In 1992, Bill Clinton's presidential campaign was rocked by reports that cabaret singer Gennifer Flowers was his lover. Clinton adamantly denied the affair, most famously on "60 Minutes" with his wife, Hillary, sitting by his side. But in 1998, during a deposition in the Paula Jones sexual harassment lawsuit (which brought the world the Monica Lewinsky scandal), Clinton admitted under oath that he did have sex with Flowers once in 1977. Even so, Flowers has always maintained that their affair had lasted for 12 years and that they had sex hundreds of times. According to Flowers's book, "Passion & Betrayal," the future president impregnated Flowers, did inhale marijuana, and once said that Hillary Clinton has probably eaten more pussy than he has. Today, Flowers is embarking on a new chapter in her life. She has recently divorced her husband and has created an Internet dating website called GenniferFlowersSoulMates.com. Some people may wonder why a divorcée who was once involved in a world famous sex scandal would be a good spokesperson for a dating site, but Flowers maintains that it is precisely because of her past experiences that she is so qualified.

HIGH SOCIETY: How did you get the idea to start your very own online dating service?

GENNIFER FLOWERS: I have a dear friend who was a member of Match.com., and she was very successful in meeting nice people. I didn't think too much about going into that business when I first became aware of the Internet dating services because I was married. Since my divorce, I myself need to find a soul mate, and I just found it an intriguing business. There's a huge part of me that likes to help people, and I have heard so many success stories. I thought, "Hey, why not?" Because it is becoming the new way--rather than bars and various others ways that people have tried traditionally in the past--and I just thought it sounded like an exciting business to be in, and I could help myself along the line.

HIGH SOCIETY: Is that actually your profile on the site?

FLOWERS: That is me.

HIGH SOCIETY: Have you gone on any dates with men you've met through your site?

FLOWERS: No, I have not, because I've been traveling so, but I do intend to.

HIGH SOCIETY: Have you heard of any success stories from your site yet?

FLOWERS: I get e-mails all of the time from people who have met people who they are getting along well with. I haven't had any marriages yet, because I'm pretty new. But I expect that.

HIGH SOCIETY: How is your site different from Match.com or eHarmony?

FLOWERS: Match.com and eHarmony are excellent sites, and they've certainly paved the way for me and others who have decided to get into this industry. I would like to think that I put a little more of a personal touch. I'm getting ready to do an "Ask Gennifer" column as part of mine, so if people want to ask me advice based on my life's experience--I am not a psychologist or psychiatrist--but I would be glad to give them advice. I have had an "Ask Gennifer" column in the past when I first started my website, GenniferFlowers.com, and it went very well. HIGH SOCIETY: What kind of advice questions do you receive? FLOWERS: "I've been dating this guy and found out he's married, what should I do? I love him. I don't know if I can quit seeing him" or "My cousin's husband came onto me last night after dinner." Those things happen every day, all day in this world. HIGH SOCIETY: Didn't eHarmony not allow same-sex dating? FLOWERS: I do. Like I say on the page, "Everyone needs love." As long as they're consenting adults, their sexual preference is their business, whether they be gay, lesbian, heterosexual, I don't judge. That's not my place to judge. HIGH SOCIETY: How many people have signed up for you site so far? FLOWERS: I'd rather not say specifically because that's part of my confidentiality, but I have several thousand.

HIGH SOCIETY: What is the percentage of women to men?

FLOWERS: I just counted yesterday, and it's almost even, which I found very interesting. There were a few more men than women.

HIGH SOCIETY: Why would someone sign up to your site as opposed to one of these bigger ones such as eHarmony or Match.com?

FLOWERS: I would say that I'm my own spokesperson. Match.com has Dr. Phil, and he's a great guy. I like Dr. Phil and I watch his show, but this is my site, and I'm so very personally involved that I would like to think that people would realize that I personally care about what happens. And they get the choice of the most quality individuals out there if at all possible. Mine has the very personal touch. People know that I've been through a lot--the relationship with Bill Clinton, I'm now divorced, which has been in the media as well--I think people know I'm a real person, that I've certainly had my share of tough times and relationships. When I say I'm looking for my soul mate and I want everyone to find their soul mate, I mean that. I have a definition of what that is.

HIGH SOCIETY: How do you define "soul mate"?

FLOWERS: For me, personally, I want someone, in terms of compatibility. Of course, who doesn't want someone who they are compatible with? I don't necessarily care how much money someone has, except that they are a productive individual, that they have a job, but they are sweet and sincere and kind with a sense of humor and someone who really takes the time to get to know me, and who could love me with all of his heart and be loyal to me. That would be my definition of a soul mate. That our souls connect.

HIGH SOCIETY: What's happened in your life since your book "Passion & Betrayal"?

FLOWERS: That book ended in '95. A lot of water has run under the bridge since then. For one thing, Bill Clinton made a partial admission, which was a joke, What he actually admitted to--he was perjuring himself. He was lying under oath, but it was a partial admission, and it did help.

HIGH SOCIETY: Did you feel vindicated?

FLOWERS: No, heavens no. Not by that crap. When a guy says one time in 1977, it's so ridiculous.

HIGH SOCIETY: When he said that he had sexual relations with you once in '77, technically he could have meant, once in '77, two times in '78, 20 times in '79. Just like when he said, "It depends on what the meaning of 'is' is."

FLOWERS: We all know how he's slick. They don't call him "Slick Willie" for nothing. Vindication for me would be that he would tell the truth.

HIGH SOCIETY: But do you feel that people on the street are more positive toward you and that some of the people who didn't believe you before, believe you now?

