot of us that didn't think that was such a great example. When he signed the Welfare bill, when he signed the crime bill that put that (unintelligible) disparity as law in this country. Crack used in the suites, cocaine in the suites, and yet brothers have to get caught, or White folk, rather, in the suites gotta get caught with a hundred times more powder than brothers in the street to get the same sentence.
So the crime bill was a disaster, many of us thought. The Welfare bill was a disaster. He got it, he (unintelligible) over the signing of the Welfare bill. He sandbagged, many people think, Lani Guinier. And I have respect for the President, but there are some parts of that relationship that people questioned then, and as time goes on question now about that relationship, in terms of whether or not the relationship was as cozy, was as good for Black folk, never mind the good that he did for the federal judges, etcetera. So, as we get some distance between his Presidency and now, and as time goes on, do you think that that affinity for Clinton, his graciousness to Black folk, is going to get better or be tainted as time goes on?
Kearney: I think it will continue to get better, because one thing that we all have to understand is he's a politician first. I think he's a good human being, but he is the greatest politician that probably ever walked the Earth. So we can question some of the things he did, and many, many people in that book did. But I think we know that as President, you don't always do everything you wanna do. Some of the things that he went to the White House wanting to do, he wasn't able to do them.
He made some, what we would call mistakes, and his interview is in there, and he admits to some of those things. Some of those things he wishes he had done differently. The Welfare reform, I think he sticks behind the Welfare reform, because he truly believed, that's my belief, that he could help women and families find jobs, find skills, be able to move their families from one level to another.
Tavis: He does admit, though, that he was slow on Rwanda. He admits that.
Kearney: Yes, he does.
Tavis: He's told me that. He was slow on Rwanda, yeah.
Kearney: He does, and he's also said that much of the work that he's doing now, and we know he's doing a lot of great work, is kind of a pittance to some of the things that he wish he had done as President.
Tavis: He has such, again, a special relationship with Black folk that that legacy, the criticism from me or anybody else notwithstanding, that relationship, I think, is gonna be intact, to your point, for time eternal. The larger question for me, and you're his personal diarist for those years in the White House, the larger question in the context of this Fox debacle, is whether or not you think, long-term, he will be able to repair, do justice to, his image, his legacy.
'Cause everybody admits, even the right admits he succeeded as a President in many ways. He made his mark. But we also know that he has tried over the years, since leaving the White House, to put that legacy together, put it (unintelligible). Will he do that successfully?
Kearney: I think so. I think so, because he's doing such outstanding things right now. And he's not gonna stop any time soon. He'll only just add to what he's doing. He just came from the Global Initiative, a huge meeting where he raised over seven billion dollars. So the world is still listening to Bill Clinton, and I think the world sees his heart, where a lot of people in the U.S. fail to see it.
Tavis: Yeah, the world is still listening to Bill Clinton, and we are still talking about Bill Clinton. It amazes me, after all these years, he still gets good TV time and magazine time and radio time of dialogue. He is quite an interesting and remarkable man. The new book, 'Conversations, William Jefferson Clinton, From Hope To Harlem.' Janis F. Kearney, his long-time diarist in the White House, is the author. Janis, nice to have you on the program.
Kearney: Thank you very much.
Tavis: That's our show for tonight. Catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local listings. I'll see you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from Los Angeles, thanks for watching, and as always, keep the faith.
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