Friday,
January 23, 1998
KEN BODE,
host: This week, two of President Clinton's old problems bumped
into each other and grew to new proportions. Out of the Paula
Jones case came new material for independent counsel Kenneth Starr,
and the results may be much larger than the sum of the parts.
That's our lead story tonight. Also, Netanyahu and Arafat come
to Washington. And the pope comes to Cuba. Tonight on WASHINGTON
WEEK IN REVIEW.
Announcer: This is WASHINGTON WEEK IN REVIEW for Friday, January
23rd, 1998.
Now here's moderator Ken Bode.
BODE:Good evening, and welcome to WASHINGTON WEEK.
Analysis: Allegations that President Clinton had an affair
with a White House intern and then later asked her to lie about
it KEN BODE, host:
Well, it's been one of those remarkable, unforgettable weeks
in Washington. The pope and Castro in Cuba; Benjamin Netanyahu
and Yasir Arafat, two heads of government, on state visits here.
Either of those could have been our lead, but the story that knocked
this city on its ear this week, that'll be on the front cover
of every newsmagazine next week, the president in his late 40s
and the intern in her early 20s. Let's take one minute to look
at some of the highlights of the week.
(Excerpts from videotape)
(Wednesday)
President BILL CLINTON: I did not ask anyone to tell anything
other than the truth. There is no improper relationship. And I
intend to cooperate with this inquiry.
Unidentified Reporter: ...the--this morning, that the president
did not have an improper relationship with this former intern.
What do you mean by an improper relationship?
Mr. MICHAEL McCURRY (White House Press Secretary): I'm not
gonna parse the statement. You all got the statement I made earlier,
and it speaks for itself.
(Thursday)
Ms. JANET RENO (Attorney General): When a matter is before
the independent counsel, I cannot comment.
Mr. KENNETH STARR (Independent Counsel): Our job is to gather
facts and to evaluate those facts and to get at the truth.
Mr. McCURRY: The president knows that he told the truth in
1992 when he was asked about that relationship, and he knows that
he testified truthfully on Saturday, and he knows his answers
are not at odds.
Mr. VERNON JORDAN: Ms. Lewinsky told me in no uncertain terms
that she did not have a sexual relationship with the president.
(Friday)
Unidentified Man: I do...
Secretary of State MADELEINE ALBRIGHT: I believe that the allegations
are completely untrue.
Man: I'll second that.
Mr. McCURRY: I don't have anything to add new to this story
today.
(End of excerpts)
BODE:Joining me now are Robert Greenberger of The Wall Street
Journal; Hal Bruno of ABC News; Mara Liasson of National Public
Radio; and Michael Duffy, the Washington bureau chief for Time
magazine.
Michael, after that video montage of what happened this week,
on s--on Wednesday morning, I remember we first talked about this,
you said Time's already decided it's the cover story for next
week. What are you gonna add?
Mr. MICHAEL DUFFY (Time Magazine): Well, y--this is a very
fast-moving story and it's very complicated. And today--tonight,
FBI agents searched the apartment of Monica Lewinsky, the 23-year-old
intern who alleges to have had, at least in some cases, affair--an
affair with the president of the United States. This is a--it's
at the Watergate Hotel--you know, the apartment complexes. This
is the place 25 years ago that another president was, you know,
engaging in searching of an office that turned out to be an obstruction
of justice problem. It's just an extraordinary turn of events.
But it's not love letters they're searching for in the apartment
today. They are looking for evidence that the president of the
United States and one of his best friends actually encouraged
this young woman from California to lie to--under oath to officers
of the court, attorneys for Paula Jones, who are working for her
in her sexual harassment case.
This has been an astonishing 72 hours. We've learned that Ms.
Lewinsky told a Pentagon friend, a co-worker, that she had had
this long relationship with the president. The co-worker, a woman
named Linda Tripp, took it upon herself to tape conversations
with Ms. Lewinsky. She then turned these tapes over to Kenneth
Starr. Kenneth Starr said, `I'll fit you with an FBI wire, Ms.
Tripp.' They went back and taped her again at a hotel just a mile
north of this studio a week ago today. Ms. Lewinsky did not want
to participate, but she spent almost eight hours talking to Ken
Starr. A week later, they still have not got a grant of immunity,
although I gather they're meeting tonight and through tomorrow.
