To print this page, select "Print" from the File menu of your browser salon.com > People Jan. 19, 2000 URL: http://www.salon.com/people/col/reit/2000/01/19/np0119 Scandal sucking and rumor ducking Author Jeffrey Toobin tells of a "rockin' ride," a "perverted doughboy" and the thing that Paula Jones "just won't do"; Twisted Sister doesn't wanna rock with John Rocker. Plus: Whitney Houston -- one toke over the luau? - - - - - - - - - - - - By Amy Reiter Jeffrey Toobin might want to send Lucianne Goldberg a thank-you note. Ever since the scandal-mongering literary agent began crying "libel" over her portrayal in the New Yorker writer's new book, "A Vast Conspiracy," everyone -- at least everyone inside the Beltway -- is rushing to read it. Spicy tidbits from the book -- Paula Jones asking Toobin "The Republicans? Are they the good 'uns or the bad 'uns?" for instance, or dismally failing an employer's alphabetizing test -- have made their way into D.C. cocktail party chatter. (You thought you learned everything you needed to know from the Starr Report, eh?) Some of the broader themes he addresses -- the "conspiracy" within the legal system to take over the U.S. political system, the impact of sexual investigative journalism and the widespread jockeying for book contracts -- have become the subject of more serious discussions. And Toobin's given good gab to everyone from Terry Gross to Larry King. "It's been a rockin' ride. Tumultuous," Toobin told me last week in a phone call sandwiched between a radio interview and a mad dash from New York to D.C. for his book launch party and a couple of TV appearances. The author attributes the heavy buzz surrounding the book to good timing and great material. "It's not homework," he says. "That was my goal. This is a crazy, bizarre, hilarious story, and I didn't want to lose that in dealing with the serious issues ... You can't make up that cast of characters." For instance, meet Cliff Jackson, the mastermind behind it all. You may never have heard of him, but this media-savvy Arkansas power player was an old school chum of Clinton's who'd soured on his presidential pal in a big way. In fact, Jackson had retired early from his prosperous law practice to dedicate himself to unseating the president. With Judas-like stealth, Jackson played a behind-the-scenes role in nearly every Clintonian scandal -- Troopergate, Zippergate, you name it -- planting stories in the press, coordinating representation, getting folks to talk. "It's just astonishing," says Toobin. "He's right out of Faulkner." "Cliff understood the cultural Zeitgeist. He understood that the press has an insatiable appetite for sexual gossip and alleged scandals. And he played on that perfectly. And he accomplished a hell of a lot," says Toobin. Paula Jones was the unfortunate ingénue -- raised religious, rebelling through sexual promiscuity (the Clinton camp dug up allegations that she once gave blow jobs to a whole slew of randy young men) -- who wanted to hide her tawdry past from her controlling husband, Steve. And Steve Jones, for his part, had a whole lot of ambition and his own anti-Clinton agenda. "It really irritates me that we've got this perverted doughboy in the White House," he said in an interview cited in Toobin's book. In another, particularly poignant, passage, Jones tells Toobin that he believes his wife's version of events because "what he asked her to do, she won't do that. I don't want you to feel sorry for me, but she just won't do that." "You can draw your own conclusions," says Toobin, snickering. Another teller of this story might have portrayed Michael Isikoff, who broke the Lewinsky story in Newsweek, as the hero. Not Toobin. In "A Vast Conspiracy," Isikoff comes off as a self-serving peddler of prurient info with his own -- you guessed it -- anti-Clinton agenda. In other words, not too well. The negative portrayal apparently hasn't been lost on Isikoff himself. Says Toobin, "He's well aware." What of the motives of Linda Tripp, who, the book reveals, suggested that Lewinsky keep an Excel spreadsheet of her dealings with the president and that she use a courier service owned by Goldberg's relatives to send him gifts? (Receipts of which were "promptly supplied by Goldberg to Michael Isikoff," notes Toobin.) All business, asserts the author. "Clinton-hating was not just Linda Tripp's avocation; she wanted it to be her vocation. She wanted to make money ... Lucianne can scream and yell all she wants that Linda was doing this for high-minded purposes, but who did she go see? She saw a literary agent. She didn't go to a lawyer. She didn't go to a cop. She didn't go to a prosecutor." Oddly enough, Toobin finds Clinton to be "the good guy in this struggle." But, he stresses, "only by comparison." After emphasizing that he does not "excuse or condone Clinton's awful behavior with Lewinsky and then lying about it," he says, "he was only the good guy because the other guys were so bad." - - - - - - - - - - - - Does Naomi Wolf know about this? "Gore -- he actually called from Air Force One [for advice]. I couldn't take the call. I was in the middle of something." -- Barbra Streisand on how she dissed the veep, in TV Guide. - - - - - - - - - - - - Juicy bits John Rocker is apparently too twisted for Twisted Sister. The band has asked the Atlanta Braves to stop playing their song "I Wanna Rock" to introduce the trash-talking pitcher, who has said he's "not a very big fan of foreigners." "We've got Hispanics in this band, Italians in this band, people who are Polish and Russian," said Twisted Sister guitarist and co-founder Jay Jay French. "We're all immigrants, all foreigners -- quote, unquote -- and this is our way of saying his comments were not acceptable." In other words, they're not gonna take it. If Whitney Houston is still waiting to exhale after allegedly being caught with 15.2 grams of marijuana at Keahole-Kona International Airport in Hawaii last week -- and beating a quick exit to San Francisco before the cops could nab her -- now might be a good time. The Hawaiian authorities are reportedly weighing whether to charge the pop star, but "since the security guard [who found the pot] was a civilian, it will be harder to proceed with prosecution," said a spokeswoman for the Hawaiian County prosecutor's office. Aloha, freedom. Break out the Jif. Marie Osmond and her husband of 13 years, music producer Brian Blosil, are separating. "We hope the media will respect our privacy during this period of our lives," Osmond said after announcing the split this week. Maybe she was a little bit country and he was a little bit rock 'n' roll? salon.com | Jan. 19, 2000   - - - - - - - - - - - - About the writer Amy Reiter is a staff writer for Salon People. For more columns by Amy Reiter, visit her column archive.