According to Robert Bennett, Bill Clinton’s lawyer, Kathleen Willey is in the process of negotiating a $300,000 book deal. Coincidentally, she decided that “enough people have suffered” so it was time for her to tell the truth, on national television.
Well, why shouldn’t she? Everyone else is cashing in: Tripp, Kenneth Star, Orrin Hatch….. And no one is cashing in more than the media. The media have made the Clinton scandal the #1 story of the decade. They act as if this story is more important than Cuba, more important than Kosovo, more important than Bill Gates, more important than Iraq. Heavens, I think they might even believe it is more important than Princess Diana!
There is a paradox at the heart of the Clinton Scandal. I haven’t seen any hard numbers yet, but obviously people are tuning in to see the story and buying the newspapers and magazines that feature it prominently on the front page. (Or are they? Only 10 million tuned in to the 60 Minutes interview with Willey: that’s not an impressive number.) Yet poll after poll shows that Clinton’s approval ratings are actually rising. In other words, the average voter loves to read the lurid tales of sex and infidelity (fess up: don’t you?), but when Oral Hatch (don’t you just wish that really was his name?) goes on television and declares that the Willey allegations, if true, should lead to impeachment… they are laughing their heads off. No way!
As I watch some of the television reports on the scandal, and the discussion of the media’s coverage of the scandal, and coverage of the media’s discussion of their coverage of the scandal, I get the sense that some crucial issue at the core of all this is missing. Of course it is. The one thing the media cannot and will not admit to you is that this story is really a tabloid story, a cheap, tawdry scandal of absolutely no importance whatsoever, and not worthy of a serious national media. Picture Dan Rather saying: “And now, we will depart from our usual practice of informing you about wars, economics, and politics, to give you a blow by blow description of the President groping a woman with big breasts.” The question, contrary to what the media say, is not “is it true”. The question is, “is it important, or just juicy?”
How important is this story? How do you measure importance? There is a strong evidence to indicate that the average American voter rates “importance” on a scale based on the answer to the question: how does this affect me?
We have to be careful to exclude self-fulfilling prophecy. To say the story is important because the media are giving it a lot of coverage, is an Alice in Wonderland argument– “the story is important because I say it is important.” In the same way, if the Republicans ever dared to try to impeach Clinton on the basis of these allegations, the real story would be the coup d’état, not the Clinton scandal.
So how does this story affect you? Will it make your taxes go up? Are you more likely to lose your job? Will your children get a better education? Will the world be at peace? Will your access to the Internet be controlled by the government, or Microsoft, or nobody as a result? Will it cause your parents be more likely to end up in a nursing home? Will it improve television? (Not so far.) Will your insurance company be more likely to tell your doctor which treatments he is allowed to give you, because Monica Lewinsky cleaned her dress? Who will lead the Soviet Union after Monica testifies? Should we grant “most favoured nation” trading status to any country that will accept Linda Tripp as ambassador?
The answer to all of the above, of course, is no, unless, as I suggested, the Republicans dare to proceed with impeachment hearings. But those issues are what the people elect a government to deal with, and the voters have loudly proclaimed, again and again, that they feel Bill Clinton is doing the job they elected him to do.
Let’s get one thing clear: the public is not indicating that they don’t care about crimes committed by the president. I don’t think they have heard of anything yet that they would consider a crime, in the substantive sense of the word. Paula Jones has no case, and she knows it, and her lawyers know it. Lewinsky has never complained about her treatment. Kathleen Willey made no complaint. If there was a crime, who was the victim? Who is the plaintive?
The other great omission: last I heard, there were congressional elections coming up this year. The House of Representatives is currently controlled by the Republicans, by a small margin; the Senate, by a slightly larger margin. I have not heard a single newscaster yet remark on the fact that if the Republicans aggressively pursued impeachment, given the current attitude of the electorate, they might just get quashed in November. If I were a betting man, I’d bet you that people like Newt Gingrich and John McCain have given this a lot of thought. Furthermore, impeachment or no impeachment, if I were a Republican, I would be a little worried about the November elections. What if the voters decide to send a real message to Congress?
What does Clinton’s 67% approval really mean?
Most people believe Clinton did it. The media knows the public believes the stories so they think that the public doesn’t care, or that the public shares Bill’s amoral attitudes, and that’s why they continue to approve.
I don’t believe it. I think the public are disgusted with Clinton, but I think they are even more disgusted with the intrusive, harassing, jackal mentality of the media. I think that it means the public is disgusted with Kenneth Starr and Oral Hatch, even as they enjoy reading the lurid details of the scandal.
This is a junk food story: yes, if it’s on the table in front of me, I’ll nibble, but it’s still junk food and if you continue to stick it into my face, I’m going to get very, very angry with you.