It's one of those stories no one could have made up, if we--if
we'd sat around and tried to write this story just for fiction.
And none of the characters in this are what a novelist would call
flat.
Ms.--Ms. Linda Tripp, the woman who did the taping, is someone
who's described by co-workers as a--efficient and smart, but sometimes
a dis--disgruntled person with a chip on her shoulder, and she
clearly now has links to people who used to work for Richard Nixon.
We've learned that in the last couple of days. Ms. Lewinsky, the
intern, is--is, obviously, very friendly, but friends of hers
say that she oftentimes boasted of bedding down men who were--who
lived there or near her, where--wherever she lived.
Watching President Clinton this week, we have relived all of
our horrible nightmares about his very carefully worded expressions
and phrases, reminding us, you know, `I d--I smoked dope, but
I didn't inhale.' And, of course, then seeing Vernon Jordan, the
president's best friend, get up in front of reporters this week,
make a statement, not take questions, say that he didn't ask anyone
to suborn perjury, he didn't ask Ms. Lewinsky to do that; but
he did find her a lawyer and he did get her four job offers. And
this is an amazing amount of attention for someone who is 23.
BODE:Michael, you've ticked off a lot of things that we're
gonna have to come back to. Mara, you had an interview with the
president this week the day the story broke. You don't ask a president
about adultery unless you have pretty good probable cause, and
you had it this week.
Ms. MARA LIASSON (National Public Radio): Well, yeah, and,
also, you know, you don't ask him about adultery just by itself.
I mean, this is not just a sex scandal. President Clinton has
weathered many of those in the past, and I think if this was merely
a sex scandal, he would have batted this one out of the park.
And I don't think--I think he would have survived. It might have
been unseemly that he had something to do with a 21-year-old.
And don't forget, these are--these are allegations. The president
has said--we might not know exactly what he means, but he has
said there was no sexual relationship. But I did have an interview
with the president this week...
BODE:Improper sexual relationship.
Ms. LIASSON: Right. He said at different times there was no
sexual relationship; then at another time, he said no improper
sexual relationship. Now, you know, there's a lot of things to
parse. And, as Michael said, because the president has a history
of giving very lawyerly, hairsplitting, careful answers, there
is a tendency now to look at every single word he says, including
`and' and `the.'
But I did have an interview with the president. These were
previously scheduled interviews that were supposed to be part
of his run-up to the State of the Union address. We forget that
that's happening next Tuesday, because this is one of the most
important things a president does every year. But he was very,
very careful. He simply refused to answer questions like, `Well,
what was your relationship with this woman?' or, `Did you have
any conversations with her before she was about to give her sworn
affidavit in the Paula Jones case?' That is what started all this,
by the way. She's one of the women that the Paula Jones lawyers
want to interview to see if they can establish a pattern and practice
that shows that President Clinton is a sexual harasser.
But one of the things that was remarkable about the White House--and
I have been there through many, many scandals--is the famous rapid
response machine of the Clinton administration. It seemed like
the wheels were falling off this week. There wasn't an aggressive
answer to these charges, as there usually is. There was no answer.
As a matter of fact, the press and political people who usually
craft the spin and--and the counterattack are really--they've
been pushed to the side. The lawyers are in charge. The lawyers
are huddling with the president, and they are trying to decide
how he should respond to these.
Now, clearly, the--the political advisers' instinct is to have
him get out there, talk about it, certainly before the State of
the Union address. But now we're hearing it is unlikely that he
will make any kind of explanation to the nation before next Tuesday.
BODE:OK. So at the White House, the lawyers are huddling.
Ms. Lewinsky's lawyers are meeting with Ken Starr right now. Let's
look at the lineup here. We have five principals: the president
and Vernon Jordan. They're on--clearly on one side. On the other
side, Kenneth Starr and Linda Tripp, the woman who made the tapes.
Then Monica Lewinsky: What is she gonna do? Will she join Ken
Starr and try for the best immunity deal she can get to avoid
perjury? Or will she join the president and Vernon Jordan and
continue to claim there was no affair, as she did at her sworn
deposition? That's the critical thing. If she stands with Ken--with--with
the president and Vernon Jordan, those folks on the other side,
Ken Starr and--and Ms. Tripp, are gonna have some problems, it
seems to me. Vice versa, Lewinsky goes to the other side...
