Starr Plays the Tripp Card

Ken Starr will be less concerned with Linda Tripp's testimony Tuesday than with how Monica Lewinsky's attorneys respond to it. After all, Tripp has spent more than 100 hours with Starr's team preparing her testimony, and her grand jury appearance is calculated to put the squeeze on his most reluctant witness -- Lewinsky.

In a rare media interview published in the Washington Post, Tripp said that her appearance provides an opportunity to fight back against the vilification she claims to have suffered over her taped conversations with Lewinsky. But the White House spin machine appears ready to roll, with White House aide Sydney Blumenthal in the New York Times recounting some of the questions he faced from Starr's prosecutors in an effort to paint the investigation as a coy probe of the President's libido. But beyond getting his witnesses to elaborate on the definitions of what constitutes a sexual act, Starr's eyes are fixed on the prize: testimony from Lewinsky about a presidential cover-up.