THE world's most prominent baby-boomer celebrated the supposed maturity of his half-century last night with an Oscars-style TV spectacular featuring Hollywood and recording stars, and a giant birthday cake with 432 eggs which even the baker described as "lethal".
President Clinton also raised over $10 million for his party from last night's $10,000-a-head dinner at the Waldorf Astoria, from the $1,000-a-head seats for the show at New York's Radio City Music Hall; and from the $100-a-head parties at 80 cities around the US, to which the show was fed by satellite.
The show, produced by the man behind the Oscars show, Jeff Margolis, starred Whoopi Goldberg, who introduced a different musical memory star for each of the President's five decades.
The one historical echo they avoided was that other famous celebration, when Marilyn Monroe was sewn into her sequin dress to croon Happy Birthday. Mr President to John F. Kennedy, which subsequent historians have claimed was even more intimate a message than it looked.
For the decade of Mr Clinton's birth, the show promised Tony Bennett singing I Left My Heart in San Francisco, and for the 1950s, a rock'n'roll medley from Bon Jovi. For the 1960s, soul star Aretha Franklin promised R-E-S-P-E-C-T. For the 1970s, Carly Simon vowed not to sing You're So Vain, and Kenny Rodgers for the 1980s and Shania Twain for the 1990s represented country music.
Reaching his 50th birthday, Mr Clinton has turned reflective. "Becoming 50 gives me more yesterdays than tomorrows and I'll now begin to think more about the long-term implications as well as the consequences of what I do," he said in a recent interview. "Since I've become president, I've become steadily more philosophical, but not less optimistic."
Thanks to a careful diet Mr Clinton is 20 lb lighter than he was last summer. But his new waistline faces the temptations of a giant American flag birthday cake, made of 96 lb of butter, 98 lb of sugar and 100 lb of flour, and served at last night's Radio City event.
"We are known as the cholesterol kings of New York, and we expect this cake to maintain our reputation," said Mr William Greenberg, who baked the $4,000 treat.
The birthday launched a 12-day re-election spectacular designed to thrust Mr Clinton back to a double-digit lead in the polls, after the success of last week's Republican convention in San Diego.
Between last night's birthday event and next week's Democratic Party convention in Chicago, Mr Clinton has choreographed a week of looking powerfully presidential. Tomorrow he will sign into law the Minimum Wage Bill, raising base pay from $4.25 an hour to $ 5.15, a traditionally Democratic achievement which few ever predicted he could wring from the Republican Congress.
On Wednesday, he signs into law the Kennedy-Kassebaum Health Bill (named after its two Senate sponsors) which represents a valuable down-payment on his earlier pledge to reform the health system. It prevents insurance companies from ending the health insurance of workers who change or leave their jobs.
Then his Vice-President, Mr Al Gore, and Mrs Tipper Gore head for Tennessee to celebrate her birthday with her own country and western show at the Grand Ole Opry, and by helping rebuild one of the black churches burned dawn in this year's spate of arson.