Ms. LIASSON: Well--well, the problem is she's got two different
stories out there. One in a sworn affidavit to the Jones lawyers
where she denies the affair and says he never made any attempt
to tell her to--to--to lie or obstruct justice. On the other hand,
there are these tapes, secretly made, where she does describe
the affair in detail and say that they did tell her to lie.
Mr. HAL BRUNO (ABC News): I think Mara makes a very important
point that it isn't the affair that counts.
Ms. LIASSON: Right.
Mr. BRUNO: It's the question of whether or not there was obstruction
of justice. You gotta remember that in Watergate, it wasn't the
burglary that destroyed...
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. BRUNO: ...Richard Nixon.
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. BRUNO: It was the fact that he was part of a conspiracy
to obstruct justice. Now everything's changed here now. Public
opinion polls, White House spinning, the Whitewater land deal,
it's all become irrelevant.
BODE:Mm-hmm.
Mr. BRUNO: It's all come down to one thing really: The fate
of the--of the Clinton presidency depends upon whether or not
obstruction of justice can be proven to be true or false.
BODE:Robert.
Mr. ROBERT GREENBERGER (The Wall Street Journal):Do--ju--I'm
just wondering on that point, ar--are we dealing here--is it gonna
come down to a narrow technicality where we'll end up with a politically
crippled presidency, but one that kind of beats the worst rap?
What's--what's the sense this week?
Mr. DUFFY: Well, the--the charges are serious, but the evidence
on obstruction is scant.
Ms. LIASSON: That's right. That's right.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Right. Right. Mr. DUFFY: I mean, where most
of the evidence is--and this i--this evidence strangely defined
on these tapes--is really about the affair. The question of whether
he really asked her to lie and whether Vernon Jordan asked her
to lie are on tapes very few people have heard. Almost no one
has, except, as far as we know, Kenneth Starr. There is a great
amount of dispute and some evidence that the tapes that--on--don't
really exist of that. It's just conversations she said she had.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Mm-hmm.
Mr. DUFFY: And so re--really it's--they have a long way to
go before they can produce a mass of physical evidence...
Ms. LIA
Mr. DUFFY: ...that really proves obstruction.
Ms. LIASSON: But that's why the president's response is so
important. In other words, the--these are allegations only. They
might be hard to prove.
Unidentified Panelist: Mm-hmm.
Ms. LIASSON: That's why, I think, the people are hungry to
hear him say, `This is outrageous. This is ridiculous. This never
happened,' you know, `This woman is making this up,' or what--or
whatever explanation, but he hasn't been able to do that.
BODE:But, Mara, you know, he said that four--six years ago
this week, he said just exactly that, `I did not have an affair
with Gennifer Flowers. I did not have a 12-year affair with Gennifer
Flowers.' Now this week it comes out that in this affidavit the
other day, the Paula Jones case, he said, `Yes, I did have an
affair with Gennifer Flowers.' You know, it's the old 11th Commandment.
Mr. DUFFY: But--but even...
BODE:If you can commit adultery, you can lie about it.
Mr. DUFFY: That story was widely reported this week that he
did finally admit this affair, but even today White House officials
were calling up reporters and skinning that back. `Well, he said
he had a rela--you know, a sexual relationship with her, but that
doesn't mean'--I mean, they were--they were dialing it back as
carefully as they can, saying he didn't really...
BODE:Why bother?
Ms. LIASSON: None of us here have seen the deposition.
Mr. DUFFY: That's right.
Ms. LIASSON: We don't know exactly what he said, but we sure
know that six years ago, he gave what millions of Americans heard,
in their ears, as a flat denial.
Mr. BRUNO: And there's a big difference, though...
Ms. LIASSON: Yeah.
Mr. BRUNO: ...also between this and Gennifer Flowers. He wasn't
president at that time.
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. DUFFY: Mm-hmm.
Mr. BRUNO: This incident, if it occurred, happened while he's
president.
Ms. LIASSON: Sure. But the change in the Gennifer Flowers story
is just about his veracity and credibility.
Mr. BRUNO: Yeah.
Ms. LIASSON: And people don't care about Gennifer Flowers.
I don't think the people care about president's personal life.
Mr. BRUNO: Well...
