American Politics Journal

Karma and Dogma
Condit, CelebCorps and Bush
By Tamara Baker

Monday, July 9, 2001 -- SAINT PAUL, MINNESOTA (APJP) -- Back in 1998, Rep. Gary Condit (D-CA), a "Blue Dog Democrat" (read: modern-day Dixiecrat) from a conservative California district, won the hearts and minds of the equally-conservative Beltway Press Buzzards by condemning -- early and often -- President Clinton's affair with former White House staffer Monica Lewinsky.

In ringing terms, he urged the President to make full disclosure of the affair, saying that the "drip, drip, drip" of dribbling details could only damage him further. Condit even went so far as to be one of the few House Democrats to vote for an impeachment inquiry.

There is no justice in this world, but there is irony.

On April 30 of this year, Chandra Levy, a young woman who worked as an intern in the Federal Government, left her Washington, DC home with only the clothes on her back and her keys. Her bags were packed just inside her door.

Now, Ms. Levy was known, by both her relatives and friends, to be a "very good friend" of none other than one Rep. Gary Condit! This was despite the fact that the congressman, publicly at least, displayed the appearance of being very much the dedicated husband to his ailing wife, whose invalidism kept her confined to her California home and well out of the District of Columbia.

Keep in mind that in missing-persons cases the police proceed from these assumptions:

1) A woman like Ms. Levy is far more likely to suffer harm at the hands of a boyfriend than she is from a stranger, and

2) Anyone missing for more than two months is in all likelihood never going to be found alive -- if ever.

Assumption #1 means that the first thing the cops are going to do is to check out all the boyfriends/husbands/lovers of the missing lady. And as early as the first week of the investigation, Condit's name turned up as being that of Chandra Levy's boyfriend.

Now, let's step back for a moment and look at the story and how it's unfolded.

If Monica Lewinsky had disappeared in, say, March of 1997, it would have been news everywhere within hours -- especially after her involvement with Bill Clinton came to light (and it would have). Clinton would have hounded from office within weeks.

But in Blue Dog Dixiecrat Condit's case, it took the national media nearly two months to notice him -- and even now, the negative press attention he's getting pales in comparison to what Bill Clinton got over a few hummers.

Think about it: a man is suspected of an affair with a consenting co-worker, and gets the Third Degree. A man is romantically linked to a missing (and probably dead) woman, and gets, by comparison, kid-glove treatment.

The difference? The first man is hated by the press; the second man is adored by them.

The result? Press coverage that shows the major-league disconnect between the corporate GOP-friendly Celebrity Press Corps and the rest of America.

It isn't just in Condit's case that this disconnect is apparent. Frank Rich, one of the few columnists on the New York Times staff that's allowed to say the truth, said this recently:

What we have here, big time, is another case of disconnect between the Beltway and the country. In the Clinton years, Washington kept saying that Americans would soon give the president the boot, only to be rebuffed by the president's high job ratings, which were then confirmed by the Democrats' romp in the 1998 election, at the height of the impeachment frenzy. In the Bush years the disconnect has inverted itself: Washington keeps saying that the country is warming to its decent new president, only to be confounded by polls showing what CNN has described as "a slow, steady slide spread out over several months" that is capsizing the G.O.P.'s ratings at an even steeper pace.

I couldn't have said it better myself, Frank.