Kathryn Harrison and D.T. Max

Reader Comments From The Fray:


[Notes from the Fray Editor: Richard Riley lives in flyover country and has only ever come across 'Jewess' in the book Ivanhoe. A-Z says Jewish practices are matrilineal, not matriarchal. Sean Fitzgerald doesn't know what the deal would be if the intern was black, and asks for enlightenment. Whither the "Breakfast Table"? Regular readers make their comments in this thread, and have suggestions for future participants.]

First of all, it isn't about the supposedly unique attractiveness of Jewish women. Both Clinton and Condit had relationships with other women who were not Jewish. The attractive quality was not Jewishess, but availability. These guys, especially Clinton, had limited opportunities to meet available women. So how are Jewish interns available to Democratic politicians? Two American cultural traditions play a role:

First, internships go to families connected to campaign contributors, and American Jews are disproportionately represented among large contributors to the Democratic party. No surprise that many Democratic interns come from Jewish families.

Second, there is an American Jewish tradition of supporting adult children through more years of education (including unpaid internships) than is standard in other U.S. cultural communities, even at comparable parental income levels. Some connect it to the yeshiva tradition in Eastern Europe, where supporting a scholar who never holds down a job was a matter of pride for an extended family. Why this tradition stuck over the generations even among the nonreligious is an interesting question. Both Chandra and Monica were still apparently supported by their parents well into their mid-twenties.

Put these factors together, and a high proportion of young democratic DC interns are Jewish. It's not a surprise that some of the women get involved with the bosses.

This pop sociology comes from the inside, as I was young and Jewish in the DC intern world myself once, and later a parentally-supported Jewish law student.

--Arthur Stock

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As I see it this "Breakfast Table" manages to give any Frayster a choice of ticking time bombs to try and disarm (or throw at other Fraysters). First, a discussion of the sexual mores of Jewish women. While I have identified a Jewish conspiracy to take all my money and life-force, the conspiracy appears limited to my wife and children. Moreover, a first person comment on whether I think Jewish women are easy for Presbyterian men, would leave me in a deeply compromised position if my wife read it. So I will boldly leave this issue alone. The raising of the second issue reminds me of a little boy who has forgotten what happens when you hit a hornets nest with a stick. So I will simply confine myself to saying that Republicans are low-life fascists who don't deserve to ever hold office in a free country.

--Neill Hamilton

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It doesn't help anybody to understand these situations by pretending that the women involved were empty little china dolls broken by big, bad men. I don't know what the deal is with Levy and Condit, but anyone who read that turgid Starr report saw that Monica Lewinsky was a participant, not a puppet, in what happened.

There are women who are attracted to power, and there are women who play on the shortcomings of powerful men for their own reasons. To suppose otherwise is to deny them the very three-dimensional existence that women's empowerment is supposed to provide. To suppose otherwise is to do a shocking disservice to the thousands of young women who cycle through Washington, DC, every year, working hard and getting ahead and never once thinking that it would be all right to sleep with a married man who insisted you not bring ID on your "dates."

--Shark

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(7/16)

• Cohen: How an Economic Crisis Is Like a War
• Froomkin: How's Bush? Put a Fork in Him.
• Milbank: A House Divided Along Twisted Lines
• Robinson: Ugly Politics at Justice | Q&A