Ms. LIASSON: We've already put that one to--to rest. This is
about, as you said, obstruction of justice.
Mr. BRUNO: We had an ABC poll, and it was 53 percent said that
it didn't matter too much about the--whether or not he had the
affair. When they were asked, `Was there a conspiracy or obstruction
of justice,' 76 percent said it did matter very much.
BODE:How much do you all think the age of the intern will
be a factor here?
Mr. GREENBERGER: I think it has a lot to do with it. I think,
particularly among the boomers...
Ms. LIASSON: Yes.
Mr. GREENBERGER: ...that like Clinton...
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. GREENBERGER: ...the--a lot of the boomers have 21-year-old
daughters, and I think it has a certain bite to it that some of
these...
Mr. DUFFY: Sure.
Mr. GREENBERGER: ...earlier things and allegations didn't have.
BODE:Immunity, that's the k--key question at this point. What
kind of immunity is she looking for? Is she looking for complete
immunity? And this is for perjury.
Mr. DUFFY: Well, already her lawyers have offered some things
to Kenneth Starr, and they, in a fairly typical investigative
fashion, have ignored them. And--and that's--today they announced
that she was actually the target of the investigation. They're
really trying to turn the screws on her.
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. DUFFY: They want everything. She let them into the apartment
today. It wasn't a forced search. She actually OK'ed so--and she
began to give some--some things. They picked up some gifts that
the president presumably had given her or some evidence of some
kind. I think we'll probably--that feels to me like we're moving
toward a--some kind of a deal. And if, you know, the lawyer who
is representing her, who is not a criminal lawyer, but a medical
malpractice lawyer, gets this right, we could have this by the
end of the weekend.
Analysis: What effect the pope's visit to Cuba might have on
US economic policy KEN BODE, host:
OK. We're going to return to a further discussion of this whole
episode and how the media covered this week, and what our obligations
are and what mistakes we may have already made for our roundtable
at the end of the program. But let's move on to a couple of the
other big stories this week. I thought it was really kind of a
magic moment when I saw the Holy Father set foot on Cuban soil,
the one place that the Cold War is not yet over. Hal Bruno, you
were a newspaper reporter back when Fidel Castro originally came
to Havana as a victorious leader of that--of that Cuban revolution.
We're gonna show some video--as you describe those days, we're
gonna show some video that's never before been seen in this country.
Tell us why the seeds with the bad--for the bad blood were--were
planted at that time.
Mr. HAL BRUNO (ABC News): Yeah. I was a reporter for the Chicago
American, and I was in Havana when Fidel Castro came in in triumph.
And, obviously, there was great joy in the streets. Everyone was
for Castro by then. It was `Viva Fidel. Cuba libre,' because the
Batista regime had been so brutal and so corrupt. With it, there
was great hope that this new leader was going to bring prosperity
and democracy, but it had to be done with US aid. Because historically,
from the time it became a country, Cuba's economy depended upon
trade and tourism with the United States. Cuba was always dependent
economically.
Shortly after the revolution, Castro came to the United States
to address the UN, and then he went to Washington. And when he
was in Washington, he tried to see Eisenhower, who was not available.
He spent 45 minutes with then Vice President Nixon. And he was
told, in effect, `If you be a good boy and go back to Havana,
we'll see what kind of aid you get.' Well, he came back to Cuba
empty-handed. And when that happened, the first Cuban Cabinet
fell. They were thrown out. And these were very moderate, pro-American
people. And then in came his brother Raul, Vilma, his wife--they
were Communists--became very important. Che Guevara began his
economic ideas. And that was the beginning of the Communist takeover
of the Castro revolution. And it was downhill after that.
The American embargo came because Cuba allied with the Soviet
Union in the Cold War. And when that happened, the United States,
I guess, couldn't tolerate it, so we put on this trade embargo
that has caused considerable suffering--great suffering--among
the Cuban people, along with the failures of communism and the
fact that the Soviet ally collapsed as well.
Ms. MARA LIASSON (National Public Radio): Well, the pope has
spoken out against the embargo. Do you think that his visit to
Cuba will have any effect on US policy? Do you think that he'll--this
is the first step to getting the embargo lifted?
Mr. BRUNO: Unlikely. All the evidence is that certainly the
Congress, the State Department, American public opinion, is not
in favor of changing the policy to Cuba.
