Game of American politics

By MATT DEES

© St. Petersburg Times, published August 6, 2000

Politics often result in some strange bedfellows, but who would expect to find books by such political opposites as William Safire and Joe Eszterhas to have anything in common?

Eszterhas is a child of the 1960s, free-spirited and rebellious. A former writer for Rolling Stone, his political and social views are decidedly liberal, and he unabashedly rails against Republicans as hateful elitists.

Safire, on the other hand, became famous for criticizing liberals as idealistic simpletons, with President Richard Nixon as his mouthpiece. Since then, he has been one of the few conservative columnists for the New York Times, espousing his codgerly wisdom for more than a quarter century.

Yet despite stark contrasts between these two authors, their new books -- both on American political scandals -- are full of interesting parallels.

The contrasting tones of Scandalmonger and American Rhapsody at first make it difficult to find any correlations between these two books. On the surface, Eszterhas comes across as a particularly crude locker room buddy, while Safire could be dramatizing a college lecture.

But a closer look shows that political scandals now and then share much in common.

Eszterhas' Rhapsody is a lascivious part-memoir, part-dramatized history on the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Juxtaposing personal reflections on his wild days as a sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll aficionado with racy retellings of the events that led to President Clinton's impeachment, Eszterhas attempts to explain the roots of the chief executive's insatiable sexual appetite.

He makes a lewd yet somewhat persuasive apology for the president's indiscretions but chastises him for lacking the gall to own up to them. Rhapsody's last chapter consists of some encouraging words and even a rap song from the presidential member, dubbed "Willard" by Eszterhas. ("It's longer than "Willy,' " explained Clinton to a girlfriend.) Twisted humor aside, the point is that "Willard" is both the president's best friend and worst enemy.

Eye-opening for those of us who would never have compared William Jefferson Clinton to Thomas Jefferson, Safire's more straightforward historical novel, Scandalmonger, recreates the early political scandals that shaped America in its infant years following the Revolutionary War and the adoption of the Constitution. Through the lenses of early America's two most prominent journalists, William Cobbett and Thomas Callendar, Safire explains the political consequences of two Founding Fathers' sexual misconduct: Alexander Hamilton's affair with a married woman and Thomas Jefferson's trysts with slave Sally Hemings.

Safire largely succeeds in revealing the seedy underbelly of America's early years, painting a much different picture than that of the rosy patriotic history taught to us in school. The dialogue used to advance the plot is not as contrived as some historical fiction, and Safire is fair in divulging the strengths and shortcomings of his characters.

So what do these works have in common?

The most important component of all these scandals is, of course, sex. The stained dress sold more newspapers than Whitewater, just as the underlying speculation scandal that prompted Hamilton to disclose his sins with Maria Reynolds caused less stir than the shocking confession itself.

While Eszterhas seems more caught up with the juicier details than Safire, both adequately convey that it is the fallout following these actions that matter in the course of human history.

But there is a key difference between the scandals of the 18th century and Clinton's 20th century debacle, at least as they're depicted in these works.

Back then, Scandalmonger asserts, some men were willing to sacrifice their personal character and political ambitions for the good of the government and their reputations as public servants. Case in point: Hamilton publicizes, in detail, his affair with a married woman in order to deflect attention from a probe into a speculation scandal that historians, including Safire, acknowledge was immoral if not illegal. "The former Treasury Secretary did the only thing he could do to protect what was most important to George Washington, the man most important to him," Safire writes in Callendar's voice. "Falsely betraying his wife was insignificant compared with truly betraying his country. The fallen patriot had responded as a patriot should, drawing enemy fire on himself rather than letting it bombard his government."

Clinton, on the other hand, did everything in his power to avoid damaging his all-important legacy. Ultimately, Eszterhas says, Clinton was more interested in saving his skin than upholding the ideals of his fellow baby boomers, who curdled at the thought of one of their own joining the likes of (gulp) "Tricky Dick" Nixon.

Both books are well researched (Safire spends nearly 50 pages showing just how much), and each offers interesting glimpses into our leaders' back rooms and bedrooms. Their works show that some things haven't changed in politics (or human nature) and that some things, indeed, have. In the end, though, their similarities reveal more about the game that is American politics than they do any kinship between the two authors.

Matt Dees, the 2000 Pittman Scholar at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and editor of the Daily Tar Heel, is an intern at the Times.

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.