“’90s Scandals Threaten to Erode Hillary Clinton’s Strength With Women” is a nytimes article about how Hillary Clinton participated in attacking and discrediting the women with whom her husband was having sex (or trying to have sex with), rather than supporting her sisters, which presumably would have eventually required divorcing the unfaithful husband.
The litigators we interviewed for Real World Divorce wouldn’t be surprised by Hillary’s decision. Had she sued Bill Clinton under D.C. family law, she would have been entitled to child support and alimony of perhaps $200,000 per year based on his salary as President. Bill Clinton’s historical earnings hadn’t been that large due to his holding down government jobs. She might have been able to share in Bill Clinton’s spectacular post-Presidential payday via an alimony and child support modification lawsuit, but a new award based on the discarded spouse’s post-divorce higher income is subject to judicial discretion (see “Peter Orszag beats the child support rap” for how a similar case played out in the D.C. courts; also see “the lottery winner in Massachusetts alimony court”).
It was economically rational for Hillary to stay married to Bill and therefore she did. If this required denouncing other women, that wouldn’t surprise anyone in the world of divorce litigation.
Readers: Where would Hillary be today if she had sued Bill Clinton in, say, 1998?
Related:
- “Why Women Still Can’t Have It All” (2012 Atlantic magazine article) from one of Hillary Clinton’s subordinates at the State Department: “My workweek started at 4:20 on Monday morning, when I got up to get the 5:30 train from Trenton to Washington. It ended late on Friday, with the train home. In between, the days were crammed with meetings, and when the meetings stopped, the writing work began—a never-ending stream of memos, reports, and comments on other people’s drafts. For two years, I never left the office early enough to go to any stores other than those open 24 hours…”
You have perfected the art of combining deep research (“post-divorce higher income is subject to…”) and copious references (“see”, “see also”) with the completely unsubstantiated assertion (“…and therefore she did”).
She’d be right where she is now, but with some other rich and powerful husband. Hilary Clinton isn’t motivated primarily by economics, but by a megalomaniacal need to control and dominate. She is, after all, a politician.
Did you REALLY envision Hillary starting divorce proceedings against Bill, the reigning POTUS in the White House in 1998, concurrently with the Starr report and that much-ado-about-impeachment? That would have destroyed all 3 of them, though perhaps spurred Chelsea to make another one of her teenage-angst faux-rap basement mix audio tapes.
Both Bill and Hillary have profited immensely from the current arrangement. Her current campaign is based on bringing back the Clinton team. Divorce would have been a disaster for both.