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Showing Original Post only (View all)Shame on Monica Lewinsky [View all]
Editor's note: Timothy Stanley is a historian and columnist for Britain's Daily Telegraph. He is the author of the new book "Citizen Hollywood: How the Collaboration Between L.A. and D.C. Revolutionized American Politics." The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.
(CNN) -- Shameless. There's no other word to describe Monica Lewinsky. Sixteen years after her affair with President Bill Clinton became public knowledge, she's returned to the limelight with a campaign against cyberbullying -- of which she claims to have been "patient zero."
Ignore the fact that she was patently not the primary victim in the Zippergate affair (poor Hillary Clinton was) or that any comparison with someone suffering a disease, especially at a time when people are dropping dead from Ebola, is tasteless in the extreme.
What's most depressing is that when she rejoined the public stage, she said she was inspired to speak out by the story of Tyler Clementi, a student who committed suicide after a video of him kissing another boy went up online. Young Clementi was the victim of societal homophobia as well as an invasion of his privacy, and his death makes any comparison with Lewinsky's self-imposed troubles ridiculous. Moreover, Clementi died in 2010. Lewinsky has decided to revisit his cause in 2014, suggesting that the timing may have less to do with him than it does with Hillary Clinton.
And, of course, this will be embarrassing for Hillary Clinton. Lewinsky has joined Twitter, which will allow her to make uncensored remarks in the course of the 2016 campaign. And Lewinsky has also lashed out at the way the White House machine trashed her in its desire to protect Bill Clinton's reputation (as it was paid to do -- she had an affair with the President of the United States, not an anonymous bank manager no one gave a damn about)
http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/21/opinion/stanley-monica-lewinsky-shameless/?cid=ob_articlesidebarall&iref=obnetwork