The week's big news, and how's it's being spun.
Feb. 1 1998 3:30 AM

The Clintometer
Chance of Clinton's Removal
Today: 30%
Jan. 30Lewinsky reportedly isn

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William Saletan William Saletan

Will Saletan writes about politics, science, technology, and other stuff for Slate. He’s the author of Bearing Right.

Update on Clinterngate: 1) The judge in the Paula Jones case excluded evidence about Clinton's relationship with Monica Lewinsky from the Jones trial because it would interfere with Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr's Clinterngate investigation. Scorecard: This is good for Starr, bad for Jones (because Lewinsky would have helped make her case), good for Clinton (because it is bad for Jones), and bad for Clinton (because it is good for Starr). The irony: Jones' lawyers, whose lawsuit precipitated Lewinsky's exposure, now can't use her. 2) According to lawyers involved in the Lewinsky immunity talks, Lewinsky said on tape that Clinton suggested but did not directly ask that she deny under oath that they had an affair. Her lawyer, William Ginsburg, hasn't even promised Starr that Lewinsky would testify to that much. This, reportedly, is why Starr is withholding immunity. All this is good news for Clinton. (For a roundup of Slate's cornucopius Clinterngate coverage, see "Readme.") (1/30)

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A bomb at an Alabama abortion clinic killed an off-duty policeman working as a security guard. A nurse was critically wounded. It was the first lethal bombing of a clinic in the United States. (Five people have been shot dead by anti-abortion extremists at clinics since 1993.) The Christian Coalition and the National Right to Life Committee condemned the bombing. Speculation focused on whether it was the work of the same people who bombed an Atlanta clinic a year ago. (1/30)

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Charlie Trie was indicted in the campaign-finance scandal. The principal charges: illegally funneling money to the Democratic Party and President Clinton's legal-defense fund, and obstructing justice by ordering the destruction of subpoenaed records. This is the Justice Department's first indictment in the scandal and is supposed to show skeptics that the department is working from "the bottom up" to get to senior officials. The catch: Trie has fled to China. The New York Times urged senior officials in the Clinton administration to lobby China to send Trie back to the United States, where, presumably, he can implicate senior officials in the Clinton administration. (1/30)

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Dolly, the cloned sheep, was copied from a dead animal. The "adult" cell used in the cloning experiment came from a sheep that had died several years earlier. The tissue from which the cell was taken had been frozen in the interim. This disclosure was buried in a New York Times story about scientists' failure to reproduce the Dolly experiment. Cloning the dead was widely discussed as a science-fiction scenario after the experiment was first reported nearly a year ago. (1/30)

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President Clinton delivered his State of the Union address. Before the speech, pundits dissected his split personality (public ease and private squalor) and predicted that the speech would be disastrously grim because of the Lewinsky scandal. After Clinton gave his usual upbeat performance, pundits expressed surprise and awe that he had surpassed expectations. The Los Angeles Times called him "focused, confident and resolute." The New York Times said he "spoke eloquently and forcefully." Reporters noted the extensive congressional applause. Editorialists lauded Clinton's proposal to reserve budget surpluses to "save Social Security first." Handicappers' conclusion: He once again performed best with his back to the wall, and may have begun to turn the nation's attention away from Lewinsky to policy. (1/28)

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A federal judge halted Navy discharge proceedings against a sailor whose homosexuality was discovered by digging into his America Online customer profile. The judge said the investigation of Senior Chief Petty Officer Tim McVeigh (no relation to you know who) violated the "don't ask, don't tell" military policy and probably broke a federal law prohibiting computer-service firms from releasing private customer information without authorization. The hip spin: It's a victory for the privacy rights of gays. The nerdy spin: It's a victory for the privacy rights of Internet users. (1/28)

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Compaq is buying Digital Equipment Corp. for $9.6 billion. It's the biggest takeover in computer-industry history and makes Compaq the second-largest computer firm in the world, behind IBM. The story line: In the 1980s, IBM focused on its traditional mainframe market and ceded the fledgling PC industry to then-smaller players such as Microsoft, Intel, and Compaq. Now the PC industry has grown up, and Compaq is returning to eat IBM's lunch. (1/28)

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The backlash against the Clinton sex-and-perjury scandal has begun. Spins: 1) Clinton won't resign, and impeachment would be too long, messy, and uncertain. 2) Disgust with the sordid affair is evolving into disgust with the sordid coverage of the affair. 3) The public cares about the lying but not about the sex. 4) Lying isn't always so bad. 5) Lies from Clinton aren't news. 6) The media have rushed too quickly from breaking the story to discussing impeachment. 7) More serious matters, chiefly Iraq, demand our attention. 8) By crippling Clinton, we cripple the United States against Iraq. 9) The real menace is Ken Starr's abuse of his unaccountable power. 10) The real outrage is surreptitious tape recordings by Clinton haters scheming to sell suck-and-tell books. 11) The real villains are Democrats scurrying off the sinking ship. Clinton is their victim. 12) Lewinsky is a sexually boastful fantasist. 13) Lewinsky's mother is a sexually boastful fantasist. 14) The stock market hasn't panicked. (For more on how the story everyone's talking about stayed out of the papers, see Slate's "Tangled Web." Also in Slate: Jacob Weisberg's "Dispatches" take you to Washington, and "International Papers" gives you reactions from around the world.) (1/26)

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The United States is preparing for a possible attack on Iraq. U.S. officials, having concluded that Iraq's defiance is rendering U.N. weapons inspections futile, are consulting foreign governments about launching a military assault to destroy Iraq's suspected biological and chemical-weapons facilities. The assault wouldn't happen for at least a week. The catch: First, the United States has to convince its allies that the attack isn't a ploy to distract Americans from President Clinton's sex-and-perjury scandal. (1/26)

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The Denver Broncos won the Super Bowl. They came in as 11 ½-point underdogs and beat the Green Bay Packers 31-24. They are the second wild card team in history to win the Super Bowl and the first American Football Conference champions to defeat the National Football Conference champions in 14 years. The sentimental story: 37-year-old Broncos quarterback John Elway finally won the big one after three previous defeats. The real story: The Broncos won because they're the first AFC team in years to wear down the NFC team with a superior smash-mouth running game. Broncos running back Terrell Davis was named the Most Valuable Player for gaining 157 yards and scoring three rushing touchdowns, a Super Bowl record. Biggest surprise: The game was worth watching. (1/26)