BODE:But, Hal, it's--it's...
Mr. BRUNO: The truth is that most people probably don't really
understand it, but that's the way it is now.
BODE:For--for 39 years, 38 years, whatever the embargo has
been in place...
Mr. ROBERT GREENBERGER (The Wall Street Journal):Since six--since...
BODE:Thirty-six...
Mr. GREENBERGER: Since 1961.
Mr. BRUNO: '61.
BODE:'61. It's been--it has had no effect except on the lower
classes in Cuba who can't get medicine, they can't get aid. And
it's really been a disaster.
Mr. BRUNO: Well...
BODE:Do you...
Mr. BRUNO: There isn't much but lower class left in Cuba these
day, but go ahead.
BODE:I mean, I've always thought that a--the only way you're
gonna get this embargo lifted, given all the political opposition
that--that it has, is a second-term president who doesn't have
to face re-election again who has a little courage to get it done.
Mr. BRUNO: Well, supposedly--and, Mara, you could probably
answer this better than anybody else--President Clinton has been
inclined not necessarily to lift the embargo, but to ease it.
Ms. LIASSON: Oh, look, I think if he had his druthers and there
was no Jesse Helms and there was a Democratic Congress and if
those--those pilots hadn't been shot down, I think that you would
see a different pol--administration policy.
Mr. BRUNO: Another thing that's interesting, though, is that
Castro is taking some risk with the pope being there. Yes, the
pope has condemned embargoes, but the pope also speaks out on
human rights. And this could encourage the anti-Castro opposition
within Cuba. And--and what strikes me as ironic, here it is, 39
years after the revolution, Fidel Castro is still trying to get
the one thing he's always needed and never had, and that's some
kind of a relationship with the United States.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Hal, do you expect any changes in Cuba itself
once the pope leaves?
Mr. BRUNO: Oh, I don't think it...
Mr. GREENBERGER: For the better?
Mr. BRUNO: Yeah. I don't think it'll be a governmental change
necessarily. There may be some easing of things. But I think the
very thing that Castro is afraid of could very well happen, and
that is some encouragement toward the anti-Castro opposition that
still is--exists in Cuba.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Mm-hmm.
Analysis: Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to the United States KEN
BODE, host:
OK. Let's move on and take a look at the state visits that
we had in this country this week. We had two of them which some
hoped would conclude with some kind of progress on Middle East
peace. The summit kind of got blown out of the water by the intern
and the president story, obviously. But, you know, in one of the
oddest moments of the week, it seemed to me that just before going
to see the president of the United States, Benjamin Netanyahu
dropped in on Reverend Jerry Falwell.
Reverend JERRY FALWELL: (From Monday) I'm a close friend of
your prime minister. I like him a lot. God bless Israel. God bless
the prime minister.
BODE:Now Falwell is a fellow who circulated and saw the videotape
for...
Mr. ROBERT GREENBERGER (The Wall Street Journal):Right.
BODE:...some years now that indicates that President Clinton--or
alleges--is a drug dealer and a drug user and a murderer.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Mm-hmm.
BODE:How can Netanyahu, who is a diplomat and was a--was at
the United Nations as ambassador--how can he know that that's
a pretty crass thing to do?
Mr. GREENBERGER: The problem that Netanyahu has, Ken, when
he comes to the United States is that he's desperate for allies.
That's--that's the basic problem. Number one, a day at the White
House for Benjamin Netanyahu is a little bit like a visit to the
dentist. It's painful, it's uncomfortable, because he's being
prodded to go quicker and--and further than he really wants to
on the peace process. So that's problem number one for him.
Number two, he is mindful always of the fact that the last
Likud government, which was in office about five years ago, lost
an election in large part because of American pressure on this
very same issue: the peace process.
Number three is the snub. When Netanyahu was here on a private
visit about two months ago, Clinton went out of his way not to
see him, so he knows there's no love lost between the two of them.
And--and finally, there's the American-Jewish community, which
should be his natural constituency in this country. But a majority
of the people in that community are suspicious of Netanyahu in--again,
in terms of the peace process.
