L' affaire Martha. (Comment).

DIDN'T you get the sense you were watching a rerun?

Live coverage in front of New York's federal courthouse, legal hotshots sounding off without any hint of the specific charges, stock footage of the accused in happier times, photographers jockeying for the best "perp walk" shot, instant reaction from passersby -- we've all seen this show before. Hohum, another corporate titan bites the dust.

In fact, the Martha Stewart drama had been so widely anticipated that the TV movie preceded the indictments. That may be a first.

This is not an especially good time to be a living legend. For all the adulation and preferential treatment, it's just a matter of time before something pulls you down several notches, whether it's a trip to the courthouse or an ignominious appearance on the pages of the New York Post. (And they never use a flattering picture.)

Jack Welch had reached virtual lionization for his corporate management prowess at GE until an extramarital affair revealed less than terrific skills at personal management. Then, as part of his ugly divorce proceedings, Welch's over-the-top retirement package was laid out in the pages of the New York Times: free flowers, newspaper subscriptions, a limousine, a cook, etc. So much for being lionized.

Michael Jordan, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Hillary Clinton - name your hero and chances are there's a scandal lurking. Forty years after his assassination, JFK is still dredged up in unflattering ways. Even Sammy Sosa, the beloved Chicago Cubs right fielder, is in hot water for using a corked bat that allows for bigger hits. Just an innocent mistake, Sosa kept insisting, but the press jackals were not willing to let this one lie.

No one is getting away with anything these days, a far cry from a few years ago when making big bucks was the predominant metric of success and celebrity -- and nobody was making waves. Does anyone think the feds would have been nearly as aggressive in their investigation of Stewart had the ImClone trade happened pre-market slide and pre-Enron?

Prosecutors not connected with the Stewart case conceded that while celebrity didn't necessarily lead to the indictments, it probably played a role in pursuing the investigation by showing that no one is above the law. "The deterrent effect is immeasurable," former SEC lawyer Christopher Bebel told the New York Times. The risk-reward of investing so many hours in the case, he added, "constitutes a very prudent allocation of government resources."

But there's more going on than aggressive prosecutions. There's also timing. Stewart, Welch, Sosa and the others find themselves in the middle of a "gotcha" backlash aimed not only at the very wealthy but most anyone who is deemed powerful or just plain admired. With the media displaying its chew 'em up, spit 'em out proclivities, hero worship is deemed very uncool.

Maybe it's a good thing. Martha Stewart is a smart and tireless businesswoman who single-handedly built a media empire but the incessant hype surrounding her success in the late 1990s was just as misleading as the nasty insinuations behind her current troubles.

What's the reality? I haven't a clue. But the outlines shape a quite fallible human being who screwed up, according to the prosecution's case, by misleading investigators in that one dumb stock deal. In other words, a flawed yet formidable executive -- someone who has a lot to contribute if only she can only keep her own worst traits out of the way.

That's not nearly black and white enough for a TV movie, but at least it's not a rerun.

Mark Lacter is editor of the Business Journal.