by Greg Enslen
“I’m not sure what I’m doing here,” Ruff began in his slow, deliberate way. Confined to a wheelchair after a mysterious illness paralyzed his legs, he looked back and forth between the people seated at the two couches.
Clinton smiled.
“I invited all of you here to meet a new friend of mine,” he said, indicating Ellis. “This is Dr. Donald Ellis, a theoretical physicist from New York. Can each of you introduce yourselves, please?” Clinton asked, looking around.
Ellis put up his hand. He felt like an idiot.
“Excuse me, sir,” he said to the president. “That’s not necessary. I know everyone.”
The room was quiet for a moment, as they all looked at him.
Cheryl Mills leaned slightly forward.“I’m sorry, but I don’t know you.”
Ellis smiled. “The president just introduced me.”
She turned and looked at Clinton. “Well, can I ask in what capacity Dr. Ellis has been asked to join us? I expected we were to discuss private matters, which this man doesn’t have any knowledge of—”
“I’m here to talk about the 2000 election and how Mr. Clinton’s dalliance with Monica Lewinsky will torpedo Mr. Gore’s chances of winning,” Ellis said, nodding at the vice president, who had not spoken yet.
The room was silent.
“And I’m not sure why you’re smiling, Mr. President,” Ellis said quietly. “This scandal with Lewinsky, when exposed, will paralyze your presidency. I know you don’t want that—you have plans, such as the Middle East accord, but people will laugh when you present new ideas. All they’ll be able to think about, until you leave office, is the blue dress.”
“What ‘blue dress?’” Ruff asked.
Ellis looked around at them.
“Mr. Clinton carried on an affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky from November 1995 to March 1996,” Ellis said, speaking from memory. “In that period, they had seven encounters of a sexual nature.”
Mills leaned forward, starting to interrupt him, but the president held up a hand for silence, then nodded at Ellis.
“Go on, Dr. Ellis.”
“Ms. Lewinsky was transferred to a new position at the Pentagon last April, when members of the White House staff became concerned that her presence could become a campaign liability.”
He looked around, but no one challenged him on the statement, so he continued.
“Beginning next month, if everything continues unchanged, Mr. Clinton will ‘revisit’ that relationship and have two more encounters with Lewinsky. One encounter will involve a certain activity, and Monica will be wearing a blue dress that will eventually end up in the possession of Whitewater and Paula Jones prosecutor Ken Starr. He will test the dress and get a positive match to the president’s DNA.”
Vice President Gore leaned forward.
“Bullshit.”
“Who is this person?” Ruff asked the president, ignoring Ellis completely. “I’m sorry, but I thought this information was restricted to White House staff only.” Cheryl Mills sat back in her chair, crossing her arms. “Does this mean we have a leak? How does he know these things—did you tell him these things? And I thought things were over with Lewinsky. This is crazy—I don’t know where this information is coming from, but it’s—”
“It’s one hundred percent accurate, Ms. Mills,” Ellis said, taking out a stack of papers. “I have access to knowledge that you do not. I know what’s happened up to this point and, as hard as it may be for the people in this room to believe, I know what is going to happen.”
Bill Clinton put his hands up, stopping the others from asking more questions.
“OK, Dr. Ellis. Tell us what happens this year and next.”
Ellis looked at him and sighed, then continued.
“The Whitewater and Travel Office scandals will die down, but Ken Starr will continue to aggressively pursue the Paula Jones case, looking for more evidence of Mr. Clinton’s improprieties.” Ellis and the others glanced at the president, who shrugged.
“I know we’ve discussed this before,” the president said forcefully, “but I still think what should matter is what I do in this office, as the Commander in Chief. What I or others do behind closed doors—what does that matter?”
Ruff shook her head.
“We’ve had this discussion, Bill,” she said. “You know that wishing it doesn’t make it true.”
“And part of it did take place in this office,” Ellis interrupted.
Clinton shot him a look. “You know what I mean. Not in this physical room, but in my capacity as the president. The actions I take as president, the policies I implement—those are the things that matter. Not what I choose to do with my personal time.”
Gore shook his head. “It doesn’t matter, Bill. People see it as a distraction from the issues you should be dealing with.”
Ellis nodded, agreeing. “That’s true. And it besmirches the office of the presidency.”
The others looked at him.
Ellis continued. “One of the Impeachment Terms that will be brought against you in January 1999 alleges that your misleading statements and deceit undermined the office of the president.”