Now the way he's going about trying to resolve these problems,
I think, is very counterproductive and will be very harmful. We
know for sure that in the White House, President Clinton was absolutely
irate over the fact that he had that meeting with Falwell, who,
as you pointed out, Ken, is viciously anti-Clinton and--and always
has been. And even among the American-Jewish community, again,
where this should be this reservoir of goodwill, there is this
suspicion of Netanyahu. And they normally would be a buffer for
any Israeli prime minister, but given the fact that he is now
alienating them with this meeting, they back off. It gives the
president a little more room to put some pressure on Netanyahu.
So it kind of comes around in a circle.
Ms. MARA LIASSON (National Public Radio): But--but that raises
a question. I mean, in the past there was always this notion that
the American-Jewish community was really important to Israel.
There was Israeli domestic policy--politics, but part of the domestic
politics were the American-Jewish community.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Right. Right.
Ms. LIASSON: Does--is--are--are those two things now being
divorced? Does Netanyahu basically not need support among the
American-Jewish community?
Mr. GREENBERGER: No, he does need it, but he doesn't get it,
and he sort of--he sort of imports a little bit of Israeli politics
over here when he comes here. In his country, the right wing has
a stranglehold on the Cabinet because of the nature of coalition
politics, and he sort of assumes that maybe the same thing works
here. I mean, a lot of these people stood up and said they represent
200,000 evangelical parishes and they can deliver a lot of clout.
There's a Republican Congress. I think he sees the mix as being
very different. I think he's wrong, but I think that's the way
he sees it.
Mr. HAL BRUNO (ABC News): Isn't it also true, though, that--that
there were American Jews who are politically conservative that
have been working with Falwell for a long, long time...
Mr. GREENBERGER: Yes.
Mr. BRUNO: ...and were present at this meeting.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. And--and it sort
of goes from the center to the fringe. One of the things that
a number of people in the Jewish community that I spoke to this
week objected to was the timing of this meeting.
Mr. BRUNO: Mm-hmm.
Mr. GREENBERGER: And there was a sense that--you're absolutely
right. Many prime ministers--certainly, Menachem Begin, Yitzhak
Shamir, even Yitzhak Rabin of--of the Labor government--met with
these people. But the si--the fact that he had this meeting, it
was kind of `in your face.' He arrived Monday night, checks in
to the Mayflower Hotel, goes downstairs to the lobby...
Mr. BRUNO: Is that right?
Mr. GREENBERGER: ...and, boom, his first two meetings are with
these people.
Mr. BRUNO: Yeah.
Analysis: Consequences of Iraq's statement that there will
be no more inspections KEN BODE, host:
Robert, I have to give you one minute to talk about the fact
that in the--in Iraq this week, Saddam Hussein pretty much threw
down the gauntlet and said, `No more inspections.' What does this
mean?
Mr. ROBERT GREENBERGER (The Wall Street Journal):Absolutely.
It--it's a story that, in view of everything we've been talking
about, sort of got buried. But I--I think it's one of the most--if
not the most--pressing foreign policy problems that the president
has right now. What it means is that we are in the endgame of
seven years of sanctions. And the United States and the UN have
some very difficult decisions to make in--in the next couple of
weeks.
BODE:All right.
Analysis: Role the media plays in the latest scandal involving
the president and a White House intern KEN BODE, host:
Well, let's go back to our lead story and talk a little bit
about us and this story--the press and this story. In weeks like
this, if you're part of the press, there are pictures you'd like
to forget. And this was the press waiting to see Ken Starr, who
promised to tell us nothing. It's called the feeding frenzy, and
it's kind of embarrassing. All right. These are delicate times.
It's sex, adultery, all these things, the Oval Office, not underage
but close, what have you. What are your thoughts, Mara?
Ms. MARA LIASSON (National Public Radio): Well, I think these
are very, very serious charges, and I think there always is the
tendency to do too much, which I think has happened. But you know
what? No one news organization can control that. That's a function
of how many of us there are and how many more of us show up when
there's a--there's anything to do with sex. But these are very,
very serious charges, not just because of the sex charges, but
obstruction of justice...
Mr. MICHAEL DUFFY (Time Magazine): Right. Right.
Ms. LIASSON: ...on the part of the president of the United
States. That is something you have to treat carefully.
Mr. DUFFY: But--but it's also a feeding frenzy, because it's
important to know, there aren't a lot of sources on this story.
Ms. LIASSON: That's right. It's one story.
Mr. DUFFY: An--and it's really very few.
