CONTENTS UNDER PRESSURE: 'FACE THE NATION' MEETS JERRY SPRINGER IN ZIPPERGATE MYTH

Is anyone else expecting to see Ken, Monica, Linda, Bill and Hillary on Jerry Springer?

Pop quiz! Identify "The Big Creep" and "Babba."

No, they aren't the protagonists of Fox's latest animated series. They aren't professional wrestlers. They aren't an alternative rock band.

They're Monica Lewinsky's pet names for Bill and Hillary Clinton.

In case you've been in a cave for the last 18 months or so, there's a sex scandal involving the White House, a president who can't keep his zipper closed and an intern who forgot to send a dress to be dry-cleaned.

Oh, and her big-mouthed friend, and the president's wife.

And some Secret Service agents who were probably trying, like most of us are now, to ignore the whole thing.

Washington sex scandals are nothing new, especially when there's a Democrat in the White House.

There is an argument to be made that sex scandals are at least more interesting than plain, old-fashioned graft or influence-peddling, which is what you get when there's a Republican in the White House.

A friend and co-worker here at the Missourian espouses the "Vote for Quotes" theory: Elect the person who's going to keep things interesting.

Seems reasonable. If our elected representatives can't get anything done, they can at least be entertaining.

I knew there was a reason I didn't vote for Bob Dole.

But he does seem like a much nicer person now that he's doing all those commercials.

And scandals are educational. We all get to learn new words. Like "transactional immunity" and "executive privilege."

If you were alive during Watergate, you should have already learned that last one.

Nixon's administration was certainly interesting, but I don't recall anybody having any illicit sex.

But after several months, the Bill and Monica story is starting to get a little stale. And while we all know there are more, and more important, issues than who the president is having sex with, we're all a little too jaded to look too deeply past the juicy details.

Like, does anybody remember the Constitution, and what does any of this have to do with Whitewater?

Or maybe we're just afraid to.

Washington, D.C., has always been a soap opera. Now it's a bad soap opera. It's fodder for tabloid TV.

Is anyone else expecting to see Ken, Linda, Monica, Bill and Hillary on Jerry Springer?

"Tonight on Jerry! A five-sided Washington love triangle."

At least on Jerry Springer, you have such scintillating topics as the husband and wife who found out they were each having an affair with the same man.

You won't see that on "Face the Nation."

And when the fight breaks out, my money's on Hillary.

Peggy O'Farrell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.