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Jewish World Review May 30, 2000 / 25 Iyar, 5760
Chris Matthews
Charged with evading the Vietnam draft, he has publicly
forgotten even getting the notice. Asked in Arkansas if
he'd used drugs, he claimed to have never broken the
law. Asked about Paula Jones, he denied ever being
alone in a "hotel" with her. Asked about Monica, he said
he didn't "recall" being alone with her, and specifically did
not "believe" he was ever alone with her in that
now-notorious West Wing back room.
This has been the Clinton story, as familiar now to friend
as to foe. Caught, he has been the ready architect of
denials, each designed with its escape hatch.
He did not deny being drafted, only that he could not
recall the event. He did not deny using drugs, only of
breaking U.S. laws. No one said he and Paula Jones
were the only people in that entire Little Rock hotel
building that day in 1991 when he had her to his room.
No one can say the president did not lose all memory of
those back-hall trysts with Monica.
A shrewd political bookkeeper, Clinton has saved his
greatest asset, the presidency, deferring payment for
these deceits.
Last Monday, the payment came due. The disciplinary committee of the
Arkansas Supreme Court called Clinton's false testimony about Monica
Lewinsky a case of "serious misconduct" and initiated disbarment proceedings.
Q: At any time were you and Monica Lewinsky alone in the hallway between
the Oval Office and this kitchen area?
A: I don't believe so, unless we were walking back to the back dining room
with the pizzas. I just... I don't remember. I don't believe we were alone in the
hallway, no.
Clinton must now defend the truth of that statement and, along with it, his law
license, to an Arkansas county circuit judge.
What judgment that jurist will render is impossible to predict. It was another
Arkansas judge, Susan Webber Wright, who lit the fuse for eventual
disbarment last year. She fined Clinton $90,000 for contempt of court for what
she ruled to be his "intentionally false" testimony in that January 1998
deposition, then referred the matter to the Arkansas bar committee.
All this is a result of Clinton's having denied his relationship with Lewinsky to
lawyers for Jones. They were trying to show a pattern of on-the-job
misconduct with women. Clinton, for a variety of understandable reasons,
refused to come clean. He not only denied getting together with Lewinsky but
also denied having had the opportunity.
Thomas Jefferson once observed that the whole art of politics is the art of
telling the truth.
In mustering his defense, Clinton practiced this art at a dazzling level of
excellence. He will go down in the history books as a president who was
impeached, perhaps even disbarred, but ended his eight years in office walking
on water.
"When I'm not president anymore, I'll be happy to defend myself," he said
Monday, defiantly demanding yet another stay of execution, displaying perhaps
a final time his galling precept that truth deferred is truth
05/26/00: Hamilton Jordan, the outsider
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