The Democratic nomination campaign in Wisconsin was thrown into turmoil last night as a Clinton-like drama unfolded around front-runner Senator John Kerry and his alleged relationship with an intern.
The Drudge Report, an Internet news site that frequently breaks such stories before the mainstream media, reported yesterday that Gen Wesley Clark had informed 12 reporters, off-the-record, that "Kerry will implode over an intern issue."
Drudge claimed that three reporters had confirmed the conversation.
Gen Clark was said to be furious that his comment leaked. The woman concerned was said to have been a former employee of the Associated Press and to have left the US for Europe at the suggestion of the Massachusetts senator.
An investigation of the allegation, partly based on letters received by a friend of the woman involved who approached a reporter, has been under way at Time magazine, ABC News, the Washington Post and AP. A source who had been investigating the story for a major US media outlet told The Irish Times if was just an affair they did not plan to publish it, but if it was an intern they would investigate to see if harassment was involved.
However, yesterday the allegation was the main topic on conservative talk radio in Wisconsin.
Governor Howard Dean, who is challenging Senator Kerry in Tuesday's Wisconsin primary, learned the story had broken after he left a midday campaign event in the Opera House in Osgosh, a town north of Milwaukee.
Rumours that something like this was in the offing are believed to have been a factor in Mr Dean suddenly deciding to stay in the race after Wisconsin, despite earlier saying he would quit if he did not win. Mr Kerry is well in the lead in the state where his main challengers are Mr Dean and Senator John Edwards.
Former president Bill Clinton advised Mr Edwards earlier this week to stay in the race, leading to suggestions that he too knew something might happen to undermine Mr Kerry.
One observer said that its leaking now would benefit Mr Edwards - and Mr Dean, whom Republicans would prefer to see as the Democratric candidate as he is viewed as less electable against President Bush.