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A Vast Conspiracy: The Real Story of the Sex Scandal That Nearly Brought Down a President

Jeffrey Toobin

3.84 · Rating details · 811 ratings · 66 reviews

In A Vast Conspiracy, the best-selling author of The Run of His Life casts an insightful, unbiased eye over the most extraordinary public saga of our time -- the Clinton sex scandals. A superlative journalist known for the skillfulness of his investigating and the power of his writing, Jeffrey Toobin tells the unlikely story of the events that began over doughnuts in a Li ...more

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Kindle Edition, 450 pages

Published November 14th 2012 by Random House (first published January 11th 2000)

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Mar 19, 2019 Lois rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Shelves: audio-book, non-fiction, politics, kindle-unlimited-or-scribd, u-s-history, books-i-read-in-2019

This was interesting and well written in many ways. It is definitely biased. Also unbelievably sexist.
The author treats Monica and Paula very disrespectfully in the text.
He also is extremely dismissive of Clinton's behavior. He repeatedly strips it down to 'a middle aged man having sex with an office worker/co-worker.' That's not really what happened here at all. A more accurate comparison would be a company owner/CEO having sex with a significantly younger unpaid intern. For which the owner wou This was interesting and well written in many ways. It is definitely biased. Also unbelievably sexist.
The author treats Monica and Paula very disrespectfully in the text.
He also is extremely dismissive of Clinton's behavior. He repeatedly strips it down to 'a middle aged man having sex with an office worker/co-worker.' That's not really what happened here at all. A more accurate comparison would be a company owner/CEO having sex with a significantly younger unpaid intern. For which the owner would be very much open to lawsuit.
First the author makes the argument that sexual harassment interferes with office hookups. Because the whole point of work isn't a career or paycheck, it's apparently for ease of hooking up. Sexual harassment workplace safety laws actually DON'T interfere with office hookups though, it interferes with UNEQUAL relationships. So bosses can't force their direct reports to date them or perform sexual favors by holding their job over their heads. Sexual harassment is incredibly difficult to prove and still happening all over. So the laws don't go far enough. In addition it's not just in work places where we acknowledge that relationships that have unequal power dynamics too easily turn into sexual coercion: teachers/profs can't date students, doctors and therapists can't date patients, so on and so forth.
The POTUS was 100% wrong for engaging in a sexual relationship with a young woman only a few years older than his daughter, who was placed in an unpaid government internship to learn about government. I don't care if she showed him her thong. He's a grown ass man who is constantly attended to. He should've had his staff looking out for crushes and REMOVING them from his direct staff to other positions. He should not have been having sex with a White House intern. There's no excuse for that bullshit.
Now I don't give a good goddamn about him being unfaithful to HRC. That's a private matter between them. The Commander In Chief fucking his staff and interns is the countries business. Those are OUR employees. He works for us. The world is FULL of women he should be smart enough to not shit where he sleeps. That he did not do that very much speaks to his basic character.
I voted for him twice. I found him charming and personable.
At the same time his bullshit 'tough on crime laws' directly lead to the current prison crisis. He knew Democrats have the black vote so he safely shafted my community.
This has caused irreparable harm to GENERATIONS.
He has to be held responsible for his actions.
As does Obama, the warmonger, who I also voted twice for.
Our politicians have to be held accountable.
This is how we got chump.
We never thought it would get this bad but we willfully ignored popular presidents bullshit policies.
To the detriment of the nation.
So this is nicely detailed and researched but all of the authors conclusions are sexist bullshit.🤷🏽‍♀️ ...more

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Jul 12, 2011 Tom rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I know what I remembered, being a Democrat and Clinton fan, and not following it too closely in the papers...

Now I have a much better idea of how the Circus actually came to town, and I gotta say, I am even more disgusted than I was then. Toobin lays out the story with extensive sources in all its sordid detail. He is not a Clinton apologist, nor is he a Starr apologist. Mostly he lays out just the facts, as far as they can be known. There's a lot of facts, and his account is clear. And wretched ...more

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May 03, 2018 Marc rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: biographies

Toobin's account of Clinton's legal problems in the 90's was supposed to be the topic of an up coming season of American Crime Story. Hence my interest in reading this book.

