TEHRAN On September 3, 1998, Senator Joseph Lieberman took to the floor of the U.S. Senate to criticize President Bill Clinton for his relationship with Monica Lewinsky, calling it "immoral" and "embarrassing." "My immediate reaction to this statement was deep disappointment and personal anger.
I was disappointed because the president of the United States had just confessed to engaging in an extramarital affair with a young woman in his employ and to willfully deceiving the nation about his conduct," he said.
Countering arguments that the extramarital relationship was a family matter, Lieberman said, "... the reality in 1998 is that a president's private life is public." "So when his personal conduct is embarrassing, it is so not just for him and his family. It is embarrassing for us all as Americans," he said.
"His duty ... is nothing less than the stewardship of our values.
So no matter how much the president or others may wish to 'compartmentalize' the different spheres of his life, the inescapable truth is that the president's private conduct can and often does have profound public consequences," he said.
Lieberman argued for some form of censure against the president, saying "... the transgressions the president has admitted to are too consequential for us to walk away and leave the impression for our children and for our posterity that what President Clinton acknowledges he did within the White House is acceptable behavior for our nation's leader." Leading Arab American Group Appalled at Gore's VP Choice Meanwhile a leading Arab American group reacted with dismay on Monday as it became clear that Vice President Al Gore had selected Senator Joseph Lieberman, an Orthodox Jew, as his running mate in November's presidential election.
The American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee said the choice of Lieberman, leaked by Democratic Party sources on Monday, raised questions about the future role of the United States in Middle East peace talks.
"Mr. Lieberman's record of wholehearted support for Israel doesn't bode well for a future Gore administration being any more even handed than Clinton was," Hussein Ibish, the committee's director of communications told AFP.
"He is one of the more pro-Israel legislators in Congress and has been severely pro-Israel for years," he said, while pointing out that the committee was a non-partisan organization and did not endorse politicians.
Many Arab American groups charge that President Bill Clinton, and previous presidents, have leaned too far toward Israel in trying to promote Middle East peace, partly owing to the strength of the Jewish lobby in U.S. politics.
Ibish also hit out at the Republican Party, which held its convention last week in Philadelphia and focused heavily on the 1990-91 Persian Gulf War in which Iraq was evicted from Kuwait.
"It was very chilling to see the Republican National Convention morph into a Persian Gulf War reunion party," he said.
Delegates at the convention feted former president George Bush, who marshaled an international coalition to take on Iraq, former head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell and Desert Storm Commander General Norman Schwarzkopf.
Republicans claim that Clinton's administration has run down the military to such an extent that it would now be incapable of mounting an operation similar to Desert Storm.