---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 23 Jan 1998 15:41:04 -0800 (PST) From: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> To: politech@vorlon.mit.edu Subject: Internal Affairs: Looking for Lewinsky, from Netly News ******* http://cgi.pathfinder.com/netly/opinion/0,1042,1708,00.html The Netly News (http://netlynews.com/) January 23, 1998 Internal Affairs: Looking for Lewinsky by Declan McCullagh (declan@well.com) Call it the year the Internet brought down a president. If President Clinton just can't shake this week's accusation of peripatetic philandering, let's give the Net some credit. First, we must acknowledge Matt Drudge, the online rumormonger who finally exacted his revenge on Clinton for supporting Blumenthal v. Drudge, a lawsuit with a million-dollar price tag. When Newsweek spiked an expos of the Monica Lewinsky scandal, it was Drudge who spread the rumor across the Net and throughout the media on Saturday, January 17. [...] Of course, until yesterday, Clinton's impeachment seemed about as far-fetched a possibility as our unearthing one of Lewinsky's close friends on Usenet -- which is exactly what The Netly News was dispatched to do. Every time there's a major news event, our intrepid Internet team is called forth to scour DejaNews, troll IRC and mass-mail anyone who might possibly divulge information on the given subject. The Lewinsky search was less revealing than most. We found the former White House intern's annual salary; her home address in Portland, Ore.; the amount she and her mother donated to Democratic campaigns ($1,550 in 1996). Someone informed us, in all seriousness, that Lewinsky once gave him a goldfish. We also had people ask us if we'd pay them for information. (Fat chance.) [...]