The author does a decent job at showing how the Paula Jones trial in Arkansas, the White Water Investigation by Special Counsel Kenneth Starr and the Monica Lewinsky deposition intertwined into the hot mess that plagued Capitol Hill in 1997-1998. I enjoyed reading the details about the many personalities' life, career and mot ...more

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Jan 27, 2013 Lee Miller rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

After reading the first two pages of "Vast Conspiracy," you will be hooked. Jeffery Toobin has crafted a political analysis that reads like a political thriller.

Yet in writing a fascinating, disturbing, and often wildly funny book, Toobin loses none of the objectivity, expertise, and standards that make him television's top legal analyst. Toobin's greatest achievement is walking the reader through the swirl of events step by step so the patterns and relationships become clear. He also displays ...more

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Jan 29, 2013 Tracy Jenkins rated it liked it · review of another edition

This was a book our book club chose, and I really wasn't that interested in rehashing all the sordid details from the Clinton scandals. However, reading this some 15 years later it is clear this president for whatever reason (zipper problems not withstanding) created the most personal hatred against a sitting president in our history. This was not political hatred, it was personal and his time in office gave a catapulted start to the divisive right wing media strongholds that persist today from ...more

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Oct 06, 2017 Courtney Wynn rated it it was ok · review of another edition

This book felt like a marathon. I bet this book would be more entertaining if you were watching the news when this all went down. I didn't know all the characters so I spent a lot of time looking up who each person was. This is basically a testament that politicians and lawyers are dishonest. Their motivation is power and they don't care how they get it. I can't believe how much tax dollars were spent on investigating the Clintons which never turned up anything. I didn't like how the author wrot ...more

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Apr 27, 2018 Frank Stein rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Even today, reading about the Clinton impeachment can feel like a tawdry activity. The public debate about impeachment was filled with intense discussions about penis shape, blow jobs, manual vaginal stimulation, and other sexual minutiae. It seems amazing that for over a year, the top political and media minds in the country debated little else.

Jeffrey Toobin, in this fine recounting of the impeachment, shows that the tawdriness touched and diminished almost everyone who came into contact with Even today, reading about the Clinton impeachment can feel like a tawdry activity. The public debate about impeachment was filled with intense discussions about penis shape, blow jobs, manual vaginal stimulation, and other sexual minutiae. It seems amazing that for over a year, the top political and media minds in the country debated little else.

Jeffrey Toobin, in this fine recounting of the impeachment, shows that the tawdriness touched and diminished almost everyone who came into contact with the case. Toobin is something of an advocate for Clinton, but he can't help but note how small and pitiful Clinton appeared after the conclusion of this case, with his lies in both the Paula Jones deposition and in the Kenneth Starr grand jury, his pettifogging and circuitous answers to questions about all aspects of his past and relationships, and his consistent denials, to his family, to the country, and to his close aides, that he had engaged in "sexual relations" with Monica Lewinsky (in one case he told his White House lawyers, such as Robert Bennett, that it would be outrageous for him to engage in adulterous sex during this presidency, just hours after Lewinsky had left the Oval Office).

Yet others were diminished even more than the President. Representative Henry Hyde, chair of the House Judiciary Committee, was celebrated by newspapers of all stripes when it was realized he would lead the impeachment hearings. He was considered a bipartisan and intelligent fact-finder with little prejudice. By the end, he would seem a zealot engaged in a foolish hunt for any information about Clinton's personal sex life. He had even organized a special "war room" in the Ford House Office Building where every salacious detail was kept. Kenneth Starr was formerly a respected federal appellate judge and solicitor general, whom everyone, from both parties, said was fair-minded, courteous and thoughtful. By the end of the case, when he was giving daily "Hefty-Bag" briefings to news reporters who came to see him take out his garbage, and when he had released to the House a 500-page report detailing every incident of oral sex engaged in by the President (many incidents were described in different sections of the report four or five times), he became the most hated man in the country. Toobin shows that Starr's supposed zealotry probably came from his inexperience in criminal matters and his deferral to his increasingly Clinton-hating staff, but it didn't matter. Starr's name too became mud.

