Kathleen Willey

Nathan Landow, a Maryland developer and a major Democratic Party fund-raiser, is a potential key to unlocking the puzzle of whether Bill Clinton is involved in obstruction of justice, perhaps the most serious legal threat facing the President. Landow's name came up in connection with Kathleen Willey, who testified in January that Clinton fondled her in the White House on Nov. 29, 1993 - an allegation Clinton has denied. Furthermore, Willey has testified that Landow pressured her in October to lie to investigators about the incident.

Does the President of the United States sometimes act like a sex-crazed frat boy? And if so, so what? It's time for the specter of such behavior - which President Clinton has denied under oath - to be taken more seriously by shoulder-shrugging citizens. Now, allegations have been made publicly that are neither murky, second-hand rumors - nor transparently self-serving. A former White House worker, Kathleen Willey, has told a grand jury and a national TV audience that Mr. Clinton crudely pawed her a few steps from the Oval Office in 1993.

In the fall of 1992, candidate Bill Clinton flew into the airport in Richmond, Va. Only a handful of supporters greeted him. Clinton had lost his voice and whispered to Virginia's then-Lt. Gov. Donald S. Beyer: "I remember that woman from some fund-raising activity, but I can't remember her name. " " 'That's Kathy Willey,' " Beyer said he told the candidate. It was a name Clinton would come to remember. Active politically in Virginia and an enthusiastic Clinton-Gore fund-raiser, Kathleen Willey ended up as an obscure White House volunteer.

Such is the power of the TV image, especially one effectively stamped "Approved by '60 Minutes,' " that a lot of sophisticated and influential people declared that Kathleen Willey was a credible person after watching her affecting, emotional appearance with correspondent Ed Bradley Sunday night. "I have to say she has a great deal of credibility," said Patricia Ireland, president of the National Organization for Women. "I found her credible," said Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss.

President Clinton's sex life ought to be off-limits to snoopy prosecutors, litigators and reporters. That's what his defenders have been fuming, and if recent allegations portrayed only a standard-issue adulterer, I might sympathize. Some of America's greatest public servants cheated on their wives. But there are two reasons why such a tolerant attitude won't fly with Bill Clinton. The women he supposedly came on to included relatively powerless employees. And there is the question of committing or encouraging perjury.

The only person to be prosecuted in the Monica Lewinsky affair is a bit player named Julie Hiatt Steele. Did we say prosecuted? We meant "persecuted. " Steele is on trial in federal court in Virginia over a complicated series of alleged lies involving her friend, Kathleen Willey. Willey told a Newsweek reporter that President Clinton made an unwanted sexual advance, and that she told Steele about it the day it happened. Steele told federal investigators that Willey asked her to back up the story, even though it wasn't true.

If the current roller coaster in Washington proves nothing else, it's that citizens need an antidote to the piety and pomposity that passes for most political analysis. With "experts" taking everything so seriously, it's easy to forget that the first intelligent response to much of today's "news" is an ear-piercing scream. What's needed is anti-punditry that showcases the charades infesting public life - and that trumps the blowhards who think every fresh word from Paula Jones' lawyers or Bill Clinton's spin doctors could tilt the republic.

A Beverly Hills book publisher said a lawyer for Kathleen Willey tried to persuade him over a two-month period to buy the former White House volunteer's life story, including her account of an unwelcome sexual advance in the Oval Office. Michael Viner, head of New Millennium Entertainment, said the lawyer, Dan Gecker of Richmond, Va., told Viner he needed $300,000 for the book because Willey was facing a legal judgment for roughly that amount. Viner said Gecker first approached him about seven or eight weeks ago at Willey's request.

Over the years, whenever a woman has alleged that President Clinton is an unfit guardian of the nation's morals, the White House spinmeisters have sprung into action - claiming that any such woman is motivated by greed, is in cahoots with a right-wing conspiracy, or is obsessed with something that did or didn't happen a long time ago in a state far, far away. By those yardsticks, Kathleen Willey may be Bill Clinton's worst nightmare. This is a woman who has no alliance with conservatives and who is reluctantly charging that something tawdry happened right there in the seat of national government.

So when does it end? Will we spend the next 22 months talking about President Clinton's sex life? True, it's not just about sex. It's about character and, perhaps, obstruction of justice, lying and sexual harassment. Yes, Kathleen Willey made a powerful presentation. She appeared credible enough that it was hard for Anita Hill's defenders not to come forward on Willey's behalf. Some of them - notably Hill herself and Patricia Ireland of NOW - did. And it's difficult not to be upset with the President.

