The audience had started getting bored with The Clinton Administration, but the Monica Lewinsky subplot, including its cover-up, got people interested again. Fox News and MSNBC were both new start-ups, and because politics had become a low-production-value subgenre of show business, it was engaging only when it was entertaining. When serious journalists started asking Clinton about having extramarital sex with an intern, the public was not so much alarmed as amazed and thrilled.