Almost every decision by every player in the story was subject to national debate, from the decision of Judge Susan Webber Wright to allow Monica Lewinsky on the witness list for the Paula Jones sexual harassment lawsuit to the Starr Independent Counsel's sequestering of Lewinsky in the Ritz-Carlton in Alexandria. Toobin tries to umpire each and every one of these debates, and although he clearly sides with Clinton and the Democrats on the whole, he makes fair calls about most issues. For instance, he argues that Wright's decision about Lewinsky was actually mandated by the broad evidence standards for sexual harassment in the Violence against Women Act, which Clinton himself had just signed in 1994, while the Starr team performed nothing untoward in questioning Lewinsky for hours in an admittedly comfortable location.

The real question is what if anything we can learn from this debacle. Toobin says it demonstrates how political questions in America have gradually been redefined by lawyers as legal questions, and that the legal profession's dominance of politics is the real "vast conspiracy" we have to worry about. That's probably true, but this case rarely rose above the nominally legal, and remained almost totally political, on all sides, at all times. I have to say that I've never read another political book where I actually felt dirty after finishing. But that's exactly how this case should feel. ...more

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Jul 08, 2020 Caroline rated it liked it · review of another edition

I picked this up because I liked two of this other books; on the OJ Simpson trial and on Patty Hearst. This one made less of an impression on me, partly just because I knew more of the history already, but it still had many of the same things to recommend it.

I was thinking while reading it about what motivated me to, when eg I still have no idea what the Mueller Report is or what it says. My patience for learning about current events is selective, and for better or for worse I tend to be more dr ...more

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Aug 26, 2018 Sarah rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Fascinating to read a detailed account of this massive political controversy that dominated the news in the late 90s. I remember so much and yet so little about it—I’m glad to know all the facts behind it, as sad as it all was.

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Oct 25, 2018 Kelsie Donaldson rated it really liked it · review of another edition

A VERY detailed account of the whole messy affair. Good supplemental material for the podcast 'Slow Burn.' ...more

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Nov 09, 2012 Kelly rated it liked it · review of another edition

I will admit it was a little difficult to put out of my mind that that author of this book has been involved in a sex scandal of his own and fathered a child outside of his marriage. The man I used to call "The Smart and Dreamy Jeffrey Toobin" was tarnished in my eyes a bit.

That being said, I enjoyed this well-reported telling of the Clinton Sex Scandal. The peek behind the scenes and the spelling out of all the times the situation could have been defused if it weren't for egos and ambition out ...more

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Sep 05, 2020 Leah rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: factual, 2020, history

Sex, lies and audiotape…

Every detail you ever wanted to know about the whole Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, and several that you didn’t. This is more than a salacious recounting of the affair that nearly brought down a President, however. Jeffrey Toobin argues convincingly that politicians on both sides of the aisle had gradually been using the courts more and more to decide political questions, and that the Clinton scandal was a clear indication that the balance of power had shifted, and that the le Sex, lies and audiotape…

Every detail you ever wanted to know about the whole Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, and several that you didn’t. This is more than a salacious recounting of the affair that nearly brought down a President, however. Jeffrey Toobin argues convincingly that politicians on both sides of the aisle had gradually been using the courts more and more to decide political questions, and that the Clinton scandal was a clear indication that the balance of power had shifted, and that the legal system was from now on to be the arbiter of all political questions in the US. He also suggests that it was the beginning of the sordid game beloved by politicians and the media (but not so much by the public, he implies) of dragging political opponents down, not by dissecting their poor performance as politicians, but by pretended moral outrage over their private behaviour.

The book was originally published in 2000, so long before the MeToo movement but at a time when questions of sexual abuse in the workplace were being raised by feminist groups. In his introduction, Toobin admits that he may have treated Lewinsky differently had he been writing now, when terms like “power imbalance” are part of the everyday lexicon. To be honest, I’m glad he wrote it when he did then, for two reasons. Firstly, my opinion then (when I was a youngish, ambitious, working woman) and now is that a 22-year-old woman is a grown adult, perfectly capable of making her own decisions, and therefore morally responsible for her own behaviour. There was never a suggestion that Clinton forced himself on Lewinsky – quite the reverse – so while I think he’s a disgusting and rather pathetically inadequate adulterous pig, I’m not willing to see her as his victim. (Her treatment later, by her tape-recording “friend” and the lawyers investigating Clinton, seems to me far more abusive than anything Clinton did to her.) Secondly, because Toobin wrote it in the heat of the moment, more or less, it gives a much clearer picture, I think, of the attitudes prevalent at that time than any later history, trying hard to tell the story through the filter of a 2020 lens, could ever do. Although Toobin is pretty tough on Lewinsky, he also shows no mercy to Clinton, so this is in no way an apologia.

