It is my custom before sleeping to read a novel. I turn off the events of the day and start my journey into the world of imagination. Last night, I was reading Madame Bovary when my wife told me about the latest turn in the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case. I was surprised, but left it to the morning to find out what happened. The New York Times report made it clear, the person who had every right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty by the courts, appears to be really innocent, a victim, not a criminal.

The implications for French and global politics and culture are significant. I worry that France, which desperately needs a serious political alternative, may be deprived of a capable public servant as President because of a false accusation and prosecution. I also worry that very serious problems concerning the relationship between public and private, the intimate and the open, sex and politics, may now go unexamined because the case is being closed, when serious deliberate consideration is what is needed now more than ever, there and here.

Daniel Dayan and I have been discussing the case as it unfolds. A few minutes ago, I received an email from him, continuing our discussion. We will actually make this discussion a part of our “Media and News in a Time of Crisis” seminar at the Democracy and Diversity Institute in Wroclaw, Poland, later this month.

He wrote:

“Just a little note to set up our discussions to come: I may have told you that I was talking with a friend on a bench in Central Park, one Saturday morning, around 11 AM just when the Strauss-Kahn episode was going on, 10 blocks south. Uncannily, I was telling my friend that Strauss-Kahn was likely to win the elections unless he was the victim of some trap. I did not realize the trap I was anticipating was functioning already while my friend and I were having our conversation.

Later, back in Paris, in a one hour debate on French TV, I kept arguing that DSK was to be considered innocent until proved guilty, and that the French journalists with whom I was debating had no reason to claim ‘they should have denounced him earlier.’ In fact, had they denounced him earlier, they would simply have been guilty of libel. There was no proof the Sofitel episode was a rape. There was no proof there were other rapes. As to being a seducer, this is not a crime.

Fortunately, the various authors of this mess damaged the life of someone who can afford good lawyers. DSK should sue the police officers who, after inflicting unnecessary humiliation, kept illegally leaking damaging information to the press. DSK should sue the press for not respecting the rule of the “presumption of innocence.” DSK should sue the Sofitel hotel management for their crucial responsibility in the whole matter. (I have been to Sofitel once or twice but do not intend to ever return, unless, of course, the alternative is sleeping in the street.)

Of course the story is not finished. After presenting ‘Ophelia’ as an innocent victim (ACT I). I anticipate the press will go all the way in exonerating DSK.  What we are witnessing now is the beginning of ACT II. But then, I also anticipate an Act III, in which DSK will turn out to be guilty again. In this ACT III, he’ll be guilty, but not of a rape. He’ll just be guilty of ‘being’ rather than ‘doing,’ of being himself; of being male, white and rich…   All this has wonderful commercial possibilities, of course. It allows selling the same story three times ….”

Daniel always was skeptical about the case against DSK. He thought a conspiracy was likely, which surprised me, as a person who is committed as a matter of principle to be the last one to recognize a conspiracy. But it turns out, he may be right. Getting to the bottom of this may or may not be possible.

Nonetheless, I agree with him that there is going to be a third act. Yet, I am not sure what will be written, who will do the writing and how the script will be performed. Will Strauss-Kahn really be prosecuted as a rich, white man, as Dayan fears? Or will the needed public examination of the problematic divide between public and private be buried in France, just when it seemed that this issue was receiving real attention, as I fear?

The debate about general principled problems has to be separated from the particular case. If Strauss-Kahn is innocent, as he now appears likely to be, he should be free to get on with his life and should be free to serve his country. But that still leaves much unaddressed: sex and politics, the distinction between seduction and aggression, and the standing of the principle of innocent until proven guilty.

We can imagine how this will develop. I’ll sleep on it.