The Threat to Linda Tripp

Creator's Syndicate, Inc.
July 31,1998 Tony Snow

THE THREAT TO LINDA TRIPP

BY TONY SNOW

RELEASE: FRIDAY, JULY 31, 1998, AND THEREAFTER

WASHINGTON -- Linda Tripp bid farewell last Wednesday to the grand
jury impaneled by Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr. She delivered a
few remarks to the jurors and then made her way outside to a waiting
horde of reporters.

She felt calm, confident, poised.

But as she descended the courthouse steps, her son, Ryan, leaned over
and said, "Don't worry, you're going to be fine."

Then Phillip Coughter, an old friend and now a spokesman, whispered,
"Don't worry just because this is on international television."

A few steps later, attorney Joe Murtha pulled her aside: "Just forget
that millions of people are watching this."

And lead attorney Anthony Zaccagnini offered a final bit of advice:
"If you start shaking, just hold your hands so the press can't see."

By the time Tripp reached the microphone and began to address reporters,

she was trembling like a leaf.

Most Americans can identify with this kind of fear. We find only one
thing more frightening than speaking to strangers, and that's death.
So when Tripp trembled, she offered a glimpse of something we have
seen seldom in L'Affaire Lewinsky: authentic human emotion.

A bit of serendipity helped her through her six-minute oration. Just
beyond the reporters stood a patriotic scultpure bearing quotations
from the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the
14th Amendment. Tripp's eyes lighted on the first engraved phrase:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident. ..."

"I was mesmerized by it," she recalls. "I almost threw my notes away."
And at the end, she did. She closed by speaking from the heart:

"I believe in our country. As I said, I'm no different than any of you.
I believe you have the right to tell the truth under oath, and I believe

you have the right to do so without fear of retribution or worse. ...
It is a right all of us should be fighting for."

Tripp's performance was a far cry from the slick and practiced
statements delivered by the likes of Vernon Jordan. It bore no
resemblance to the rehearsed assaults on her, Kenneth Starr or
anybody else who has dared question the probity of a patently
corrupt president.

Yet it also featured a fair share of zingers, including the following
passage: "I became aware between 1993 and 1997 of actions by
high government officials that may have been against the law.

"For that period of nearly five years, the things I witnessed concerning

several different subjects made me increasingly fearful that this
information was dangerous -- very dangerous -- to possess."

She identified the two enduring features of the Clinton scandals: brazen

lawlessness and witness intimidation. With Tripp, the administration's
oft-used "nuts and sluts" assault failed. She pushed back her fear and
talked -- and in months to come, others may do the same.

Even though she has taken vicious hits from such political giants as
Jay Leno and John Goodman, Tripp says she's nobody's victim. She
merely stood up for her rights. "We all share the same rights," she
says with conviction. "It's our country, not Bill Clinton's country."

And now, she feels free to recount some of the things she has seen.
She says she was shaken by White House dishonesty during
investigations of Vince Foster's death, Filegate, Travelgate and
reports of drug abuse among administration employees.

"It's chilling," she says, "to watch high government officials lie
under oath."

She says a political operative recently approached her attorney,
Anthony Zaccagnini, and relayed stunning news. The man said the
White House legal team had asked him to root through Tripp's
trash and perform a back audit on all her tax returns.

"Tell her to watch what she puts in the garbage," he warned,
noting that he had turned down the commission from Team
Clinton.

Tripp doesn't consider that unusual. It turns out Monica Lewinsky
gave her much more than talking points. The intern also relayed
threats from the president during the Kathleen Willey controversy.

Tripp had alerted her White House superiors that Michael Isikoff
of Newsweek was about to print Willey's claim that the president
assailed her sexually. The administration wanted Tripp to observe
the old rule of omierta.

So the messages came: "(Talking to Isikoff) is a dangerous thing to do."

"Team players don't do this. You need to be a team player."

"You have two children to think about."

"This is not a good career move."

She says presidential fixer Bruce Lindsey told her she would be
"destroyed" if she went public with anything she had seen

. For a while, the threats worked. "Fear is a magnificent motivator,"
she says. "There is none quite like it. But you do get to a point where
you say either, 'I'm going to continue this way and do what I need to
keep my health and my job', or, 'I'm mad, and I'm not gonna take it
anymore.

Tripp made her choice. "There are no standards in that White House,"
she says, "and I'm not going to be a part of it. I'm going to expose
it."

To find out more about Tony Snow and read his past columns, visit the
Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.