Sunday's episode of "60 Minutes" drew a near-record audience of 22 million by airing an interview with a porn star locked in a legal battle with President Donald Trump's personal lawyer, Michael Cohen. She claims to have had an extramarital affair with Trump in 2006, and that a $130,000 payment she received from Cohen days before the 2016 presidential election was to keep the voting public from knowing the true depths of Trump's debauchery.
The White House disputes her claims. The American public is now in the awkward position of ranking the believability of the president of the United States against that of a porn star. Given the president's record of marital infidelity, objectification of women and blatant lies, porn star Stephanie Clifford, also known as Stormy Daniels, wins the argument.
Daniels is one of two women who claim to have had affairs with Trump in 2006, the year after he married now-First Lady Melania Trump and only months after the birth of the couple's son. Also during those early months of marital bliss, Trump made explicit comments to an "Access Hollywood" reporter about sexually groping women.
Trump twice apologized for those comments before the election. After the election, he said maybe it wasn't his voice on the tape after all — just one of thousands of reasons his credibility is shattered.
Daniels has her own credibility problems, having issued multiple public statements denying that she'd had an affair with Trump, only later to describe the alleged affair in detail to "60 Minutes."
Included in those details were that she swatted Trump on his bare behind with a magazine that featured him on the cover, and that Trump said Daniels reminded him of his daughter. He has described daughter Ivanka Trump as "hot" and stated in one 2006 TV interview that "if she weren't my daughter, perhaps I'd be dating her."
Some might argue that American voters knew what they were getting and elected Trump anyway. That's not entirely true. Daniels signed a contract and was paid for her silence — specifically to prevent American voters from knowing this aspect of the GOP candidate's moral failings. The payment also appears to have violated federal campaign laws.
Daniels' story is consistent with that of former Playboy model Karen McDougal, who received a $150,000 hush-money payment in 2016 regarding her alleged 10-month affair with Trump. McDougal also has said Trump made comparisons between her and his daughter.
Americans keep lowering the bar on their expectations of this president's bad judgment and crass behavior. How much lower can it go? It once seemed unlikely that any sitting president could surpass the ick factor of President Bill Clinton's Oval Office encounter with a White House intern, but Trump offers a new and richer definition of "ick."
REPRINTED FROM THE ST LOUIS POST DISPATCH
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