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| KISS AND TELL? | |
 March 11, 1999 
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TERENCE SMITH: George Stephanopoulos, once among President Clinton's
closest aides, left the administration following the 1996 presidential
race. He has spent much of the last two years teaching at Columbia |
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| A president betrayed? | ||||||||||||||||||||
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GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: I did not vet it with them. What I - and I understand that, and if people want to say that, they'll say what they say - what I tried to do is write an honest book, and I think a fair book, that showed all sides of the Clintons, of the White House at that time, and not really try to make too many hard judgments, let people make the judgments for themselves as they read the book and they see the experience unfold. But, you know, criticism comes with the territory. TERENCE SMITH: In fact, it is a season of dueling |
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| Inside experience. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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TERENCE SMITH: For more on memoirs past, present, and future, we turn
to historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., the TERENCE SMITH: Rahm Emanuel, let me begin with you. George Stephanopoulos is a friend of yours, of course, a former colleague. Do you have any problem with what he's done? RAHM EMANUEL, former adviser to President Clinton: TERENCE SMITH: And you think that George has been disloyal? RAHM EMANUEL: I don't know if I would use "disloyal." I want to read the book. I would not have written -- remember, we're commenting on comments yet without the book, so I will reserve that kind of harshness, but I would like to read the book before I come to that conclusion. What I've seen to date, I would not have written that book. I don't think -- let's just take a moment on, kind of, intimate details between the President and First Lady. I've argued and talked on this program and on other programs about a zone of privacy for public officials. I've done that in the face of press kind of piercing in on that privacy. I never thought I would have to argue about that or argue for that in the face of staff. TERENCE SMITH: Arthur Schlesinger, do you see it that way, as a violation of loyalty to a president while he's still in office? ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR., Historian: As a historian, I'm delighted at
anything that enriches the TERENCE SMITH: And are those more important considerations in your view than loyalty to one's president? ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR.: Well, that is a matter of personal judgment. I think that the enrichment of the historical record is good, not only for historians, but for the American people. In a democracy, knowledge about the way government is run, knowledge about the people who run the government, is ordinarily regarded as useful. And I think that it's the -- you know, knowledge of presidents is on the whole a good thing. |
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| Cashing in? | ||||||||||||||||||||
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TERENCE SMITH: Peter Carlson, you describe this in your article as cashing in. Is that what it is? PETER CARLSON, Washington Post: It certainly is. Mr. Stephanopoulos is not doing this for free. He's not waiting -- TERENCE SMITH: Why should he?
TERENCE SMITH: Rahm Emanuel, was it your sense during your time in the White House that George Stephanopoulos was going to write a book? Was he taking notes? Did he talk about writing a book? RAHM EMANUEL: I mean, you understand, I don't have a problem with writing a book. I don't have a problem with Arthur's view of the historical record being contributed. I do have one slight -- and this is attention in an historical sense: I think you cannot rush historical judgment and fast-forward it. I think you need time and perspective to do that. On the other hand, you don't want one's memory of events to start to gray at the edges and fray at the edges. On the other hand, George didn't say every day he was going to write a book, but I don't think anybody took it as a surprise that while he was -- it was public there was a negotiation going on that he was going to write a book. I don't have -- that's not where I have any sense of betrayal. I don't have a betrayal yet with George. I have yet to read the book, and I still consider George a friend. I do think, though, as a staff person -- now this is a staff person -- Arthur answered that question as a historian. I'd be interested in his perspective also as a staff person, rather than just a historian, and that perspective. And that is, we got -- we served the President and we were given a unique opportunity. George did it for the full length of the first term. I did it a little longer. I think it was a great opportunity. I would do it again. I'm honored that the President gave me the trust to serve him in many different capacities. And I would do it again, and I think I owe him that sense of loyalty, not only on his personal life. I don't have to be blindly loyal in the sense of not to be able to tell the warts, but I'm honored to have worked there, participated in what happened, and contribute to what I think he's done in the sense of how presidents are measured, which is what is the status of the country they inherited and what is the status of the country -- the state of the country they left behind. TERENCE SMITH: All right, let's turn to - RAHM EMANUEL: And I think it's a fair analysis and fair argument and a healthy argument. |
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| A matter of ethics. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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TERENCE SMITH: Let's turn to the former staff assistant, Arthur Schlesinger, and ask him whether he would have felt hide-bound to keep his counsel, at least until a president was out of office. ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR.: I think what Rahm TERENCE SMITH: Right. Well, Peter Carlson, I suppose there is one difference. If you write a book when a president's still in office, it's worth more money. PETER CARLSON: It certainly is. If Monica Lewinsky and George Stephanopoulos decided to wait 20 or 25 years, they would be writing books for very little money compared to what they're getting now. They are going to the market when the market is eager for them.
