Bill Press is a syndicated columnist, the co-host of CNN's Crossfire, which airs Monday-Friday at 7:30 p.m., and author of the newly-published book Spin This!

Bill Press: Republicans can't let go of Bill Clinton

WASHINGTON (Tribune Media Services) -- It would be funny if it weren't so sad. We're at war. We're struggling to climb out of a recession. But some Republicans still want to talk about nothing but Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky. Why are they so obsessed with oral sex?

The tawdry scandal was resurrected by Republican Robert Ray, who inherited the position of independent counsel from Kenneth Starr a little over two years ago and finally issued his final report this week. The Clinton investigation lasted eight years and cost $70 million. For that much money, did we learn anything new from Ray's report? Not one thing. It's just a rehash of old trash.

Indeed, the report's cover says it all. In the middle of its blue-and-white cover, in midsize print, is the title, "Final Report of the Independent Counsel in Re: Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan Association" -- reminding us how it all started. Just below, in large letters, is the subtitle, "Regarding Monica Lewinsky & Others" -- reminding us what it quickly disintegrated into, thanks to Starr.

In his report, Ray comes to two conclusions. First: that during his deposition in the Paula Jones case, Clinton lied under oath about his relationship with Lewinsky.

What a waste of time and money. Is there one person in the United States who didn't already know that? Even Clinton has admitted it.

"I tried to walk a line between acting lawfully and testifying falsely," the president said in his January 2001 settlement of the Monica mess, "but I now recognize that I did not fully accomplish this goal and that certain of my responses to questions about Ms. Lewinsky were false."

Which also undercuts Ray's second conclusion: that he had sufficient evidence to file criminal charges against Clinton, but decided not to. This time, Ray is the one who's lying.

In that same legal agreement, in exchange for Clinton's admission of wrongdoing and five-year surrender of his law license, Ray agreed never to press charges. In other words, the independent counsel didn't just decide not to indict Clinton, he willingly gave up the right to do so, back in January 2001 -- but spent the last 13 months and millions of dollars writing a 237-page report about it.

Why? What would motivate Robert Ray to continue, even today, beating a dead horse?

The answer can be summed up in two words: New Jersey. Within weeks, Ray is expected to announce his plans to challenge Bob Torricelli to be U.S. senator from New Jersey. What better way to get a burst of national publicity and endear himself to Republican fat cats, always eager to write a campaign check to any proven Clinton-basher?

Republicans, in fact, seized on the Ray report as proof that they were right all along in their persecution, if not prosecution, of Clinton. They got it backwards. Ray doesn't prove how right they were, he proves how wrong they were -- and what a great disservice they did to the country.

Consider this. Two years ago, just about the time the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal broke, both ABC and CBS ran special reports on the evening news revealing the existence of training camps in Afghanistan, run by some guy named Osama bin Laden, where young terrorists were being schooled for terrorist attacks against the United States. Yet not one congressional hearing was held on the warnings contained in those ominous reports.

Imagine what grief this nation might have been spared if Republicans in Congress had spent as much time investigating the threat of terrorism as they spent clucking about Monica and Bill.

But if it was wrong to pursue Clinton's sex life back then, it's just as wrong for Robert Ray to try to stir it up again now. We've been over all this ground before, and there are a lot more important issues to worry about.

Alan Brinkley, chairman of Columbia University's history department, said it best: "There are certainly people who cannot get enough of any charge against Clinton. That group aside, though, I doubt anyone wants to think about this anymore."

He's right. Monica's on HBO. Bill's on the lecture circuit. There's nothing about their relationship we don't already know, in far too much detail. It's time to move on.