Toobin spares us none of the intimate detail, and I fear I learned far more than I wanted or needed to about Clinton’s anatomy and sexual preferences, not to mention Lewinsky’s underwear and performative techniques. (It made me realise that, back in the day, although the case was reported on at extremely boring length over here too, our dear BBC must have decided to leave out the most salacious details, for which I belatedly thank them.) However, in terms of the book I do think it was necessary to include them, because part of Toobin’s argument is exactly that public interest arguments shouldn’t justify this level of intrusion into the minutiae of sex between consenting adults. This case opened the door to the constant diet of sleaze that is now common currency in what we laughably call political debate. Does the public have the right to know their President paid a porn star for her silence about their affair? Probably – it goes to questions of character and vulnerability to blackmail. But do we really need a detailed account of the act complete with anatomical measurements? I think not.

The bulk of the book, however, is about the Starr investigation, and how incestuous the whole relationship between the legal and political systems of the US has become, with partisan lawyers and judges acting to down political opponents and circumvent the laws of the land, rather than behaving as impartial administrators of justice. This provides a lot of insight for outsiders, and I expect for many Americans too, on why the most important agenda item for many politicians seems to be to pack the courts with their own appointees. One only has to see the reaction of the left to the appointment of Kavanaugh (who plays a bit part in the Clinton story), or the desperation with which the Democrats are praying that Ginsberg will be able to remain in her role until next January, or the disgust of Republicans that Chief Justice Roberts has “betrayed” the right in a couple of recent judgements to know that this politicisation of the legal system is corrupting even the Supreme Court. Toobin shows us the origins of this, and the collusion of all sides in allowing it to happen. There were several chapters where, had the names been omitted, the book could as easily have been about Trump, Mueller, and the biased and polarised media of today’s America.

So despite all the sleazy details, I found this a fascinating and illuminating scrutiny of the modern American political system. It also surprised me that so many of the political players back then are still influential now – Kavanaugh, George Conway, Ann Coulter were all linked to the Starr investigation, while many of the Senators and members of Congress on both sides, mostly not young or junior even back then, were trotting out opposite arguments during the Trump impeachment two decades later. It made me wonder why the US seems to have stuck – these same people have been running it, badly, for decades. Maybe it’s time for a generational shift, though since the major question in this year’s election seems to be which of the candidates is less senile I’m not expecting it to happen soon. Recommended to Americans who want to understand how and why their system fails them, and to Brits and others as a stark warning not to follow them down the road of giving lawyers and judges more power than our elected politicians. 4½ stars for me, so rounded up.

NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, William Collins.

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Feb 14, 2019 Kathleen Kirchner rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobooks

I love Toobin, but this was not his best. Just a four hundred page love letter to the clintons, the nicest people in the world.

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Jun 26, 2020 Sonja Rutherford rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I mean. Wow. So, I apparently was too busy with high school and that time immediately after high school when you're trying to be an adult and wasn't TRULY paying attention (and wasn't adult enough to pay CLOSE attention) to the Clinton scandals/impeachment hearings. So, much like the time I went back to learn about the Iran hostage crisis, I bought myself a book and got down to work.

I'm giving this review 4 stars and I'm telling you that in advance because, this is clearly a bit left-leaning (Cl I mean. Wow. So, I apparently was too busy with high school and that time immediately after high school when you're trying to be an adult and wasn't TRULY paying attention (and wasn't adult enough to pay CLOSE attention) to the Clinton scandals/impeachment hearings. So, much like the time I went back to learn about the Iran hostage crisis, I bought myself a book and got down to work.