PETER CARLSON: It certainly is. As Professor Schlesinger just said, in politics, it is and in every other field of endeavor. People who become famous for good or ill have, throughout our history, cashed in with books and in other ways. ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR.: If books sell well, the author is entitled to the bulk of the proceeds, it seems to me. If books sell well, why should the publisher get all the money? TERENCE SMITH: There speaks an author, of course. RAHM EMANUEL: Terry, can I ask a question? TERENCE SMITH: Yes, Rahm. |
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| Breaking the relationship. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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RAHM EMANUEL: I don't mean to cut in here. Arthur brought up -- and I would be interested in his perspective -- other staff who have written books while the president's serving. All the -- unless my -- I'm losing it in the ear piece -- all the cites he has is of staff while they are writing-- or former staff, that is, or former cabinet secretaries -- who have written while a president is still serving are -- ones he cited I think were -- had a break in that relationship or some bond. Are there staff who wrote while a president is still serving and written favorable books after they have left that I don't think he cited? Is that, like, a kind of dividing line between books written by staff while the president's still serving -- that is, staff have waited -- the favorable ones have waited till the president leaves; or the president writes his own memoirs -- versus those who have some kind of break with the administration and decide they got to get their piece out first. TERENCE SMITH: Right. Do you see that as an important distinction, Mr. Schlesinger? ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR.: I'm not sure where TERENCE SMITH: Well, that raises a question, Peter Carlson, whether a subject, a president in this case, as some say, earns disloyalty by his own behavior. PETER CARLSON: Well, one could say that President Clinton does not inspire a heck of a lot of loyalty. Ask Lani Guinier, for instance. But I believe that we're losing track of one fact here. When George Stephanopoulos worked for the president, his job was to make him look good. Nobody complained about that. Now he comes forward to present a more three-dimensional view, and his morals are called into question. That seems odd to me. |
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| For the history books. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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TERENCE SMITH: Rahm Emanuel, Mike McCurry, the former press secretary, is quoted in George magazine as saying that he knows of no one, no former staffer, no current staffer, who is, in his words, "blindly loyal" to Bill Clinton. What is your thought on that? RAHM EMANUEL: Well, Mike and I have discussed this while we were in
the White House. My view on that is that if you have something critical
to say to the president, you give him your honest opinion. I've done
that many times. I considered, though, that in the public arena, that
sense of loyalty and commitment either to support or not to say TERENCE SMITH: Arthur Schlesinger, you said you read the excerpts in Newsweek. Some of those are very intimate detail about the President, the First Lady, anger, moments of despair, et cetera. Does that cross a line in your view? ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR.: Well, it's a question of taste, I suppose. If we had equal eyewitness accounts of relations between Abraham Lincoln and his wife and so on, we'd cherish them. I think that, as a matter of taste, one might feel this is too early to have these disclosures. But when you look at historical figures, anything like that is of great value. TERENCE SMITH: Okay. In other words, questionable taste, but still useful history. ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR.: Absolutely. TERENCE SMITH: Thank you, all, very much. |
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University,
analyzing politics for ABC News, and writing his memoirs, for which
he received a reported $2.75 million advance. The book, All Too Human,
released this week, provides an intimate portrait of life inside the
Clinton White House. It is unflinching in its critique of both the President
and First Lady. The book's release has sparked debate on the propriety
of former White House staffers criticizing a president while he is still
in office. This past Sunday, Sam Donaldson questioned his colleague
about that on ABC's "This Week." 
