Updated: Feb 12 1998 6:22PM

It was supposed to an innocuous sit-down with reporters in the Map Room. But Hillary Clinton needed only a little prodding Wednesday to finger yet another culprit in her husband's troubles: the Internet.

"Without any kind of editing function or gatekeeping function, what does it mean to have the right to defend your reputation?" the First Lady said when asked whether the newest news medium needed curbing. "There used to be this old saying that the lie can be halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on. Well, today, the lie can be twice around the world before the truth gets out of bed to find its boots."

Netly News Washington correspondent Declan McCullagh says the unnamed villain was clear: online gossip-slinger Matt Drudge, who forced the Lewinsky scandal to the forefront by leaking the Newsweek account -- and who is also the target of a libel suit by Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal.

McCullagh says the wild and woolly style of news on the Net is a good thing. "The beauty of the at-large Internet is that there are no gatekeepers. And that terrifies politicians, because they're accustomed to a close relationship to the media," he says. "But there's a better policy than restricting free speech." It's called buyer beware.

-- Frank Pellegrini