By Debbie Schlussel

I want to pay tribute to someone who I think has been unfairly vilified by the media and the left over the years, Linda Tripp, who died today of pancreatic cancer.

As you may recall (how could you forget?), Tripp is the former government employee whistleblower who turned in Bill Clinton for lying under oath. She did this by disclosing to government investigators that a young White House intern, Monica Lewinsky, had been engaged in sexual acts and an apparently one-sided “romance” with the then-President.

She’d befriended the much younger Lewinsky, who confided to her about her affair with Slick Willie. Tripp made recordings, and that’s how the famous Gap blue dress, with the William Jefferson Clinton semen stain, was uncovered.

For that, Tripp was portrayed as a disloyal friend who betrayed Lewinsky. She was endlessly mocked and attacked, mostly for her looks and weight (but you can’t say anything about Lizzo!), in a way these phony “MeToo” liberals would never do to anybody else. Saturday Night Live even had John Goodman play her in a skit. She couldn’t get a job anywhere, and her life was ruined. She basically had to go into hiding and become a hermit for years. When Tripp later got plastic surgery, she got mercilessly attacked for that, too. But who could blame her? What they did to her, had to be tremendously traumatizing.

I look at Tripp in a different way than the conventional liberal media maligners and cheap comedian thugs. She had tremendous bravery and fortitude to do what she did. And she did the right thing. She had nothing to gain from it, and in fact, because of her whistleblowing, she lost everything. Everything. She really couldn’t recover from it.

And she may have saved Lewinsky’s life. I’m no conspiracy theorist. But a lot of people with stories to tell about the Clintons, ended up dead. A lot. Most of them under very weird, mysterious circumstances with suspicious cues. See the Vince Foster suicide, for one of many examples. Because Tripp taped the phone calls, told Lewinsky to save the Gap blue dress, and turned in this information to the feds, Lewinsky had insurance. She’ll probably never admit to herself that this is the case, though.

In the end, Tripp will be remembered for this, and for this only. Sadly. And I remember her for doing the right thing. Not for the obnoxious, inaccurate, completely biased way the media covered her. It was vicious. It was vile. It was unfair. And it wasn’t true. Linda Tripp was a patriot. She did the right thing. And for that, she was bullied. She will probably be bullied for it again, posthumously, when American Crime Story’s latest season comes out late or early next year. (It’s about the Clinton Impeachment.)

Monica Lewinsky said she was dedicating herself to being an advocate for victims of bullying. But the most bullied in the Clinton-Lewinsky saga wasn’t her. It was Linda Tripp.

Linda Tripp, Rest In Peace.