The Obstacle Course

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Their very forthrightness may have helped squelch suggestions that a bribe was involved. Their portrayal of a White House in disarray--the Final Daze--sounded so plausible that some thought it explained why Clinton waived his Executive privilege and allowed his counselors to testify. This is what passes as the best defense--not that he was venal but that he was an idiot. "I think that people are finally tiring of it," Podesta told Time, "but as long as it's still selling cable-TV rating points, it will probably go on a little longer."

As for the ex-President, he was rattling around the house in Chappaqua, N.Y., wondering whether he should try a big blowsy tell-all TV interview to try to turn this around. A longtime Clinton adviser put it this way: "For the last 30 days, he hasn't had one positive story. It could go on like this for another 30 days. So he's thinking, If I don't stop it now, I never will. We are very close to locking in a public impression about the President that isn't good and isn't temporary." But any kind of question-and-answer session would be a disaster in the making. When it comes to those drug runners and con men his brother-in-law sponsored for pardons, "what is he gonna say? He can't get through that." For the moment, Clinton is holding off on a big confessional. "He's decided instead," says another adviser, "to just call every American, one person at a time."