While waiting for the trial to start, and therefore the accusations against Silvio Berlusconi are also discussed in an official forum according to the law, the national debate is unstoppable and in the last week invaded every kind of television program: from the talk shows of the second evening to those of early evening, from the hits and answers in the newscasts to afternoon magazines to the containers of the morning. Each of these occasions sees one or more exponents of the center to play the ungrateful role of the defender of Berlusconi, forced to respond to interceptions and elements that are more than explicit and difficult to contradict, beyond their criminal relief. The tactic is therefore a: throw the ball in the stands. Scream, rant, change the subject. To confront the interlocutor with his own phrase of the last twenty years so as to be able to accuse him of hypocrisy. And pull Bill Clinton in the middle. At some point, of whatever you’re talking about, Berlusconi’s duty defender quotes the story of Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky. He does this to reproach the alleged absolutist comments expressed at the time against Bill Clinton by the leftist press, or to say that the whole world is a country and that presidents judge themselves by their political actions and not by their private life.
The day when it all started is January 17, 1998. The Drudge Report website reports that the Newsweek editorial team decided last minute not to include an article in a weekly issue on a US President’s report. a 23-year-old intern. The investigation arrived a few days later in the Washington Post: it was told of the “love letters” sent by the intern to the president, their “meetings” in various places in the White House and the existence of records that would have proven them. The identity of the intern, called Monica Lewinsky, is revealed: she worked for a long time in the White House and was transferred to the Pentagon a few months ago.
What happened? In 1995 Monica Lewinsky was hired by the White House as an intern: over the course of the week, she met President Clinton and held a close relationship with him. At the end of the year, Lewinsky is hired by the legislative office, and is assigned a task that leads her to deliver documents several times a day in the Oval Office. In April 1996, Lewinsky was transferred to the Pentagon. The person who makes this decision, Evelyn Lieberman, will tell the New York Times that he has done so because of the immature and inadequate behavior shown by Lewinsky in his work. Lewinsky starts working at the Pentagon and becomes a friend of Linda Tripp, a new colleague Meanwhile
A crucial event happens between the end of 1997 and the publication of the articles. On May 6, 1994, a woman named Paula Jones had reported Bill Clinton for sexual harassment. He claimed to have been harassed on May 8, 1991, when Clinton was governor of Arkansas. President Clinton rejected all charges and was eventually acquitted, as there was no evidence of alleged harassment. During the trial hearings, however, Paula Jones’s lawyers brought both Clinton and some White House employees into the classroom among those who worked more closely with him, including Monica Lewinsky. Both Clinton and Lewinsky denied under oath that they had sexual relations or relationships.
With whom you speak Linda Tripp
On January 7, 1998, Linda Tripp went to Kenneth Starr, the US independent prosecutor, who was already investigating some minor scandals involving the Clinton administration. Tells its story, offers the recordings. On January 14, 1998, Linda Tripp again meets Monica Lewinsky, wearing a tape recorder: the former White House intern gives Tripp a copy of a document entitled “Things to say during the testimony”, saying that it had been delivered by an employee of the White House. The document contained a guide with things to say and not to say during his deposition. Three days later, on January 17, 1998, Drudge Report will make the matter surface. It is the beginning of the so-called Sexgate.

The Starr investigation
Starr is an iron republican. Start calling all White House employees, question them, compare their depositions. A tough legal battle that lasts for months, while Clinton continues to deny having had any kind of improper relationship with Monica Lewinsky and the same Lewinsky deals with Starr in search of an agreement to have immunity. Linda Tripp is heard three times, her records are put on record but another proceeding is opened concerning the lawfulness of her actions and therefore the procedural use of illegally registered tapes. Finally, on July 28th, Monica Lewinsky signed an agreement with Kenneth Starr: she and her relatives had complete immunity, and Kenneth Starr made a full confession. The day after Bill Clinton announces that he will voluntarily testify, so Starr withdraws the invitation to introduce himself that he had sent him.
What does Monica Lewinsky say?
The former intern says he has never had sex with Clinton but has practiced oral sex on several occasions. On November 15, 1995, in an office adjacent to the Oval Office; November 17, 1995, while Bill Clinton was on the phone with a deputy; December 31, 1995 in a room in the White House; on January 7th 1996 in the Oval Office; January 21, 1996 in an entrance hall adjacent to the Oval Office; on 4 February 1996 in the Oval Office; March 31, 1996 near the Oval Office; February 28, 1997 near the Oval Office; March 29, 1997 in a room in the White House. Lewinsky delivers a blue dress to the FBI: he says he wore it on February 28th 1997 and on that dress there are traces of Bill Clinton’s semen, as the exams will make.
The deposition of Bill Clinton
On 17 August 1998 Bill Clinton became the first president in office to testify before a jury investigating his conduct. Immediately after the deposition Clinton appears on television telling that the January deposition was “legally correct” but recognizes that it was not accurate. He therefore admits that between him and Monica Lewinsky there have been “inappropriate relationships” but claims to have never forced anyone to lie. He says he is sorry and sorry, asks the country to respect the privacy of his family and says he is ready to take all the responsibility for his behavior and his mistakes.
The documents at the Congress
The following month, the attorney Starr, at the request of the Chamber, sends a 453-page report to the Congress and 36 boxes full of evidence, reports, reports, testimonies, videos, reports on the case. Republicans spread Starr’s report on the internet. In between there are the Clinton depositions during the Lewinsky case and during the Jones case, dry and detailed. Everything becomes public. Including a fundamental passage, the one in which Starr asks Clinton for the statement made during the harassment trial in Paula Jones, when he denied the relationship with Lewinsky. Clinton will say that he did not consider oral sex a “sexual act” because, by receiving it, he had not come into contact with any part of Monica Lewinsky’s body indicated by the document as “sexual areas” nor was it intended to “gratify” her from the point of sexual view. So he claims he did not lie under oath.

impeachment
Republicans in the House start impeachment practices: American law, in fact, allows Congress to remove the president of the United States, in the event of corruption, betrayal or otherwise very serious crimes. It takes a simple majority vote of the Chamber to begin the trial, and a two-thirds vote of the Senate – at the end of a parliamentary inquiry – to conclude it with the removal of the president. On October 8, 1998, the Republican Chamber voted to authorize impeachment. Bill Clinton becomes the second president in the history of the United States to undergo this process, after the Democratic Johnson in 1868. The process begins. In mid-December, the Chamber made two accusations against Clinton, accusing him of perjury and of obstructing justice.
Clinton’s popularity
Although everything was certainly very serious and embarrassing, Clinton’s popularity experienced no decline. The US economy was experiencing a period of explosion with few precedents in American history and in front of the rabid republican accusations, the people sided with Clinton, whose popularity steadily stood at around 60 percent, and during the trial he climbed up to exceed 70 percent of US voters. Also because in the meantime the press discovered several cases of marital infidelity among some of the most ferocious republicans against Clinton himself.
The vote
On December 18, 1998, the Chamber met and, 130 years after the vote on Andrew Johnson, voted by majority the impeachment of Bill Clinton. On January 7, the Senate trial begins, where Republicans have a majority of 55 votes out of 100 but do not have the 67 they need to remove Clinton from the White House. On 12 February the Senate decides: 45 out of 100 senators think that Clinton is guilty of perjury, 50 out of 100 senators think that Clinton is guilty of having obstructed justice. Clinton is safe. Two hours later, in the White House, one will still be very sorry. Lewinsky has lived a few years of great popularity, has done interviews, commercials, a book. Then in 2005 she got fed up, gave up everything and moved to London. He holds a master’s degree in psychology from the London School of Economics and has retired to private life.