Thomas Samson / AFP - Getty Images
A television screen shows former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn on Sept. 18.
By Stephanie Gosk, NBC News Correspondent
PARIS - Sunday night saw an unprecedented moment in French history: More than 13 million people, the biggest TV audience since 2005, tuned in to watch a man once thought to be a top presidential contender discuss private indiscretions and express regret.?
The live appearance, watched closely by both the general public and the country?s chattering classes, was France?s ?Clinton moment,? one historian said, referring to the former American president?s public pronouncements on his relationship with ?Monica Lewinsky.
With his career and reputation in tatters, the former highly respected head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn said he was guilty of moral wrongdoing when he had sex with a hotel maid in New York City last May.
Nevertheless, he denied that he tried to rape the woman, Nafissatou Diallo.
?So what happened? What happened didn?t involve violence, no criminal act,? the 62-year-old told a TV news anchor.? ?What happened was not only an inappropriate relationship, but more than that it was an error.? It was a failing vis-?-vis my wife, my children and my?friends, but also a failing vis-?-vis the French people, who had vested their hopes for change in me.?
Shannon Stapleton / Reuters
Nafissatou Diallo, the Manhattan hotel maid who accused Dominique Strauss-Kahn of sexually assaulting her, is escorted from Manhattan Criminal Court on July 27.
Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance dropped all charges against Strauss-Kahn on Aug. 23, telling a judge that Diallo was simply not credible.
Despite French?s reputation for indifference to their politicians? private failings, that was not enough for Strauss-Kahn?s critics.? A recent poll by Le Journal du Dimanche newspaper showed that more than 50 percent of the public want DSK (as he is often referred to here) to retire from politics altogether.
The NBC News crew watched the interview with author, journalist and fierce Strauss-Kahn critic Nicole Bacharan. ?Even before it began, Bacharan was pointed out that the TV news anchor asking the questions also was also a close friend of?DSK's wife, Anne Sinclair.
?It?s not very satisfying,? she said when the interview was over. ?He didn?t give a credible version of what happened (in the hotel room).? He didn?t give any version of what happened in that six to nine-minute encounter.?
Strauss-Kahn?s demeanor also stuck Bacharan.
?He seemed very angry to be in that position to have to explain himself about such a tawdry affair,? she said.? ?I didn?t hear him say he was sorry to the French people.?
'Like Indiana Jones'
Strauss-Kahn will have to do more to win back the trust of people throughout the country if he hopes to return fully to the French political scene.?
Acknowledging that fact, Strauss-Kahn said he wouldn?t seek the presidency.? He does hope to regain his position as a prominent economist, however.
Strauss-Kahn is largely credited with bringing relevance back to the International Monetary Fund during the global economic crisis.?
Many also believe he is one of a small handful of economists capable of guiding Europe out of its current deep economic crisis.
That is the role he hopes to take on assuming he can salvage a career out of the aftermath of the scandal.? Biographer Michele Taubmann believes he can.? ?He is the comeback kid,? he said. ??He is like Indiana Jones.?
?He has the experience of pain.? He is not only a bright man, a competent man,? Taubmann said. ?He is also a man who has suffered, a man who has recognized his mistakes.?
Strauss-Kahn said several times that he has paid and paid dearly for those mistakes.?
The question the French need to answer now is whether he has paid enough.?
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