Why Do So Few Want Clinton Cast Out?

In the final scene of Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather,” Michael Corleone’s wife, Kay, asks him if it is true that he ordered the murder of his sister’s husband. At first he refuses to answer, eventually exploding in anger at her: “Don’t ever ask me about my business!” Seeing the hurt and fear his response has inflicted, he unexpectedly relents, telling his wife that “this one time” he will permit her to ask him about his business affairs. Kay meekly repeats her question, and for a long moment of almost unbearable cinematic tension, he lets it hang in the air. Then he says the words she is so desperate to hear: “No. No, it’s not true.” The look of profound love and even deeper relief that sweeps over Kay’s face provides the perfect exclamation point to the film’s climactic moment of corruption and betrayal.

I thought of this scene while listening to the senatorial sparring over whether the president’s endlessly slippery evasions before a federal grand jury have added up to an impeachable brand of perjury. The brilliance of the concluding image in “The Godfather” is that after witnessing three hours of murder, mayhem and every conceivable form of treachery, it is nevertheless Michael’s point blank lie to his wife that fully makes clear the depth of the moral depravity into which he has sunk.

The president’s impeachment trial also brings to mind the contrast between Michael’s lie to Kay and his appearance before a Senate committee. In the course of that testimony, we see Michael perjure himself again and again. Nevertheless, we still feel a certain sympathy for the harried witness as he is forced to listen to the hypocritical posturing of a senator who a few weeks earlier had attempted to extract a bribe from the very man the committee is now interrogating.

Of course, the lies and evasions that are common features of such legal proceedings remain for the most part morally indefensible. Still, these sorts of evasions are in some sense understood to be part of the game, especially when that game takes on the corrupt character that marks our current willingness to mix power politics with a cynical exploitation of the legal process.

When Bill Clinton appeared to lie under oath, he may have broken the law. But when he wagged his finger at the American people, assuring us that he had “not had sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky,” he broke something even more important: the almost personal bond that this most emotive of presidents had labored to construct between himself and the people who elected him. This was no lawyerly evasion, designed to squirm out of a tight spot in a corrupt legal game. This was an egregious lie, told directly to the American people, many of whom understand the difference between misleading and evasive answers given in a deposition and betraying the trust of a friend or a spouse. That this lie represented nothing more noble than a craven attempt to save its speaker’s political skin would seem to make it all the more unforgivable.

So how can it be that there is still so little support for removing the president? We must conclude that, if the polls are to be trusted, the American people have decided to play the role of a loyal Mafia wife. On finding themselves forced to ask their man about his “business,” they were told an unambiguous and outrageous lie. They have nevertheless chosen not to walk out on him, even though this requires ignoring the enormity of the insult that lie represented. Naturally their anger has now turned on those who keep reminding them of the nature of the choice they have made.

When offered the chance to divorce themselves from a president who betrayed their trust, the American people have flatly declined the invitation. Yet congressional Republicans persist in their attempt to make this an offer we can’t refuse. Is it surprising that this insistence on reminding us that to ignore such a lie is to be in some measure humiliated by it has now made the president’s accusers the focus of the public’s wrath?