The Lewinsky-Tripp Talks: Friends but Without Much Friendship nytimes.com
In which it is made clear why one side here puts such great stock in Linda Tripp:
Mrs. Tripp, who made the tapes, is frequently unable to resist making her feelings of moral and intellectual superiority clear to the younger woman.
But she was just making a substantial argument, based on facts. Just like everybody around here who wants to stick strictly to Ken Starr's "facts" as the only relevant material.
She corrects Ms. Lewinsky's grammar, sighs at her romantic yearnings, edits her love notes, ridicules her girlish handwriting and needles her with such zingers as, "He's never been attracted to you because you use big words."
When Ms. Lewinsky admits with some embarrassment that she has sent the President her thoughts on education reform, Mrs. Tripp responds, "Oh, you mean an actual idea."
At every opportunity, Mrs. Tripp prods Ms. Lewinsky to push the President harder to get Ms. Lewinsky a job, and not just any job. Mrs. Tripp tries to persuade Ms. Lewinsky that she is thinking too small, settling for too little and going too easy on Clinton.
In Ms. Lewinsky's grand jury testimony, the former White House intern presented herself as an operator who aggressively lobbied the President to find her a well-paying, low-stress job. But these tapes show the extent to which Ms. Lewinsky was in turn influenced by Mrs. Tripp.
Word by word, Mrs. Tripp helped Ms. Lewinsky write the letter demanding that the President help her get a big job.
And so forth. On to the usual ironic conclusion, a bit more biting than normal here.
Ms. Lewinsky gives Mrs. Tripp presents, and showers her with affection and gratitude in a way that Mrs. Tripp obviously enjoyed. But like her involvement with Clinton, the relationship is way off-kilter and, in the end, one-sided.
When Ms. Lewinsky thanks her friend for helping her tape the sexy message to the President, she gushes, "Here you are, sitting on the phone, going over all this stupid [deleted] with me, listening to the tapes." Mrs. Tripp responds, "It's because I care about you, and I -- you know, in my heart of hearts."
Looks like the Heart of Darkness to me.
Cheers, Dan. |
