They pull out the old clips and all the stops. See Ann Lewis circa 1991 excusing Anita Hill for following Clarence Thomas to a new job. The political women who found Thomas' dirty talk enough to disqualify him from the Supreme Court are being asked about the latest scandals. Carol Moseley-Braun, reluctantly pulled to the microphone, says we have to wait for all the facts. I am not surprised by this turn of events.
Life is easier when politics and sexual politics dovetail, when public and private character adhere.
Nor am I surprised the attention is on women. The love of a cat fight, the passion for a civil war among the sisterhood, runs deep. And we know such sexual matters really matter to women's lives. Women who talk disparagingly of the boss who hits on employees, the professor who leches after students - and yet feel compelled to give the president the benefit of any doubts. Still, if women in the inner circle, like women in the polls, stay with the man that brung them to the White House, it is not blind loyalty or rank hypocrisy.