Dimbleby: You say we're not to know what you did and that's obviously your affair, but your wife, in her book, clearly sets out that you did lie to her.
Clinton: And I said I did, and I acknowledge that in my book.
Dimbleby: So, it is true that you lied.
Clinton: It is true that I didn't tell her the truth, I didn't tell anybody the truth ... I decided not to compound my personal error by letting these people [Starr, et al] win and that, in the meantime, I shouldn't expose anybody until the thing calmed down a little bit because we had a mad prosecutor on the loose who was dying to indict anybody ... You know, if this had been a normal thing where I had been found to have done wrong personally, and I'd been asked about it, I would have simply dealt with it in an appropriate way, with my family and anyone else ...
(Very angrily) And let me just say this - one of the reasons he [Starr] got away with it is because people like you only ask people like me these questions. You gave him a complete free ride. Any abuse they wanted to do, they indicted all these little people from Arkansas, what did they care about them, they're not famous, who cares that their life was trampled. Who cares that their children were humiliated. Who cares if Starr sends FBI agents to their school, and rip them out of their school to humiliate them, and try to force their parents to lie about me? Who cares if he sends a woman like Susan McDougal in to a Hannibal Lector-like cell and makes her wear a uniform worn only by murderers and child molesters? Nobody in your line of work cared a rip about that at the time. Why? Because he was helping their story.
And that's the difference in me and the people that were after me. I actually cared about what happened to those people, and I wanted to be President to help those people. And that's what the fight was about. Now that doesn't justify any mistake I made, but look how much time you spent asking me these questions, and this time you've had - that’s 'cause what you care about, 'cause that's what you think helps you and helps this interview. I care about what happened to the people I fought for.
This all naturally and conveniently forgets Clinton's own use of the FBI, the ATF and the INS to ruin the people he always thought were after him, all eight long years of his term in office, but never mind. But, hey, he cared.
Article comments
1 - Mac Diva
[personal attack deleted]
2 - Eric Olsen
Mark, we need a link to where you got the transcript, assuming it is online. TV is not print, I see no violation in reprinting a transcript of a television interview as long as we attribute the source and link to it.
3 - Mark Edward Manning
That's what I figured, Eric. If it wasn't a violation of copyright laws, they never would have put it on the internet. I just had to search for it. Anyway, the link, which I was going to publish in Part II and still will, is here. Sorry for the break in journalistic etiquette, but I repeat, the link was going to be published in my forthcoming Part II entry.
4 - JR
Mark Edward Manning: This all naturally and conveniently forgets Clinton's own use of the FBI, the ATF and the INS to ruin the people he always thought were after him, all eight long years of his term in office...
And could you provide a link to some documentation to back up that comment?
5 - boomcrashbaby
JR, Kenneth Starr is going to teach at Pepperdine University. Isn't that proof he has been ruined?
As far as the Clinton bashing continuing more than 4 years after he left office, I can only say that because conservatives get one of those throbbing forehead veins whenever they discuss him, can only be a tribute to his successful liberal platform.
It was during the Clinton years and due to all his economic policies (as well as our hard work) that enabled this household to get out of the poverty category and well into the middle class. I don't care what anyone else says, he will always be a hero in this house.
Conversely, I just got off the phone with my sister, a 2nd grade teacher in an economically deprived area of Okla. and she just told me that due to "no child left behind', currently about 75% of her students are being left behind....
Oh, what I would give to have another Democrat in the White House, someone dedicated to making this country better for ALL, not just his elite voting base. (speaking of voting base, did anybody see today's news story that Bush is seeking to get church membership records as a way to recruit new Republicans?)