Word: scandalous
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...will be watching her more closely than the Cartographer in Chief. For a public troubled by the image of an embattled President distracted by a consuming scandal, the reality is even worse than the fears. Though his aides say he will not be sidetracked, Clinton calls his lawyers constantly, the intense voice unmistakable. What surprises his lawyers at the other end of the line is the way Clinton jumps into the conversation as if in midsentence: explaining the latest piece to emerge from the grand jury or the deposition, putting it in context, dissecting its implication. Last Thursday the President...
...Clinton. As protocol in these matters demands, Clinton's lawyers howled their outrage: They insist this had been a "disaster" for their side, putting Clinton the Philanderer on the front page again, this time in his own words. But the account also provided, for the first time in this scandal, a story line that is minimalist, consistent and covers nearly all the bases...
...apologia. As it turns out, the director's understanding of Clinton allowed him to create a presidential portrait that in many ways is more damning than any right-wing caricature, because it feels so real. Largely completed before America had heard of Lewinsky, the film comments on the scandal in ways that are downright eerie. Just as the public doesn't know what actually happened between Clinton and Monica--or Clinton and Gennifer Flowers, for that matter--so the movie refuses to spell out what did or didn't happen between Stanton and the women he is accused of bedding...
With the attention back on the President, the scandal has granted the Democrats a double bonus. First, they avoid the embarrassing, public soul-searching Gephardt was pushing, Second, they may even be helped by Clinton's remarkable approval ratings. Republicans, on the other hand, face the unpleasant possibility of considering the impeachment of a popular President based on the recommendations of an unpopular Independent Counsel for charges many consider superfluous...
Ironically, the Lewinsky scandal may enable the Democrats to get through the '98 elections following the usual script of rallying around the leader and demonizing his accusers. These tactics might even be enough to elect Gore in 2000. But, of course, this would only postpone addressing the problem. Eventually, a day of reckoning will come. As republicans solidify their control over Congress and state governments across the country, Democrats will have to fill their empty shell of a party with clearly-articulated principles and solutions--or risk getting crushed for many Novembers to come...