In an interview with Craig Melvin on the Today Show Monday morning, former President Bill Clinton got extremely defensive when he was asked about the Monica Lewinsky affair in light of the #MeToo movement, eventually proclaiming that he doesn’t owe Lewinsky any apologies.
Here are five reasons why Clinton should absolutely apologize to Lewinsky.
1. Because Lewinsky was publicly shamed and ridiculed
(Photo by Jeffrey Markowitz/Sygma via Getty Images)
“In 1998, when news of my affair with Bill Clinton broke, I was arguably the most humiliated person in the world.” Those are Lewinsky’s own words from a 2014 essay she penned for Vanity Fair. Indeed, after news of the affair broke, the media and public went from scoffing at Lewinsky’s claims to ridiculing her as a homewrecker to pitying her.
Lewinsky’s experience under the public microscope is best summed up by a disgusting incident that occurred in 2001 after she agreed to participate in an HBO documentary titled “Monica in Black and White.” While filming for the documentary before an audience at New York’s Cooper Union, Lewinsky was asked, “How does it feel to be America’s premier blow-job queen?”
Heads would roll today if someone asked a question like that of Stormy Daniels, or any other woman who’s accused a high-powered man of sexual infidelity. Clinton should absolutely apologize in private to Lewinsky for the decades of public ridicule she’s received.
2. Because the affair ruined her life
(Photo: House Judiciary committee)
In the 2014 Vanity Fair essay, Lewinsky describes how she was forced to move to England “to escape scrutiny” and begin to attempt to live a normal life. However, despite earning a master’s degree in social psychology from the London School of Economics, Lewinsky soon learned that, because of the affair, “traditional employment” would not be an option for her. “I’ve managed to get by (barely, at times) with my own projects, usually with start-ups that I have participated in, or with loans from friends and family,” she wrote.
But her professional life is not the only thing Clinton wrecked – he also ruined her personal life. “With every man I date (yes, I date!), I go through some degree of 1998 whiplash,” she wrote. And while Lewinsky has enjoyed several meaningful relationships over the course of her life, she has never married.
3. Because money doesn’t make up for it
(Photo by David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images)
In his contentious interview with Melvin, Clinton pointed out that he didn’t escape the scandal entirely unscathed – he lost a lot of money. “Nobody believes that I got out of that for free. I left the White House $16 million in debt,” Clinton opined.
Does he expect us to feel bad for him?
It says a great deal about Clinton that, 20 years later, his greatest concern remains the money he lost.
4. To take responsibility for his actions
(Photo By: Harry Hamburg/NY Daily News via Getty Images)
Judging by how defensive Clinton got with Melvin, it’s clear he still believes he did nothing wrong. After all – infidelity aside – Lewinsky stated as late as four years ago that her relationship with the former president was “consensual.”
However, in a second essay for Vanity Fair in March, Lewinsky wrote, “Now, at 44, I’m beginning (just beginning) to consider the implications of the power differentials that were so vast between a president and a White House intern. I’m beginning to entertain the notion that in such a circumstance the idea of consent might well be rendered moot.”
Indeed, Clinton used his vast power as the President of the United States to pressure a young, naive woman into a sexual relationship. And while Lewinsky takes full responsibility for her part in the affair, Clinton doesn’t; and – as Lewinsky writes – he has “enough life experience to know better.”
5. To atone for his other sins
(Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
The Lewinsky scandal is what led to Clinton’s impeachment, but it’s far from his only offense. Besides being accused of sexual harassment and assault by numerous women, Juanita Broaddrick has accused Clinton of rape – but Clinton, his family, and the mainstream media have all but dismissed the claims of Broaddrick and others. While nothing short of an admission of guilt could ever begin to atone for Clinton’s sexual misdeeds against women like Broaddrick, a personal apology to Lewinsky could open the door to healing for others. At the very least, it would demonstrate that Clinton has some semblance of a conscience.
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