PLAY IT AGAIN, DICK

By Roger Rosenblatt

Until I read the just published new excerpts from the secret White House tapes of Richard Nixon, I didn't realize what has been so grievously lacking in the Clinton presidency. Mr. Clinton is not funny. Nothing and nobody in his Administration are in the slightest way funny.

Five years is a long time to go without laughing at a U.S. President. Nixon, bless him, would hardly let a day go by without convulsing the public. So many memories--such as when he paid a visit to the Great Wall of China and remarked to Secretary of State William Rogers, "I think you would have to agree, Mr. Secretary, that this is a great wall." Or when he went to Paris to attend Charles de Gaulle's funeral. The President emerged from his limousine, looked about and exulted, "This is a great day for France!"

Now, this month, there are these priceless tapes exposing more of the Watergate cover-up. Nixon on the congressional hearings: "If they started a fishing expedition on this, they are going to start picking up tracks." On presidential counsel and informer John Dean: "I think we can destroy him. We must destroy him." To which the take-charge humorist, former White House chief of staff Alexander Haig, replies, "Have to."

Who would not sell his mother to have these birds back in the Oval Office for only a day, scheming, brooding, drawing up enemies lists, conniving about "Plumbers"? The most entertaining of the tape excerpts, to me, has Nixon raging about the threat of impeachment to his press secretary Ron Ziegler, when his dog, King Timahoe, suddenly jumps up on him: "Christ, impeach the President on John Dean's word... there's a cancer in the heart of the White House, on the heart of the presidency. [The dog barks.] King! Goddam, get off me! But they can't want, frankly, to see Agnew be President."

Of course, it's all awful and criminal, what was going on, but apart from the barking-at-the-gate-in-Macbethness of the scene, it is breathtakingly hilarious. If Nixon had understood that the key to his historical resuscitation lay in the hilarity of his corruptedness--his voice, manner, language, his crooked sincerity--he wouldn't have wasted all that time writing books. The advantage in having a funny presidency is that people will always think of it fondly, no matter what they were laughing at. The mere act of laughter is heartwarming, and eventually they recall only that and not its cause.

So Gerald Ford is remembered warmly, certainly by Chevy Chase, for tripping over his feet and for announcements like "I always watch the Detroit Tigers on radio when I can." (One especially likes the "when I can.") And even earnest Jimmy Carter evokes memories--of the "attack rabbit" episode on his rafting vacation out West and of his Freud-grounded introduction of Hubert Humphrey at the 1980 Democratic National Convention as "Hubert Horatio Hornblower." Woodrow Wilson, too, could be impressive. "When enough people are out of work," he observed, "unemployment results."

No tandem of Presidents was ever funnier than Ronald Reagan and George Bush. Returning from an expedition to Latin America, Reagan informed us, "You know, they're all individual countries." Explaining flaws in his Administration, he confessed, "Sure, we've made mistakes. But let's not throw the baby out with the dishes."

One of the more unusual things he is reported to have said occurred in response to the Foreign Minister of Lebanon, who was presenting Mr. Reagan with a half-hour lecture on the differences among the political factions in Lebanon. One may imagine how complicated a lecture this was. When the Foreign Minister finished, Mr. Reagan approached him and said, "You know, your nose looks just like Danny Thomas'."

As for Bush, citizens still get weepy with nostalgia when they recall Mr. Bush's appreciation of Czechoslovakia's President Vaclav Havel as "living, or dying, whatever, for freedom." Assessing the volatility of the 1988 presidential election, Bush predicted, "The undecideds could vote one way or the other."

Gone, gone, all gone. Once in a blue moon we will hear from Mr. Bush on some matter, and the giggles start to rise again, but it is not the same as when he led the free world. The country needs a funny President, and Clinton is not it. To be truly funny, a U.S. President has to 1) have real wit, like Lincoln and J.F.K.; 2) be a sort of caricature, like Jackson, Teddy Roosevelt, Coolidge and F.D.R.; 3) act with such consistency in one's decisions and policies that the very predictability becomes a hoot; or 4) have done something that really merits the use of a special prosecutor.

If Mr. Clinton is indeed looking for his place in history, he may have found it. No presidency, much less a two-termer, has been without a single good laugh, so there's his place. But what a dreary achievement. And how debilitating for the nation. And who waits in the wings, polishing his "I'm so boring" routine? Let's draft Al Haig. Have to.