The only person to be prosecuted in the Monica Lewinsky affair is a bit player named Julie Hiatt Steele. Did we say prosecuted? We meant "persecuted. " Steele is on trial in federal court in Virginia over a complicated series of alleged lies involving her friend, Kathleen Willey. Willey told a Newsweek reporter that President Clinton made an unwanted sexual advance, and that she told Steele about it the day it happened. Steele told federal investigators that Willey asked her to back up the story, even though it wasn't true.

Of all the subplots in the Monica Lewinsky saga, the case of Julie Hiatt Steele is one of the most baffling. For years, Steele lived in obscurity in the Washington suburbs, looking after her small children and pursuing a career in telecommunications sales. That all changed in 1997 when Steele told a Newsweek reporter that Kathleen Willey, who had worked as a volunteer in the White House, had told her that President Clinton had groped her in the White House. Shortly before that account was published, Steele changed her story, saying that her initial version was a lie that Willey had asked her to tell.

Independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr today will tell Congress that President Clinton has misused his authority and power to try to "thwart the search for truth" in the Monica Lewinsky probe, according to a prepared statement obtained yesterday. The testimony that Starr is set to give to the House Judiciary Committee goes significantly further than his impeachment referral to Congress, which was limited to his investigation of sex and perjury. The portrait of Clinton that emerges from the testimony is that of a president who has gone to great lengths to hinder Starr's four-year investigation at every turn.

As the rolling barrage of bimbo eruptions continues, here's a thought experiment possibly worth contemplating: Where would Bill Clinton be today if he was, in fact, capable of keeping his pants zipped? His status might well be something like that of Teddy Roosevelt in the middle of his second term. In that simpler era, any citizen willing to stand in line for hours could shake the president's hand on New Year's Day, and an unprecedented throng of thousands were in line in 1907 to exercise this privilege.

If the current roller coaster in Washington proves nothing else, it's that citizens need an antidote to the piety and pomposity that passes for most political analysis. With "experts" taking everything so seriously, it's easy to forget that the first intelligent response to much of today's "news" is an ear-piercing scream. What's needed is anti-punditry that showcases the charades infesting public life - and that trumps the blowhards who think every fresh word from Paula Jones' lawyers or Bill Clinton's spin doctors could tilt the republic.

Nathan Landow, a Maryland developer and a major Democratic Party fund-raiser, is a potential key to unlocking the puzzle of whether Bill Clinton is involved in obstruction of justice, perhaps the most serious legal threat facing the President. Landow's name came up in connection with Kathleen Willey, who testified in January that Clinton fondled her in the White House on Nov. 29, 1993 - an allegation Clinton has denied. Furthermore, Willey has testified that Landow pressured her in October to lie to investigators about the incident.

The Clinton Follies (I think that sounds so much better than "the mess in Washington," don't you?) are not nearly over. There are jury trials yet to come, congressional hearings, more investigations and - dare we hope? - still more salacious accusations. But perhaps it's time to pause and consider the lessons of the case so far, the most powerful being this: It's the haircut, Stupid. For six years, Clinton has been pelted with accusations of impropriety by women with funny hair.

Low unemployment, no inflation, a record Dow, minuscule interest rates and now record low oil. It doesn't get any better than this. You're driving to your new high-tech job in your three-ton gas-guzzling sport-ute (bought at zero percent interest) on a tank full of 97-cent gas. And some media moralist is suggesting that you change presidents because of Kathleen Willey! Is he crazy? Oh, lucky man. Richard Nixon got the biggest oil price increase in human history right smack in the middle of Watergate.

Kathleen Willey burst onto the national stage last Sunday with her explosive 60 Minutes story about the President groping and kissing her near the Oval Office. Her story led newspapers across the country. Feminists, many of whom had been hesitant to support Clinton's other accusers, rallied to her side and lashed out against him, using powerful words like "sexual assault" and "sexual predator. " Willey appeared to be the President's worst nightmare coming true. But it hasn't worked out that way, at least not yet. Her story has faded into the background clutter of the ongoing scandal, weakened by public uninterest and her own disputed credibility.

Such is the power of the TV image, especially one effectively stamped "Approved by '60 Minutes,' " that a lot of sophisticated and influential people declared that Kathleen Willey was a credible person after watching her affecting, emotional appearance with correspondent Ed Bradley Sunday night. "I have to say she has a great deal of credibility," said Patricia Ireland, president of the National Organization for Women. "I found her credible," said Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss.