A big chunk of Clinton hatred and a big chunk of Clinton's downfall to the extent there was a downfall had to do with his near-compulsive need to just trim the truth a little bit.

The mention of Bill Clinton, his face showing up in the TV, would send my father into an apopleptic rage.

Hey slow burn listeners. A few weeks ago our podcast team wrapped up season two with a series of live events.

We traveled to five cities, New York, D.C., San Francisco, Portland, and Chicago.

In each location I explored some lingering questions about the Clinton administration with reporters, historians, and cultural critics.

In this special episode of Slow Burn, as well as one more that you'll hear next week, we're going to share some highlights from those conversations.

Now a few seconds ago you heard the voices of Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus, who covered the Clinton White House, and Rick Purlstein, author of the Invisible Bridge, and a scholar of the conservative movement.

Marcus and Purlstein talked to me about how the Clinton administration infuriated journalists fed into the hands of their enemies and galvanized the political right.

We'll also talk about whether the conflicts they found themselves in were inevitable.

But first, before we get into those, I wanted to play you the opening act of the show we put on in every city we traveled to this fall.

The story from the Clinton saga that did not make it into season two of Slow Burn.

But it gets into some of the big questions we hope to leave people with at the end of the season.

Hey everybody. So Slow Burn 2 is over.

And I've been thinking about how if we had known what we know now back when we started, we would have definitely made the season longer.

At least 10 episodes, maybe 12, definitely not 8. Because there's just so much plot. So many things happened.

Travogate, prom night at the Ritz Carlton Hotel, federal prosecutors taking a blood sample from the president at the White House, always wearing a texito.

I never knew about any of that stuff.

And I'm wondering if anyone here knew about the blood sample thing, for example. Anyone? What about prom night?

All right, perfect audience.

There are a bunch of little subplots along those lines that we would have loved to include in our account of the Clinton impeachment.

The cutting room floor is thick with material.

So tonight I wanted to tell you all a story that I find particularly beguiling.

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