Corruption & Scandals, U.S. Politics & Government - 1992-2001, U.S. Politics - Public Affairs & Administration
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Overview
The greatest threat to the future of the office of the American Presidency may turn on whether William Jefferson Clinton told a lie, under oath, and then tried — unsuccessfully — to keep secret his sexual relationship with a 21-year-old White House intern. The media's feeding frenzy and the public's voyeuristic prurience have been fueled by almost daily disclosures about this affair, making The Starr Report itself an instant #1 national bestseller. Yet all of this obscures the very real matters of state that lie at the heart of the Starr investigation. In Sexual McCarthyism, best-selling author Alan M. Dershowitz addresses the key issues at stake — issues that transcend the titillating daily headlines — and what their long-term importance and effects my be. Among the many important questions he raises and then answers are these:
- Why the President's private life actually is the business of the American people.
- Why the independent counsel law is a necessary evil, but why the appointment of Kenneth Starr was improper.
- Why the Supreme Court was right in requiring the President to submit to the Paula Jones lawsuit.
- Why Kenneth Starr's leaking of testimony and evidence is at least as serious an obstruction of justice as anything alleged against the President.
- What the lasting constitutional, historical, and political legacy of this case is likely to be.
Long after the buzz and sizzle of "Monica-Gate" has subsided, readers will still be looking to Sexual McCarthyism as a substantive, clear, and definitive analysis of the underlying importance of one of the most serious, yet entirely avoidable, developments in modern American presidential politics.
Editorials
Allen D. Boyer
[Dershowitz] has little good to say about anyone involved in the investigation....[he] feels that this inquiry is rooted in dubious politics...and that Clinton's evasions do not justify his impeachment.— The New York Times Book Review
Booknews
Harvard legal scholar Dershowitz presents a timely analysis and chronology of events leading up to what he terms "the Clinton/Starr constitutional crisis," tracing it back to its Whitewater roots. The partisan author probes beyond the current headlines to raise questions about whether the President's private life is the public's business, the independent counsel's equating of sex and politics, and the likely precedent-setting legacies of this case. No index. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.Allen D. Boyer
[Dershowitz] has little good to say about anyone involved in the investigation....[he] feels that this inquiry is rooted in dubious politics...and that Clinton's evasions do not justify his impeachment.— The New York Times Book Review
Book Details
Published
February 1, 1999
Publisher
New York, N.Y. : Basic Books, c1998.
Pages
256
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9780465016280