Rudy is Appalling as is Politico

I am so naive that I can still be shocked by Rudolph Giuliani who said

"after being married to Bill Clinton for 20 years, if you didn’t know the moment Monica Lewinsky said that Bill Clinton violated her that she was telling the truth, then you’re too stupid to be president.”

The problem (revealing utter moral depravity) is that Monica Lewinsky never said that Bill Clinton violated her. She also didn't say he sexually harassed her. To Giuliani, there seems to be no difference between genuinely consensual sex by 2 adults and violation.

I am also so naive that I can still be appalled by "Politico's lack of editorial standards. Louis Nelson quoted Giuliani without noting that he conflated sex and violation. Giuliani's claim about what Lewinsky said is just false and an adequate reporter would have noted this fact.

Others note that Giuliani holds wives responsible for their husbands' infidelity. This is, in fact, part of a long now mostly obsolete Catholic tradition (which was never official doctrine) which includes the phrase "dovere congiugale" (which is Italian for women are obliged to have sex with their husbands even if they don't want to because that is the only way to prevent adultery).

But to me the key point is that, to him, it doesn't matter at all that Lewinsky took the initiative (not that there is anything wrong with that). This used to be the standard view here (in Rome) 2000 years ago (also later and moving to Istanbul in the law promulgated by Constantine which mandated the death penalty for voluntary premarital sex (obviously only if the father of the woman had high social class). I had hoped humanity had moved on.

As to the alleged stupidity, Giuliani knows a lot about how often spouses (such as his two wives) are the last to know.

I have heard of Clinton attacking Lewinsky a lot recently. I don't recall any such attacks. Now, one way or the other, it is not at all surprising that she was irritated with a woman who claims to have had sex with her husband (even if Lewinsky first said it to someone she thought was a friend in what she thought was strict confidence). Again, Rudy must know all about that. But when two people contest the facts, saying you trust and believe one isn't attacking the other.

I do think that what Clinton did was morally wrong especially given the gap in ages and huge gap in power. But "violated" is a strong word which, in context, means "raped". Giuliani doesn't understand the moral difference between voluntary sex and rape. Now I am not saying that I am therefore confident that he has raped. Based on his attitude, I strongly suspect that he has, but I know of no evidence of any specific rape (of course I know that Trump has been accused of rape by two women and of sexual assault by a third and I am very very sure that Donald Trump is a rapists (I note that here the standard for what I just typed to be both a tort and a crime is that it was false -- not knowing is no defense here).