Death of American Virtue - Ken Gormley [338]
Monica herself completely “flipped out.” Ginsburg had shown Monica and her father a first draft of the article—they had made clear that “he was not supposed to publish it.” She later recalled: “I was with my dad and we were beside ourselves.”
Around this time, prominent Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz spoke on television, his entire face filling up the screen: “Lewinsky family, listen to me. Get rid of Ginsburg.” As Bernie would recall, “And that’s pretty much what put us over the edge.”
Several high-level advisers in the Clinton White House later defended Bill Ginsburg’s legacy, saying that he did exactly what an aggressive criminal defense lawyer was supposed to do: He confused the opposition and tangled up the prosecution in knots. One White House insider noted, “Ginsburg deserves a lot of credit for driving them nuts. He protected his client through his egomania. He did a good job for his client.”
Ginsburg himself, sipping coffee in the trendy Jerry’s Diner nestled in the picturesque hills of Encino, California, later reflected on this unusual detour in his career, maintaining that he always tried to act in the best interests of his client. A prosperous medical-malpractice attorney with offices in multiple states, Ginsburg defended his handling of the Lewinsky matter: “[I] kept Monica out of the grand jury and away from indictment for nearly six months.” The “Open Letter to Kenneth Starr,” he said, was a last-ditch effort to grab his attention because Starr “wouldn’t communicate with me personally.” After their brief meeting in the OIC lavatory, Ginsburg had run into Starr only once, while arguing a motion in front of Judge Johnson. Ginsburg had sidled up to him and said in a friendly tone, “Ken, you and me and Sam [Dash] ought to sit down sometime, you know, in a deli somewhere and figure this all out.” Starr had smiled, but he had never gotten back to him.
So Ginsburg decided, “Okay, if this is where we’re at, I’ve got to destroy this man because he represents the worst [in government]—not only the position he holds, but the way he handles the position that he holds. He won’t even [negotiate]. It is his way or the highway.” Ginsburg had planned to send the independent counsel a copy of the “Open Letter to Kenneth Starr” with a note: “Dear Ken, what are we doing here? Why are we killing ourselves?”
He never sent that note, Ginsburg later explained, because his piece was reprinted in the Washington Post “before I could address the envelope.”
With respect to the comment that he had kissed Monica’s “little pulkes” as a baby, Ginsburg felt the media had made a big deal out of nothing, unduly upsetting the Lewinsky family. “I’m kind of a Dutch uncle,” he explained. “So what the hell are they talking about? They’re trying to make everything be a sexual thing. And that’s ridiculous. It would be like saying that [someone] had a newborn baby and I kissed him, and that I was, you know, a pervert.” Ginsburg believed that he had been caught in the middle of a “typhoon,” becoming a victim of the media’s unhealthy obsession with the Lewinsky scandal.
Moreover, Ginsburg insisted that he had talked about stepping down as counsel before his services were terminated, because he had reached a philosophical impasse with his client. According to Ginsburg’s version of how the relationship ended, Monica Lewinsky was now prepared to negotiate immunity “at any cost.” In Ginsburg’s view, it would be an “indignity” to both Monica and President Clinton to disclose the sordid details of their relationship to this drooling band of Starr’s prosecutors. He knew about the blue Gap dress; he feared it would open up a can of worms if its existence were disclosed. Ginsburg had come to believe that “no grand jury