Bill Clinton: I Misled People

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In the postspeech recap, the commentators hit Clinton hard for going after Starr and turning what was supposed to be a sacred moment into a profane one. But a White House insider argued otherwise: "It was a great piece of bait, and the Republicans took it." Instead of focusing their fire on Clinton's lying or misconduct in the Oval Office, he noted, they are using their sound bites to defend the most unpopular man in America. That may not pull Starr up much, and if the Democrats have any luck, it may pull down the Republicans. And it certainly is a diversion.

Starr's team lost no time in signaling that it was not about to back down because of a four-minute speech. On Tuesday morning the independent counsel was back in his office by 5:30 and issued another call for Lewinsky to testify. The plan is apparently designed to test the President's latest testimony for perjury, by contrasting her detailed story with the President's evasive account. Far from receding in any way, the confrontation between Starr and the President seemed to raise the stakes and send both men back to their corners more ornery than ever.

Starr and his team still have the option of subpoenaing Clinton. The President defied them, refusing to answer their questions fully. "No prosecutor would accept that from an ordinary witness," says John Barrett, a former Iran-contra prosecutor now teaching at St. John's University School of Law in New York City. "You'd get a subpoena the next day and ask specific, pointed questions until you got answers, or you'd indict the guy." But the Chief Executive plays by different rules.

Legally, Starr would almost certainly win a subpoena fight--Clinton already conceded the grand jury's legitimacy by testifying--though appeals could take months if the Supreme Court chose to hear the case. The harder prediction was political. Would the public blame Clinton for dragging out a subpoena fight now that he's admitted sex and lies, or Starr for continuing to hammer away on more Monica minutiae?

Starr's first steps after Monday showed awareness that restraint gave him strength in a war of attrition. Instead of picking an immediate subpoena fight with Clinton, he was apparently weighing whether the smarter course might be just to finish up a few remaining witnesses and send the House his report "of any substantial and credible information...that may constitute grounds for an impeachment." Along with other important evidence, the transcript of Clinton's answers and evasions could be included for the Judiciary Committee to make its judgments, and could help Starr's case. But Clinton seemed to relish a gallop to Congress, where those big approval ratings and the thought of a promotion for Gore have the Republicans paralyzed.