Programs by Year: 1998

Nov. 3, 1998

Fat

(60 minutes) Despite the appeals of the multi-billion dollar diet and exercise industries, the United States is getting fatter. The media bombards us with images of thin models exuding the message that to be thin is to be beautiful. But for many of us, being thin is a difficult, if not impossible, achievement. FRONTLINE examines how the diet industry is contributing to our frustration over unwanted pounds and asks if one can be healthy, fit, beautifuland fat. (Web site »)

Oct. 27, 1998

The Child Terror

(60 minutes) In the midst of a sudden willingness to believe that children were being ritually abused in day-care centers during the 1980s, parents, police, prosecutors, and the press turned Miami, Florida, into ground zero for a new way of convicting alleged child molesters. <br>Led by Floridas then-prosecuting attorney, Janet Reno, alleged abusers were relentlessly pursued and convicted with a zeal unmatched in the nation. Today, as some of Renos celebrated cases seem to be unraveling, FRONTLINE correspondent Peter J. Boyer examines the convictions that were a stunning triumph for the crusading prosecuting attorney and created an emerging political model that would be emulated by prosecutors across the country. (Web site »)

Oct. 13, 1998

Plague War

(60 minutes) Today, there are at least ten nations in the world with the ability to produce biological weapons. Cheap and now technologically possible to produce and refine into weapons of mass destruction, biological warfare has the potential to do as much damage to civilian populations as nuclear weapons. FRONTLINE presents new evidence culled from scientists, intelligence agencies, and policymakers to examine the threat biological warfare poses to world security and the responses the U.S. is frantically developing. (Web site »)

Oct. 6, 1998

Washington's Other Scandal

(60 minutes) The 1996 presidential campaign was the most expensive in history and the most corrupt since Richard Nixons 1974 re-election. Janet Reno has now renewed deliberations over the appointment of an independent prosecutor to examine the campaigns financial abuses, and the McCain/Feingold reform legislation is being debated in the Senate. In a special report with Bill Moyers, FRONTLINE goes behind the headlines to explore how both Democrats and Republicans conspired to evade the laws which limit the amount of money allowed to flow into election campaigns. (Web site »)

Sep. 29, 1998

Ambush in Mogadishu

(90 minutes) The story of the disastrous 1993 Delta Force/U.S. Rangers operation which still haunts the U.S. military. (Web site »)

Sep. 21, 1998

The Farmer's Wife

(390 minutes) Filmmaker David Sutherland's searing portrait of a marriage -- "one of the extraordinary tv events of the decade." (Web site »)

Jun. 2, 1998

Fooling With Nature

(60 minutes) FRONTLINE examines new evidence in the controversy over the danger of manmade chemicals to human health and the environment, thirty-five years after Rachel Carson first raised concerns of an impending ecological crisis. Currently, millions in research and public relations dollars are being spent in the battle, and President Clinton is calling this one of his top environmental priorities. The film takes viewers inside the world of scientists, politicians, activists, and business officials embroiled in this high-stakes debate that threatens the multibillion dollar chemical industry. (Web site »)

May. 26, 1998

The World's Most Wanted Man

(90 minutes) FRONTLINE examines the dramatic hunt for Radovan Karadzic, the notorious Bosnian Serb leader indicted for atrocities by the War Crimes Tribunal in the Hague, but still at large in the former Yugoslavia. The film investigates Karadzic's rise to power, the war crimes committed during his rule, and why NATO and U.S. forces have failed to arrest him. (Web site »)

May. 19, 1998

Secrets of an Independent Counsel

(60 minutes) In a rare in-depth television interview given by a sitting independent counsel, Donald Smaltz takes FRONTLINE inside his investigation of former Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy. FRONTLINE correspondent Peter Boyer steps behind the current controversy about Kenneth Starr to find out what these independent counsels really want, how far they'll go to get it, and why they cost so much money. (Web site »)

May. 12, 1998

Inside the Tobacco Deal

(60 minutes) FRONTLINE goes inside the tobacco deal,telling the intriguing tale of how a group of small-town lawyers from the nation's poorest state brought Big Tobacco to the bargaining table. FRONTLINE correspondent Lowell Bergman follows the trail of confidential Brown & Williamson documents that were leaked, examines the role of former presidential advisor Dick Morris in shaping Clinton's stance on tobacco,and reveals new information about the government's criminal case against the tobacco industry. (Web site »)

Apr. 28, 1998

Busted: America's War on Marijuana

(60 minutes) The United States government spends nearly $2.5 billion each year to process arrests related to marijuana production and sales, which often carry severe penalties. While the war on marijuana may be going strong do the results prove it a boom or a bust? FRONTLINE expolores the impact of current policy on stemming the tide of marijuana use and looks at how marijuana law enforcement is affecting American life. (Web site »)

Apr. 14, 1998

The High Price of Health

(60 minutes) Today, providing health care is a profit-driven enterprise which is subject to the forces of the marketplace and operated by administrators with their eyes on the bottom line. But has too much of the decision-making power been taken away from the doctors, nurses, and patients? FRONTLINE looks at how in the wake of a failed attempt by the Clinton administration to provide universal health care for every American, the industry has undergone a dramatic transformation. The film examines the changing health-care industry through an in-depth look at how California and Massachusetts hospitals are coping with this health-care revolution. (Web site »)

Apr. 6, 1998

From Jesus to Christ: The First Christians

(240 minutes) The story of the life of Jesus and the epic rise of Christianity. Said one critic: " It's a revelation of what television can be." (Web site »)

Feb. 10, 1998

The Two Nations of Black America

(60 minutes) Today, America has the largest black middle class in its history, yet half of all black children are born into poverty. Have the walls of segregation tumbled down, only to be replaced by walls of class? FRONTLINE correspondent and Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., grapples with the issues facing the 'two nations of black America' as he takes a personal journey that measures the distance between the beneficiaries of affirmative action and those they left behind. (Web site »)

Feb. 3, 1998

My Retirement Dreams

(60 minutes) 'I began my journey as a voyeur in the landscape of old age, but when it was over I was an insider,' says FRONTLINE producer Marian Marzynski. Marzynski, who calls himself somewhere between a boomer and a geezer,' takes viewers on a personal and poignant journey into America's way of growing old. As the baby boom generation begins to anticipate age, Marzynski settles into the life of Miami Beach's condo complexes, investigating the retirees' struggle to leave behind their old lives and to find new meaning and new joy in life's final chapter. (Web site »)

Jan. 20, 1998

Last Battle of the Gulf War

(60 minutes) In the years following the return home of the last U.S. troops who participated in ground war in the Persian Gulf, attention has turned from the historic victory to a strange new sickness the press has dubbed Gulf War Syndrome. But while many veterans believe something in the Gulf made them ill, scientists argue Gulf War veterans are not dying or being hospitalized at a higher-than-average rate. FRONTLINE tells the story of how Gulf War Syndrome came into existence, examining the psychology of war, the politics of veterans affairs, and the roles of the media and the biomedical research community. (Web site »)