This Is a Battle --Hillary Clinton

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That was a little disingenuous, since Lewinsky left the White House staff nearly two years ago for a job at the Pentagon. Ginsburg also made light of the "souvenir shop" gifts that Lewinsky received from Clinton--no dress, "unless you consider a long T shirt a dress." And as for the alleged 'DNA dress,' " he added, "I have said for two weeks now that I have investigated that very carefully because I think it's a very important potential piece of evidence. I'm not aware that any such dress exists." The next day he announced he and Lewinsky would be heading back to California, so she could spend some time with her father.

While Starr was trying to make his case, Clinton's job last week was to persuade the American people to reserve judgment, let the investigation proceed and bear with the Great Explainer's refusal to explain much of anything. So after days of watery nondenials and rumors of resignation, last Monday Clinton finally gave voters who wanted to believe in him an excuse to do so. In the Roosevelt Room of the White House Monday morning, with Hillary beside him, he stared into the camera and narrowed his eyes. "I want you to listen to me," he said. "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie, not a single time, never."

It was an enormous gamble, the result of a fierce White House battle. While Clinton had for days been urged by adviser Mickey Kantor and others to toughen his denial, the Monday morning statement was finally worked out in a post-midnight strategy session with former deputy chief of staff Harold Ickes and Hollywood imagineer Harry Thomason. Ickes, the street-smart infighter who had steered Clinton's re-election campaign only to be bumped out of a second-term job, flew in from California and went straight to the White House. Ickes' prescription for the President: Look the people straight in the eye and, to the extent you and your lawyer are confident, say, "I didn't do it." Only a loud, unambiguous denial would "stanch the wound," Ickes said. Thomason, meanwhile, helped the President rehearse the stern, reproving body language, according to a source familiar with the meeting.

It was the first of several turning points, and it worked. That afternoon, when Hillary arrived in Harlem to visit an after-school program, the crowd was jeering reporters, chanting, "Leave Bill alone!" The next day was the First Lady's turn, to usher a new villain onstage. The ground had been carefully laid: Clinton's defenders had been attacking Starr as a vigilante armed "with a loaded subpoena." Clinton lawyer Bob Bennett had filed a motion, which read like a press release, to move up the date of the Paula Jones trial, scheduled to start in May. He charged that Starr "intentionally or unintentionally...has joined forces with Paula Jones. The virtually unregulated processes of civil discovery have become a vehicle for parties allied in an attempt to destroy the President."