Catch-phrase likely to enter the language: “7.87 trillion Caucasians.” From the DNA odds on a semen match. This could serve as a welcome variant to the overused “Is the pope Catholic?”
A Washington catch phrase likely to acquire a second meaning: “face time.” In political circles, it has long meant “precious briefing time with a hard-to-reach senior official.” During Monica’s self-described phase of “continued flirtation” with the Big He, Barry Toiv, then a senior aide to Leon Panetta, observed that she was getting a lot of “face time” with the president. Now it will be impossible for anyone–especially Toiv, who is now deputy press secretary–to ever use that tell-tale phrase without inducing snickers.
Monica’s taste in gift books was…well…eclectic. In addition to the oft-discussed Vox, Lewinsky also gave Clinton a bar-mitzvah leftover called Oy Vey! The Things They Say: A Guide to Jewish Wit. Checking with Amazon.com, Chatterbox discovered that the paperback version has been marked down to $3.46. As of Friday, this Borscht Belt joke book ranked a pallid 153,339 on Amazon’s sales list. Chatterbox predicts that sales will soon firm.
–Walter Shapiro and Timothy Noah