FLOWERS: Yes, even the partial admission helped tremendously at that point in my life. It really did. And there are people who don't like me, who are not going to like me no matter what because they perceive me as an enemy of the Democratic party, which I am not. I have voted Democratic in the past. It wasn't about that for me. It just seemed that most of my alliance, besides from my personal friends and family, came from the Republican party. But they had their own agenda.

HIGH SOCIETY: It's interesting that Rush Limbaugh wouldn't play your tapes of you talking to Bill Clinton on his show.

FLOWERS: Yeah. I was accused of having those tapes doctored, and I had documents that they were tested twice and proven to have never been tampered with.

HIGH SOCIETY: Did you see that movie "Primary Colors"? It was fictionalized, but there's a whole thing about doctored tapes.

FLOWERS: That was a bunch of bull too. The tapes were not doctored. Listen, I wasn't that sophisticated. I had a little 20 dollar recorder that was hooked up to an answering machine with cheap tapes that I had bought for my rehearsal. I wasn't doing it to set anybody up; I was simply doing it for survival. I could have had a library of tapes and videotapes and photographs had I chosen to. And I wish I had now. But hindsight is 20/20, isn't it?

HIGH SOCIETY: The stained dress is what saved Monica Lewinsky from being portrayed as a liar.

FLOWERS: Yeah, I'm sure she thanked the good lord many times for that dress. Listen, these people paint you as a vindictive, crazy, bimbo bitch out to destroy this man; he has done nothing wrong, and you are just crazy, and if you don't have anything to prove differently, it's horrible. It's your word against theirs. Of course, I think they've all been proven to be big fat liars through time. But initially they weren't; so I was the first big battle there. I was the first one to go through that. It was very scary. I lived a horrible life for a long time, in that I had insecurity all of the time. I was rather paranoid, until I just decided I couldn't live that way anymore, and if they get me, they get me.

HIGH SOCIETY: When did you decide that?

FLOWERS: 1993.

HIGH SOCIETY: Did anyone threaten to sue you because of the book?

FLOWERS: No, I told the truth. That's a defense against anything, libel, defamation. No, of course, they couldn't.

HIGH SOCIETY: Has anyone ever made a TV movie of your life?

FLOWERS: No, for a time, I had interest, but they kept getting shut down. The networks wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole, but the individual movie companies would look into the possibilities and the potential of it, and, you know, because of the long arm of the Clinton operatives, they were afraid to do it. It will be done one day, maybe after I'm dead and gone.

HIGH SOCIETY: Anything else going on besides the website?

FLOWERS: Well, I'm still a singer/performer. My show consists of old standards. I do a lot of parody songs. I did a show in New York called "Boobs, The Musical: The World According to Ruth Wallis." Ruth Wallis wrote parody songs in the '50s, '60s, and '70s. I do a lot of comedy in my show.

HIGH SOCIETY: What's are some of the songs?

FLOWERS: I do a song my Ruth called "Baby's Little Dingy"--"He's got the cutest little dingy in the Navy. All the girlies know that it's so. Cutest little dingy in the Navy. They love to watch him go heave-ho," and she does "Queer Things are Happening to Me" about a lady who finds out she's married to a gay man, and I do one called "Boobs," that's about boobs. Ruth had a history of her own; basically Eisenhower shut her down in the United States because he thought that her music was rude. It was the same thing Mae West was doing, but she was doing it through music; so she started touring outside the country and had her albums confiscated in Australia. She's still alive by the way.

HIGH SOCIETY: Have you ever met her?

FLOWERS: I have not. I've spoken to her on the phone. She's in very bad health and she comes and goes, but she was excited that I was doing the show, and very supportive.

HIGH SOCIETY: Have you been approached to do more nude photos since you posed for Penthouse?

FLOWERS: I was, but I declined. I had a guy call my agent, wanting me to participate in a video with a Bill Clinton lookalike, having sex. I have nothing against women who do nude pictorials in magazines at all; it's a personal choice. I had never considered doing it, but as a business woman, I was offered a great deal of money, and I didn't have a lot of earning alternatives at that point because of the Clinton thing so I did it. I don't regret doing it. And if I was faced with the same sort of circumstances today, I would do it again.

HIGH SOCIETY: Do you have investors for your dating site?

FLOWERS: Yes, I did get some investors and, of course, a huge portion of it is my own money. That would be another reason I would tell you that it's very personal. The majority of what's in it is mine, and I have a couple of small investors. I'm fortunate in that, because I'm a celebrity I can probably do a lot of radio, for example. I love radio anyway, and they've been good to me.

HIGH SOCIETY: Have you had much media response to your dating website?

FLOWERS: I had cosmetic surgery not long ago and have not--until this last week really--been able to do interviews, but I certainly plan to kick a promotional plan in high gear in the near future.

HIGH SOCIETY: What kind of cosmetic surgery?

FLOWERS: I had a face-lift. They're tough. They cut and they pull and you get stitches and staples. I intend for that to be my last one; that's it.

HIGH SOCIETY: Do they hurt?

FLOWERS: I wouldn't say there's a lot of actual pain, but there's an amount of discomfort. And when you have to go through the process of healing, you're very swollen, you wait for the swelling to go down, and that becomes frustrating. I've done very well, and I've followed the rules and done what I'm supposed to do. My swelling has gone down in the predicted amount of time. But you're looking at--for the initial amount of swelling to go down--six to eight weeks. That's a long time; it takes really a year for everything to be back to normal. It's quite a process.

(This article first appeared in High Society Magazine)



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