[On April 14, 1922, the Wall Street Journal published a story breaking the news of a crooked deal that became known as the Teapot Dome scandal. So this week I’ll AmericanStudy that history and four other presidential scandals, leaving aside the Grant administration as we’ll get to them in a couple weeks and the Trump administration because ugh. Share your thoughts on these & other histories, including Grant or Trump if you’d like of course, for a scandalous crowd-sourced weekend post!]
On how two quite
distinct things can be true at once, and how my own perspective has changed
over time.
The first true
thing I want to say about the President
Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky scandal is that it was the result of a
multi-year, highly partisan and suspect fishing expedition. After he was
appointed in August 1994 as an independent counsel to investigate the
nothing-burger that was the
Whitewater “scandal,” attorney Ken Starr—who had long been an avowed
opponent of Clinton’s and was funded by an even more overt and powerful such
opponent, billionaire Richard
Mellon Scaife—kept expanding the scope of that investigation to other and
equally suspect “scandals.” For example, in October 1997 (more than three years
after his appointment)
Starr released a 137-page report (drafted by Starr’s assistant Brett
Kavanaugh!) on the 1993 suicide of Deputy White House Counsel Vince Foster.
After that wasted effort, Starr
turned his attention to Clinton’s adulterous relationship with White House
intern Monica Lewinsky, making the resulting scandal the sole successful
product of a four-year partisan fishing expedition into all things Clinton.
But the second
true thing I want to say is this: the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal was more than
that, was indeed a significant and serious presidential scandal. Partly that’s
because of how Ken Starr initially learned of it: Clinton was being deposed in Paula
Jones’ sexual harassment lawsuit against him, and lied under oath about
whether he had ever “had sexual relations” with Lewinsky (I’m not willing to
accept Clinton’s
later argument that he didn’t consider oral sex “sexual relations” and so
wasn’t lying). But it’s also because of the affair itself—not because of the
adultery part (countless
presidents have cheated on their spouses, and to my mind that’s ultimately a
personal matter) but because of its unethical and unprofessional nature: of
Clinton having sex with
an intern, someone over whom he had direct professional power; and of him
doing so in
the Oval Office, while conducting the political and national business of
the presidency. I don’t imagine he was the first president for whom those
things were true either, but repetition of something scandalous doesn’t make it
any less scandalous, and I would argue those unethical and unprofessional sides
to the affair demand our condemnation in any case.
Finally, a
third, more personal but also I believe broadly relevant true thing: my
perspective on the relative dynamics of those other two things has shifted
significantly in the 20+ years since the scandal. At the time, I was entirely
convinced that, whatever Clinton’s personal flaws and failures, the scandal was
far more fully a reflection of the GOP’s unhinged hatred of him and his administration
(which seems to have been a
main public takeaway from the impeachment
trial at the very least). But while those contexts and factors remain part
of the story as I’ve said here, I have to say that over the last few years, the
unfolding perspectives and narratives of the #MeToo
movement have fully convinced me of the paramount importance of challenging
and ending workplace
sexual harassment (among many other issues of course). While Clinton’s own
such workplace harassment scandal might not have risen to the level of an
impeachable offense, it nonetheless reflects clearly and potently the truly
ubiquitous presence of such issues, even at the highest and most powerful
levels of American society. To my mind, that (along with the deeply impressive
second act of Monica
Lewinsky’s life and work) should be the ultimate takeaway from this 1990s
presidential scandal.
Next scandal
tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What do you
think? Takes on this scandal or other ideas you’d share for the weekend post?
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