By KATIE ROIPHE
The most striking revelation of the Starr report is the lurid detail it goes
into -- not about sex, but about jobs. Surprisingly large portions of the report
are devoted to Monica Lewinksy's career pursuits. The public has known through
rumor and leaks about the former White House intern's infatuation with the
President, her fantasies of marriage, her sentimental notes and nicknames for a
long time.
But her savvy, ambitious streak did not emerge until the report was released on Friday.
After Ms. Lewinsky was asked to leave the White House, she took a position at the Pentagon, which she found unfulfilling, and, according to her own account, she cried, threatened and cajoled the President into getting her a better job, if not in the White House, then in New York.
There should be a term connoting the opposite of sexual harassment: when a person of less power uses her sexual attractiveness or personal relationship with a person of greater power to get ahead. Whatever we choose to call it, it is a phenomenon abundantly on display in the Starr report. There was definitely a quid pro quo as far as Monica Lewinsky was concerned. She explains to the office of independent counsel that she left the White House "quietly." She did not reveal her intimate relationship with the President. Therefore she felt that she was owed a job. "I don't want to have to work for this position," she said in a recorded conversation, "I just want it to be given to me."
Ms. Lewinsky's tenacious pursuit of a new job is reflected in one late-night phone conversation with the President. She wanted to talk about getting a new job at the White House, and she recalls that he finally said, "I don't want to talk about your job tonight."
The report makes it clear that Clinton is not the one who thinks of offering her a job outside of Washington to buy her silence, but that she is the one who pushes for it relentlessly. According to Ms. Lewinsky's testimony, it was, in fact, her idea that Vernon Jordan be called in to help with her job search because of his connections in the private sector.
She submitted a "wish list" to the President of five New York public relations firms that she wanted to work for, and then explained that she didn't want to be anybody's administrative assistant, an unusual demand for a 24-year-old entering a field in which she has little or no experience. The report tells us that she did "poorly" in several job interviews. But that didn't matter. She was catapulted over these minor obstacles by a single call from Jordan to Ronald Perelman, and got a short-lived job offer from Revlon.
A close reading of the Starr report reveals that Ms. Lewinsky was not just attracted to a man in power, she was attracted to power itself: Her love notes to the President included suggestions on education reform, and she says that she often chatted with him about her ideas of how the country should be run.
When she was frustrated with the progress of her job search she used her personal power over the President to get results: she herself says that she threatened him with disclosure to hasten the process. In another revealing moment, she informed him that Newsweek magazine was working on an article about Kathleen Willey, a former White House volunteer who claimed that the President had made a pass at her. Ms. Lewinsky suggested to the President that he get Ms. Willey a job to appease her and "make this go away."
Raised in a feminist era, Ms. Lewinsky's romantic visions of the future were mingled with fantasies of professional advancement. "I was so sure that the weekend after the election you would call me to come visit you," she wrote the President in a letter she never sent, "and you would kiss me passionately and tell me you couldn't wait to have me back. You'd ask me where I wanted to work and say something akin to 'consider it done' and it would be."
There is nothing inherently wrong with Ms. Lewinsky's way of thinking, or with her attempt to translate her personal relationship with the President into professional advancement. It is a time-honored female tradition to use sexual power as a way to try to improve one's position in the world, immortalized in literature in characters like Becky Sharpe in "Vanity Fair" and Lily Bart in "House of Mirth."
But if there are any lingering doubts about Monica Lewinsky's ability to take
care of herself, any lingering perceptions of her as a victim, an innocent used
for sexual purposes, a careful reading of the Starr report should put them to
rest. Whatever one thinks of Clinton or Monica Lewinsky, it is clear that the
currents of exploitation, as they so often do, ran in both directions. And
looked at in purely personal terms, the phrase "abuse of power" could apply
equally to the President and the 24-year-old former White House intern.
Katie Roiphe is the author of "The Morning After" and "Last Night in Paradise."