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William Jefferson Clinton, the forty-second president of the United States, is undoubtedly the greatest American enigma of our age---a dark horse who captured the White House, fell from grace, and was resurrected as an elder statesman whose popularity rises and falls based on the days sound bites.John D. Gartners In Search of Bill Clinton unravels the mystery at the heart of Clintons complex nature and explains why so many people fall under his spell. Gartner tells the story we all thought we knew, from the fresh viewpoint of a psychologist, as he questions the well-crafted Clinton life story. Gartner, a therapist with expertise in treating individuals with hypomanic temperaments, saw in Clinton the energy, creativity, and charisma that leads a hypomanic individual to success as well as the problems with impulse control and judgment, which frequently result in disastrous decision making. He knew, though, that if he wanted to find the real Bill Clinton he couldnt rely on armchair psychology to provide the answer. He knew he had to travel to Arkansas and around the world to talk with those who knew Clinton and his family intimately. With his boots on the ground, Gartner uncovers long-held secrets about Clintons mother, the ambitious and seductive Virginia Kelley, and her wild life in Hot Springs, as well as the ghostly specter of his biological father, Bill Blythe, to uncover the truth surrounding Clintons rumor-filled birth. He considers the abusive influence of Clintons alcoholic stepfather, Roger Clinton, to understand the repeated public abuse he invited both by challenging a hostile Republican Congress and engaging in the clandestine affair with Monica Lewinsky that led to his downfall.Of course, there is no marriage more dissected than that of the Clintons, both in the White House and on the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign trail. Instead of going down familiar paths, Gartner looks at that relationship with a new focus and cle...



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