Blunt Political Assessments in Bill Clinton Transcripts

He thought George W. Bush was perpetrating “a fraud” on America as a presidential candidate, Vladimir V. Putin had “enormous potential,” and the people of Wyoming would be “shooting at me” if he visited.

He railed about “reactionaries in Congress,” ruled out assassinating Saddam Hussein or Slobodan Milosevic and fretted about becoming “a meandering old man.” At one point, he felt so beaten up by world events that he jokingly suggested becoming a British citizen.

Fifteen years almost to the day since former President Bill Clinton left office, a newly released batch of documents from his library offers a fresh look at his later years in the White House even as his wife, Hillary Clinton, seeks to win the post for herself. The documents transcribed phone calls and meetings between Mr. Clinton and Tony Blair, then the British prime minister and perhaps Mr. Clinton’s best friend among foreign leaders.