Sex, Lies and Politics (3/27/2007)

Only in America would a president be impeached for lying about sex with a consenting adult. But a president who lied to drag us into a needless, ruinous war seems exempt from impeachment.

President Clinton’s impeachment began when special prosecutor Ken Starr investigated some Clinton land deals. He found no wrongdoing, so politically-motivated Starr searched for ways to nail Clinton. A fake friend had secretly taped Monica Lewinsky’s calls, so Starr used the tapes to expose Clinton’s affair with her. Clinton lied when confronted about it, and was impeached by the House of Representatives for perjury and obstruction of justice. Ironically, many who spouted family values as they attacked Clinton were hardly pure themselves.

Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich led the impeachment charge while he committed adultery with an intern, 20 years younger than he. Multi-married Gingrich had served divorce papers to his first wife, who was in the hospital with cancer; he married wife number 2 a few months after the divorce. His third marriage is to the former intern. But, so-called family values leaders Reverend Jerry Falwell and Focus on the Family’s founder James Dobson excuse Gingrich’s adultery.

Illinois Republican congressman Henry Hyde chaired the prosecution team. Hyde, too, had committed adultery, with a married mother of three. Hyde called his adultery a “youthful indiscretion” because he had been in his forties. Other impeach-Clinton voters were: Bob Barr of Georgia, who married a third time but did not pay child support for his children with his first two wives; adulterer Dan Burton of Indiana, who fathered a child by a woman not his wife and tried to keep that quiet; Bob Livingston of Louisiana, Speaker-elect, who had to resign when his past adultery was revealed; and Mark Foley of Florida, anti-gay chair of the House caucus on missing and exploited children, who sexually harassed young male interns. In the Senate, segregationist Strom Thurmond, who had raped and impregnated a 15-year-old African-American maid but never publicly acknowledged the child, voted Clinton guilty.

Some so-called family values leaders also say one thing but do another: Bill O’Reilly, rabid right-wing Fox network commentator quietly settled a sexual harassment suit brought by his producer; tart-tongued, talk radio host Rush Limbaugh, married three times and a drug addict, rails against liberals and, yes, drug addicts; Evangelical preacher and President Bush’s faith advisor, Reverend Ted Haggard, a married father, ranted against homosexuals while having sex with a male prostitute. The list goes on.

Flash forward to this month. Current congressional investigations reveal a vindictive White House plot to “out” a covert CIA agent because her husband exposed Bush’s lies about Iraq weapons of mass destruction. Vice President Cheney’s chief of staff Scooter Libby has been convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice as a result. Many Republicans have called on Bush to pardon Libby. One is congressman Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who voted to impeach Clinton, but excuses Libby’s perjury. Is perjury about a sexual liaison worse than perjury that threatens our intelligence agencies’ integrity? Only in America would a President’s lie about sex be a bigger sin to some than a President’s lies that imperil our national security.

- Judith Kohler

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