I'm giving this review 4 stars and I'm telling you that in advance because, this is clearly a bit left-leaning (Clinton supporting) by the author - although I think he wrote as unbiased as possible (or at least was obvious about his own personal opinion when that came into play instead of trying to hide/lie about it.) But anyway, full disclosure and all that.

Although this was left leaning, I felt the writing was much more unbiased than I'd anticipated, and lots of that is because it was highlighting what the media was writing at the time, actual transcripts, and the black and white facts as much as possible throughout. And boy, howdy, if you want to believe the media like to hype things up and is soft on liberals - go back and explore this time and what happened. They drug Clinton through the mud like the biggest whore in history, and to be fair, Clinton is definitely a whore and a scoundrel and a cheat and then he was a liar. But honestly, if you look back at it - everything was about sex and embarrassing the president and his family, and nothing was about national security or a truly impeachable offense. It's pretty embarrassing for the country that it happened the way that it did (not to mention extremely expensive).

Clinton is NOT a sympathetic character, he's a cheater and a liar when it comes down to it, masked in southern charm, but he has brought a lot of this all down upon himself. But it's not like he handed out the nuke codes or colluded with a foreign country, etc. But, I did find it fascinating how this all played out, learned more about the impeachment process to begin with, learned more about some well known political figures and how they figured into everything back then as well.

The biggest take away is truly feeling badly for Monica Lewinsky. No one got drug through the mud more than she did, and she really didn't deserve that. She wasn't even attention seeking, never wanted this to be public, never wanted to testify against the president or have her name in the papers. I feel like we all need to pass around a card to sign that says, "Sorry, we were all assholes in the late 90s and I hope you forgive us."

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Oct 21, 2020 Clare rated it really liked it · review of another edition

A prescient book given the current political situation, A Vast Conspiracy lays out the facts of the impeachment of then President, Bill Clinton. Clinton was riding a wave of popularity but there had long been rumours about his dalliances with women other than his wife, Hillary. It was also rumoured that there was something more sinister to these extra marital encounters and that they weren’t entirely consensual. Clinton’s quite mind boggling decision to start a physical affair with intern, Monic ...more

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Oct 20, 2019 Liz rated it really liked it

I read this for two reasons: first, because of the planned season for American Crime Story based in part on this book. Second, having been alive during this time period, I was interested in how it was written.

This is about the Clinton impeachment. And as I read, I remember how it unfolded in the media; I remembered what I thought at the time. I learned things I didn't know, had a better grasp of what was and was not going on.

I'd read that Monica Lewinsky is a producer for the planned season, and ...more

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Jul 01, 2017 Jake rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: politics, history

Ah the good ol days when a President having an extramarital affair with a consenting adult was our nation's biggest scandal.

Toobin is good at breaking down legalese for the rest of us. As he did in Run Of His Life, he shows the maneuvering of powers that converged in an unlikely way for a trial that descended into farce. But unlike the OJ Simpson trial, which took time to get there, Clinton's was ridiculous from the beginning.

There are numerous people here, each with their own agenda and Toobin ...more

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May 04, 2020 Ollie Hodgkinson rated it liked it · review of another edition

A surprisingly engaging book for which mainly revolves around American politics and law, a subject that I know not too much about. I had to concentrate quite a bit too, so I guess I’m a bit of a dumb boy.

The conclusions are a bit suspect, where the author seems to dismiss Paula Jones’ claims and also doesn’t really explore the irresponsibility and shadiness of Clinton’s actions. The most powerful man in the world was sleeping with a young public-hired intern, but it comes across as simply an ex ...more

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Oct 03, 2020 Emily rated it liked it · review of another edition

I felt quite sick reading this in places as everyone was either after money or power. I always thought Monica Lewinsky was an innocent party in all of this but in fact she was the instigator of the affair but that does not mean that Bill Clinton should have reacted the way he did to her behaviour! However by the end I did feel sorry for her as she did not deserve to be treated the way she was.
The book was rather long-winded and I didn't really understand a lot about the voting side of things. H ...more

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Aug 23, 2017 Pablo rated it liked it · review of another edition

There's no doubt that Toobin is a sophisticated writer and an engaging storyteller, but ultimately all the legal erudition and political savvy couldn't rescue the book from the tabloid-y gossip in which it wallows.

