It's become clear in recent months and years that few of the values that most Americans hold dear duty, honor, truth, trust are of any importance at all to our president.

The one factor that has motivated him to make any attempt at all to accomplish anything other than his own aggrandizement has been his desire to leave some kind of legacy that will read well in the history books.

Those who despise him will say that he will be remembered only for his indiscreet sexual exploits. Those who revere him will say that his legacy is the robust economy that has marked his administration.

Because his legacy appears to be so important to this president, the news/talk shows have made a point of interviewing historians now and then, and those that I have heard have been unanimous in their refusal, rightly so, to give the president very much credit for the economy.

Congress has had much more effect on the economy, as it always does, than the president. The Federal Reserve has kept interest rates low, investors have kept the money supply going, and the American people have continued to buy. Out of all of the above, the president has had the least effect on the economy.

It remains to be seen how much, if any, credit he will get for "fixing" Social Security. The president has been talking about it for six years, but so far has not offered a program for putting this mega-program on solvent footing.

He did appoint a task force, headed by a member of his party, which has come up with a program that the majority in Congress seems to favor, perhaps with a few changes here and there. But the president is loudly opposing the agreement forged by his appointees.

By holding out for a few changes, probably some of the same changes Congress would have made on its own, he may be able to put that one in the books and get some credit for it.

There are a few other check marks in that book... family leave, the 100,000 cops, possibly some additional education programs.

But one effect of the Clinton presidency that may overshadow all others remains to be played out. We may well find ten years from now that the one "accomplishment" for which this administration becomes notorious is that it has restarted the Cold War.

I hope I'm wrong, but I'm beginning to get the distinct, spine-chilling feeling that I'm not.

We had the Russians right where we wanted them. They gave up in the arms race, offered their people the chance to begin learning how to govern themselves, and adopted a generally friendly stance toward their old enemy, the United States. All of that, of course, goes in the books as part of the legacy of Ronald Reagan and, to a lesser extent, George Bush.

I don't often agree with Pat Buchanan, but when he said Sunday that friendship with Russia ought to be our number one foreign policy priority, I wanted to stand up and cheer.

Unfortunately, under the Clinton Administration we have treated Russia, which still holds an immense nuclear arsenal, like just another country we have to deal with. We have ignored the Russians as we sent troops into their part of the world, turned a deaf ear to their objections as we got involved in a civil war on their doorstep, and we have taken few steps to strengthen the fledgling friendship that has begun between our nations.

Meanwhile, we have jump-started a new arms race with China. Maybe the Chinese will never catch up, or even come close to the status we and the Russians have as nuclear powers, but maybe they will.

It's up to them now, because we have given them the technology.

No, I'm not referring to the revelation that some of our nuclear technology was stolen by Chinese spies during the Reagan/Bush years. Spies are always at work, and somebody fell asleep at the switch and let them get away with some secrets, true enough.

But that information was of very little use to China. They could build better nuclear bombs and, with the stolen secrets, they could target them a little better. But they couldn't shoot them very far.

That's where the president came in. In a move that still has gotten very little press, our president issued an executive order that allowed some of his campaign contributors to sell technology to the Chinese, contrary to law, that enabled them to build rockets that can reach targets in the United States.

And lest we forget, China also was illegally pouring millions into Democratic campaign coffers at the time this sweet deal was worked out.

Bottom line, as a direct result of the president's illegal campaign activities, which the Justice Department continues to refuse to investigate, China is in a position to begin building a nuclear arsenal and forcing us to go back to building our own.

And as a result of the administration's inactivity, our alliance with a powerful new friend has not grown stronger, perhaps has grown weaker.