It is Us

“We have met the enemy and he is us.”

In March of 1999, Congressmen Bob Livingston (R-Louisiana) had just been elected Speaker of the House of Representatives, succeeding Newt Gingrich, and was forced to resign from office because it was revealed that he had several extra-marital affairs in his past. This turn of events came shortly after Bill Clinton was impeached for having an affair with 20-year-old intern, Monica Lewinsky, and for sexually harassing Paula Jones while he was Governor of Arkansas. Congress voted to not remove Clinton from office, but forced Livingston out.

Livingston was forced to resign, we were told at the time, not because of his extramarital affairs but because of his hypocrisy. Bob Livingston had been one of the leading voices against Bill Clinton during his impeachment which made Livingston’s sexual improprieties intolerable. It did not matter that Clinton did some of the same things that sent Harvey Weinstein to prison, Clinton kept his job because he was not a hypocrite whereas, Livingston lost his Congressional seat because he was – he tried to hold someone accountable to a moral and ethical standard that he had failed to live up to.