The book does provide quite a bit of insight into the political machinations and personal vendettas that fueled this scandal, but I couldn't escape without feeling like too much brainpower had been expended on the topic.

Still, this was the dominant political scandal of my childhood, an ...more

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Aug 26, 2019 Ellen rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: j-o-b, 2019

Read mostly for the Congressional/ impeachment-related details, but but it helped to fill in some details of the scandal for me. (I was a teen at the time and turns out my memories of the scandal were VERY distorted by pop culture/ whatever filtered down to that level. And of course, we didn't learn about it in history class.)

Oh yeah, and when Jeffrey Toobin described Lindsey Graham as someone who "liked being the center of attention as much as he cared about ideological purity" I fully lost my ...more

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Mar 20, 2020 Art rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I've been a fan of Toobin as a television legal analyst for years...he's always struck me as being very factually driven and practical. Having read A Vast Conspiracy....I am an even bigger fan. This is an exceptionally well written narrative of how we got to where we did and note, Toobin both admires and deplores Clinton, and makes no bones about the latter. I'll let you readers decide whether impeachment was appropriate...did lying about sex reach the standard of "high crimes and misdemeanors?" ...more

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Jun 04, 2017 Emi rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Jeffrey Toobin is definitely one of the best non-fiction writers I know. This particular story is about the Monica Lewinsky. I still remember the scandal, so it was very interesting to read all the different aspects of this story. This story was not quite as good as his OJ Simpson book, but still a compelling narrative.

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Aug 01, 2017 Afshin Afshar rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Jeffry Toobin does an excellent job of breaking down this curious and perhaps shameful (for all involved) episode in American history. He presents personalities, facts, processes, and the dynamics between them in a fascinating and captivating manner. A very enjoyable read for those who want to know what this entire thing was all about, how it started and eventually ended.

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May 24, 2018 Kamala rated it liked it

I was excited to read this book, as I as pretty young when this whole situation unfolded. What I found was a book with a LOT of information on the Clinton scandal, but it was really too much. I found A Vast Conspiracy to be somewhat repetitive, and just much longer than it needed to be to get the story out there.

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Jul 01, 2020 Marie Stein rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I started reading this book a while back, because I wanted to read a book by the author whose frequent guest spots on CNN have always been enlightening. He’s a brilliant writer. But I could barely finish it, because this story is so full of sexism and misogyny that was so much a part of the culture at the time. It’s quaint. Sort of. And a time capsule of shifting American notes and politics.

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Nov 20, 2020 Mary Kan rated it liked it

Toobin’s Editorializing Hasn’t Aged Well

I was struck by the petty comments about Monica Lewinsky - he painted her as shallow and conniving and silly. He also had snarky comments about pretty much everyone from Paula Jones to Henry Hyde (but not Barney Frank). Toobin comes off as arrogant. I would have preferred a more objective viewpoint and recitation of the facts.

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Feb 04, 2018 Miranda rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I loved The Run of His Life and Jeffrey Toobin did not disappoint with this book. I was a little kid during the Clinton impeachment trial so there was a lot that I didn't know before I read this book. ...more

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Mar 26, 2018 Ryan rated it really liked it · review of another edition

A deep dive into something I didn't have a ton of interest in, although it ended up being quite fascinating, especially from a legal perspective. Toobin's commentary and bias lays on a little thick at times. ...more

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Aug 11, 2018 Arlyne Gemmell rated it really liked it

Reading this as Trump is currently out President, makes a lot of machinations clear

Clear reporting about events of the time. Descriptive analysis of political people that ring true as history has moved on. I find Mr. Toobin to be an excellent writer of historical situations.

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About Jeffrey Toobin

Jeffrey Toobin

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Jeffrey Ross Toobin (J.D., Harvard Law School, 1986; B.A., American History and Literature, Harvard University) is a lawyer, blogger, and media legal correspondent for CNN and formerly The New Yorker magazine. He previously served as an Assistant United States Attorney in Brooklyn, New York, and later worked as a legal analyst for ABC News, where he received a 2001 Emmy Award for his coverage of t ...more