SAM
DONALDSON: If it runs true to form now, there are various parts of this
book that are not a very good read if you're President Clinton or Mrs.
Clinton, I suspect they are going to denounce you in some respect, or
say that it's a bunch of hooey. What do you say to people who say, well,
you're now the betrayer, oh, you should not have written this book?
Did you vet this book with them?
memoirs
by former presidential advisers. Henry Kissinger, Secretary of State
to Richard Nixon, releases the third and final volume of his memoirs,
Years of Renewal, next week. But, unlike Stephanopoulos, Kissinger's
latest book comes some 25 years after Nixon left the White House following
the former president's death. Stephanopoulos is not the first presidential
adviser to criticize his president while still in office. Political
strategist Dick Morris penned Behind the Oval Office, a blistering
account of his years working for President Clinton. 
He
reissued the book recently with the subtitle, "How We Reelected Our
Sunday Morning President But Ended Up With Saturday Night Bill." During
the Reagan administration former chief of staff Donald Regan, who was
fired from his job, got even with the president and the First Lady with
a book entitled For the Record, in which he described Nancy Reagan's
consultations with an astrologer. Earlier, former budget director David
Stockman attacked President Reagan's economic plans in his book, "The
Triumph of Politics." George Stephanopoulos is not the first to kiss
and tell. And he may not be the last.
former
special assistant to President John F. Kennedy - he is currently writing
his own memoir; and to Rahm Emanuel, a former senior advisor to President
Clinton -- he is now a managing director at a Chicago investment bank,
who has yet to write about his White House experience; and to Peter
Carlson, a Washington Post staff writer who wrote an article
earlier this week about what he called the "American Game of Cashing
In."
Well,
I haven't read the book. But, you know, I've read what's been out there
in the public domain to date. I think that, you know, as I said to the
President when I left, you know, "I've given you seven years and you've
given me a lifetime of memories." And I do think that we owe that president
a test of our loyalty and a commitment. And I think George did that
while he was there. And just from my own perspective, I continue to
have and want to show that sense of loyalty because I think this has
been a good president who has given me a unique opportunity to serve
our country and to serve his administration, and I'm proud of the work
that I was able to contribute. 
historical
record. I think that it is also some use for people who write about
their experiences in the White House to do so rather quickly so that
others who shared that experience are in a position to rebut them. If
you wait too long, all the other witnesses will have died and you don't
get the further amplification of the historical record that you get
through rebuttal and, say, rebuttal. 
PETER
CARLSON: -- several decades. He is striking when the iron is hot. He's
getting while the getting is good. And he's certainly not the first
person who's done that. 
Emanuel
has to say is a very honorable position to take. But I think that it
doesn't really matter whether you write it while a president is still
in office or whether he's out of office. I don't think that makes a
great difference. There's nothing new about this. Andrew Jackson's secretary
of the treasury, William Duane, wrote a book after Jackson fired him,
attacking Jackson. The Due Deal, Raymond Mulley's book -- after
seven years -- Mulley was once very close to Roosevelt. It is an important
memoir of great value for historians that came while Roosevelt was still
in office. It was used by his political opponents against him, but,
you know, that's the way life is. I think it's a matter, as I say, of
loyalty. Loyalty is an important consideration. Ted Sorenson, Pierre
Salinger, Ken O'Donnell, I, all wrote books about JFK. We felt he'd
earned our loyalty. And I suppose we -- but I don't think we -- we suppressed
anything because of that. 
TERENCE
SMITH: Now, this is a great American tradition, is it not? 
anything
critical, that was just my perspective. Now, I'll give you an honest
argument -- I gave -- honest anecdote. I told the president I wouldn't
have gone forward with NAFTA. I thought politically at the time it was
a lot to take on right after the budget, given the health care that
we wanted to do. And I told him why and I gave him straight-up, honest.
I thought it was politically too tough. He decided to go forward and
spend the political capital to do it. I helped run that effort with
Secretary Daley to pass it. I gave him my honest view. He made his decision.
It was a major policy decision and political decision and went forward.
I think you owe the president your honest opinion. Whether you have
to share that in the public domain, it depends on where it reaches in
your sense of judgment of what the president is doing violates some
principle. And that's an individual decision to make.