Ms. LIASSON: That's right.
Mr. DUFFY: There are probably, you know, 300 or 400 reporters
chasing the story, and there are probably four or five people
in town who've even seen or heard these tapes who aren't reporters.
So--and--and it's hard to appreciate that, but, you know, some
of these folks are up all night long just answering reporters'
phone calls. And--and--and--and the other thing to point out is
that a lot of--a lot of the stuff that's being, you know, sort
of printed and reported, talked about and seized upon really hasn't
been seen. It's been heard of.
Ms. LIASSON: Right.
Mr. ROBERT GREENBERGER (The Wall Street Journal):Right.
Mr. DUFFY: It's--a lot of this is hearsay. And--and I think
you just have to be very careful as you go forward.
Mr. GREENBERGER: You know, one of the things that we haven't
talked about is that it also acts as a magnifying glass. And you...
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. GREENBERGER: And it affects lots of other areas of policy.
The Cabinet went out of its way today to say...
Ms. LIASSON: That's right.
Mr. GREENBERGER: ...it's had no impact. But we were talking
about Iraq a moment ago. There was a story out of Iraq earlier
today, essentially quoting somebody as saying, `Oh, we know he's
gonna come bash us now, because he's got to take the attention
off this--what's--what's happening back in Washington.'
BODE:You attended a meeting--a briefing by Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright in the White House briefing room. And...
Mr. GREENBERGER: I had a very good seat.
Ms. LIASSON: That's right. There were very many empty seats,
which is an astounding thing. She's been in the briefing room
twice this week, and there've been plenty of empty seats.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Exactly.
BODE:Hal Bruno.
Mr. HAL BRUNO (ABC News): You know that picture with Starr--look,
Starr let it be known that he wanted to talk to the reporters.
Why not have people come in to an auditorium...
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. BRUNO: ...and sit down and have a press conference...
Mr. GREENBERGER: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Mr. BRUNO: ...instead of that scene out on the sidewalk? Look,
journalism is not brain surgery. Our job is to find out what's
going on and tell people about it. It really is that simple. When
something like this happens where the--the whole dimensions of
this thing changes overnight, it's a story that has to be covered.
If we didn't cover it the way we are covering it, we'd be criticized
by the very same people who are trying to cover up instead of
cover the story.
Mr. GREENBERGER: Mm-hmm.
BODE:What Michael said wa--that there're so few people who
really know, and a lot of the people who know or think they know
are being told not to talk...
Mr. DUFFY: That's right.
BODE:...period.
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
BODE:The lid is on.
Ms. LIASSON: Sure.
Mr. DUFFY: Ken Starr didn't really answer questions.
Ms. LIASSON: No.
Mr. DUFFY: Vernon Jordan didn't answer questions.
Ms. LIASSON: No. No, and the president hasn't answered very
many.
Mr. DUFFY: Bill Cl--that's right.
Ms. LIASSON: Yeah.
Mr. DUFFY: And he's answered...
Ms. LIASSON: Yeah.
Mr. DUFFY: Yeah, that's right. He's answered two or three.
And so what you're left with is--is really very thin gruel. And
now that the tapes, which are the best evidence, as far as we
know, that exists, have moved into Starr's hands, that will become
even harder.
Ms. LIASSON: That's right.
Mr. DUFFY: And--and so, once again, we're back in the box where
essentially the independent counsel has the ball. And we're gonna
have to wait on him, and to the extent that he is talking to reporters--and
that's very, very minimally.
BODE:Well, to the extent that there are two balls in this
case. One of them is the tape that he put on...
Mr. DUFFY: Mm-hmm.
BODE:...Ms. Tripp. And the other one is the possibility of
immunity. He's got--he's really got the whole show going on. Right
now as we are doing this program, Ken Starr is meeting with her
lawyers.
Mr. DUFFY: Right.
Mr. BRUNO: But, also, I think in terms of the media, we're
not telling tales out of school, but you can be sure every major
news organization has its own investigative teams that are out.
And independent of what Starr or anybody else comes up with, the
news media's gonna be coming up with things.
Sign-off: Washington Week in Review KEN BODE, host:
All right, folks, that's all the time we have. Thanks to the
panel. Thanks to you for watching. We'll see you next week, and
I'm sure we'll have a lot more to say about this big story then.
Thanks.
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