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the breakfast table: An e-mail conversation about the news of the day.

Goldberg and Tarloff

from: Lucianne Goldberg

Choo Choo and Buttered Bread

Posted Monday, Aug. 24, 1998, at 3:41 PM ET

Dear Erik:

Some more thoughts about Newt. I think he had to say something and called Starr's office for some input. He knows the report is going to be more than sex and can talk this way without really talking a stand.



It is in my nature to keep score so I've started my passenger list for the train that is leaving the station with George Stuffinenvelopes, Leon Panetta and Dee Dee Myers in front seats. Dee Dee has a terrific essay in the off-week Time this "week" that breaks my heart. I never bought Clinton feeling anyone's pain and I don't know how he lives with the betrayal of so many people who truly loved him. Her detractors say Linda Tripp betrayed Monica--if one agrees they would still only have to count to one. In Clinton's case it has to be everyone he knows--not to mention the electorate.

I am also pro-bombing. My friend, terror-expert Michael Ledeen has a simple foreign policy that I rather agree with. He says that every two or three years we should take some two-bit third world country that breeds terrorists and throw them up against the wall. Harsh but effective.

Now, because I have someone on the West Coast captive.... What do you know and/or think about the stories that say Clinton will go to LA and work for Dreamworks? Back here that sounds like some kind of bad joke. Could that be? Will he have one of those jobs where he gets (like Henry the K) thousands of dollars to "do lunch"? Will he have one of those remote controlled fireplaces that jumps into flames at the touch of a button? Will they want to hire him if he takes that last helicopter ride sooner rather than later?

I highly respect the Field Poll (for the chutzpah it takes to call it that). Speaking of polls--have you seen a poll anywhere that says what the spinners say--that people are tired of hearing about the Monica Mess? I haven't and I don't believe it.

The minute the cable stations do something else their phones jump off the hook. Theother night Michael Regan said "the bombing story may have legs but the Monicastory has lips." I think the only people who don't want to hear about it are the spinners themselves.

...or am I being too confrontational?

Lucianne

from: Lucianne Goldberg

Choo Choo and Buttered Bread

Posted Monday, Aug. 24, 1998, at 3:41 PM ET
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Lucianne Goldberg is a New York-based book agent. Erik Tarloff is a writer based in Berkeley, Calif. His novel, Face-Time, is forthcoming.
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