Having so dramatically fallen to earth, Scott O'Grady last week was thrown into the sun. The bright, hot rays of instant fame enveloped him: newspapers put him on their front pages and magazines on their covers; he appeared on all three network morning shows the very same day; and the Clinton Administration and the Air Force exploited his pluck and Gary Cooperish innocence, determined that he be asked no questions about the confused policy that had him flying over Bosnia in the first place. When properly combined, three volatile elements generate American celebrity: the media, the public and the spinmeisters who manipulate them. In the case of Scott O'Grady, the three achieved nuclear fusion. The danger was that in the process, a likable, humble man could be consumed.
Clinton and his advisers knew immediately that O'Grady would cause the country to shift into full hero mode. In the days before the pilot's rescue, the President and his top aides had been resolving the final points of a secretly planned address that would be given from the Oval Office. It was a crucial moment in Clinton's presidency: he was about to change course on fiscal policy, and the surprise move would accommodate Republicans while infuriating congressional Democrats. The speech was planned for the evening of June 8.
But early that day, shortly before 1 a.m., a call came in from National Security Adviser Anthony Lake. "Got 'im," Lake said, telling Clinton that O'Grady had been rescued. At the various White House staff meetings that morning, the O'Grady rescue was a featured topic. Clinton's top aides, many of whom wanted to delay the budget speech anyway, saw the potential for positive coverage of the President if he placed himself in the middle of the pilot's story. They decided to postpone the speech so its impact would not be swamped by the O'Grady frenzy.
The Administration carefully calibrated the President's meeting with O'Grady the following Monday. The instinct at the White House was to be extremely careful about seeming overly opportunistic. So while O'Grady was invited to the White House for a private lunch, a decision was made not to hold any kind of ceremony there lest Clinton seem too eager to share in O'Grady's good fortune. Instead speeches were given at the Pentagon. For the same reason, there was no photo opportunity with O'Grady and the President in the Oval Office and no transcript of their meeting. "It was good news for once from Bosnia," says a senior White House official. "We made a conscious decision not to overdo it."
O'Grady arrived at about 11:15 a.m. with a huge entourage, including his mother, stepfather, father, father's fianca, brother, sister, maternal grandfather, maternal grandmother, one cousin, four friends and the wife of one of his friends. They spent nearly an hour meeting privately with Clinton. After lunch, during the limousine ride to the Pentagon, O'Grady asked the President to pinch him "to see if this is real." The President declined, but the pinch was eventually delivered by Secretary of Defense William Perry. At the Pentagon O'Grady made some remarks, and Clinton said, "He gave us something more precious than we can ever give him: a reminder about what is very best about our country." (The President delivered his budget speech the following night.)