Bill Clinton, who was disgraced three years ago when details of his affair with former intern Monica Lewinsky were made known, avoided being expelled from office. This month, he tied with the pope for the man Americans most admire. How well Norquist is equipped to deal with this crisis in his career has a lot to do with his personality, his friends and foes say. If he can quietly go about his business and convince the people of Milwaukee that they are better off with him as mayor than without him, then people will be willing to move on, they say. People are more interested in their leaders running good government than what they do in their private lives.
Talk is cheap, the observers say.
The full-page ad Norquist took out last month, in which he acknowledged that he made a mistake and said he was sorry, did little to convince many people that he was sincerely contrite, judging from the content of the letters to the editor that followed. Norquist declined to be interviewed for this story. His spokesman, Steve Filmanowicz, said the mayor expressed his thoughts on the matter in his ad, which ran twice in this newspaper. Norquist breezed into the mayor's office in the spring of 1988 as an upstart promising change from the stale air of Maier's 28-year reign at City Hall. Norquist would bring youthful energy to this staid city and be a voice for the many folks who were tired of the same old bombastic rhetoric from Maier.