The first enabler

First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton has begun her campaign for the Senate from New York in an odd fashion. After completing her “listening tour” of a state in which she has never lived, she has now spoken in some detail about her relationship with her husband in an interview with Talk magazine.

In it, Mrs. Clinton describes the “great pain” the president’s affair with Monica Lewinsky caused her, but surprisingly, never holds him accountable. Instead, she contends that he was mentally abused as a child, which accounts for his marital infidelities. “He was so young, barely four, when he was scarred by the abuse that he can’t even take it out and look at it.”

The source of this childhood abuse was conflict between his mother and grandmother in which they had a physical confrontation over who would raise him. To call conflict between two family members over the style of parenting “abuse” means that a large percentage of Americans are victims of abuse.

Whatever it is called, it does not give one permission to behave any way one likes. Mrs. Clinton described it as an accomplishment when her husband does not commit infidelities. The moral confusion in her apology for his behavior qualifies as awe-inspiring and provides a new standard for enabling addictive behaviors. Tammy Wynette is a feminist compared with Mrs. Clinton.

Better to refuse to discuss his past infidelities and their private life, thereby allowing Mrs. Clinton to focus on the important issues that face New Yorkers locally and nationally. Instead, she has opened herself up to continuing criticism by absolving Mr. Clinton of a history of marital transgressions.

Her view of her husband was and should have remained her private business. Her attempt to remodel her public portrait was unnecessary and unfortunate. We have had eight years of Mrs. Clinton the first lady, much of it the long-suffering and reluctantly dutiful partner. This was her opportunity to demonstrate her much ballyhooed intelligence in policy-making, her debating and speechmaking skills, her chance to step out of the long shadow of the president. Instead, she begins her campaign by creating new diagnostic categories to explain behaviors that are as old as the Bible she quotes.

Many Democrats had hoped that Mrs. Clinton could revitalize the liberal wing of their party. Instead, she presents a rather sad picture of a wife still under the influence of her husband’s excuses, trying to justify very difficult personal choices. That’s her business, it should not be ours. There’s still plenty of time to focus the campaign on what she thinks. Let’s leave the president in Washington.