Estranged bedfellows

The scandal’s ingredients are familiar: an adulterous politician and “aggrieved” victims turning their suffering into cash. Britain’s latest eruption followed the publication of Diaries by former Conservative defence minister Alan Clark. In the book, Clark admitted to a 14-year extramarital affair with Valerie Harkess, the wife of a judge, as well as sex with her two daughters. Angry at being exposed, members of the Harkess family sold their version to the British media. A chastised Clark admitted that he should be “horsewhipped” for his behavior. But Jane Clark regarded her wealthy husband’s only sin as having slept below his social standing. “If you bed people of below-stairs class,” she said, “they go to the papers.”