“Impeachment?” Gore asked suddenly. “Who said anything about impeachment?”
Ellis began shuffling through the papers in front of him and pulled out small, stapled stack of papers.
“I know it’s hard for you to believe, but I know what I’m talking about. Here, let me pass this around,” Ellis said, handing the papers to Clinton.
The president looked at it for a long moment, flipping through each page, before handing it to Mills.
“My State of the Union speech.”
Ellis nodded. “Yes, you’ll deliver it on February 4. I particularly like the part at the end about the ‘thousand days’ to the new millennium.”
Mills handed the speech to Gore, who looked up at the president.
“Is this your speech?” Gore asked him.
Clinton nodded and got up, grabbing a stack of typed pages from his desk and passing them around. “This is what I’ve been working on, so far. I’ve seen Dr. Ellis’ copy—it’s the final speech. I stopped working on mine, because his is perfect—it’s exactly what I wanted to say.”
“That’s not possible,” Ruff said, flipping through the pages.
Ellis nodded. “It’s a copy of his speech. And yes, the president will be formally impeached. The proceedings will consume this presidency and the nation for the better part of three years. Most of the president’s close friends, and quite a bit of his staff, will be required to testify,” Ellis said, glancing around. “The two of you,” Ellis said, indicating Ruff and Mills, “will make up the primary members of his defense team, along with Gregory Craig, David Kendall, and Dale Bumpers.”
The others glanced at each other. Ellis could tell that Cheryl Mills, for one, wasn’t buying a word of what he was saying. Her arms were crossed, and she was looking at Clinton as if she wanted to be excused.
He took out another sheaf of papers.
“Here are the Articles of Impeachment,” he said, handing them to the president, who glanced at them and handed them to Ruff, who immediately began reading them out loud.
“Trial Memorandum of the U.S. House of Representatives. Now comes the U.S. House, by and through its duly authorized Managers, and respectfully submits to the U.S. Senate its Brief in connection with the Impeachment Trial of William Jefferson Clinton, President of the United States,” Ruff read.
“It doesn’t matter,” Al Gore said quietly. “Anyone can put together some words that sound like what the U.S. House would write, if they were going to impeach someone—in fact, you could probably copy the words from the Andrew Johnson impeachment. Anyone can make this up,” Gore said, his eyes on Ellis. “I want to know how this man knows. The Lewinsky issue was resolved, I thought.”
“Yes, it was—I’ve had almost no contact with her since last April. But I had been thinking about contacting her again—�
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“What?” Cheryl Mills said, sitting forward. “Haven’t you learned your lesson?”
Clinton looked at her. “What I do is my business.”
Gore shook his head. “Not if the rest of us pay the price. You’ve got staff members getting her jobs to keep her away from you. Wasn’t she going to get a job at the U.N.? Bill, you need to end it, now.”
“It’s not that simple,” Ellis said. “Lewinsky was told that she could come back to the White House after the election and that she could have any job she wanted. She won’t go away easily. She will confide in a friend at the Pentagon, a Linda Tripp, who will clandestinely record their conversations. Those recordings, along with the blue dress that Tripp convinces Lewinsky not to have dry cleaned, will form the basis of the impeachment.”
The room was quiet.
Clinton nodded after a long moment of quiet. “I have met with Dr. Ellis several times over the past few days to go over his information. Believe me, what he says is the truth. What we need to do is figure out what we’re going to do—”
“What we’re going to do?” Gore said angrily. “What ‘we’re going to do’ is have you castrated.”
Clinton looked at him and slowly, a smile broke out on his face.
“Very funny, Al.”
“Actually, that’s not a bad idea,” Cheryl Mills said, not smiling. “You need to learn to control yourself, Mr. President. Is it worth it to have this Lewinsky matter dominate your agenda for your second term, if it ever gets out?”
“It will get out,” Ellis said, passing around more papers—both were photocopies of articles from the front page of The Washington Post. “And I assure you, Mr. Gore, these items are real. I have the technology to fake articles from the Post, if I cared to, but these are accurate.”
Clinton took the papers and passed them around again after a quick glance—Ellis remembered reading somewhere that he was a very fast reader.
“The first sheet is an article from the Post on January 19 of next year, covering the president’s defense team. The second sheet is a series of articles, including one from January 8 on Mr. Ruff’s appointment, then another on the White House response in July to the subpoena for Mr. Clinton to appear before Ken Starr. The last is Mr. Ruff’s opening statement at the impeachment trial.”
The sheets went around, and Ruff read through his statements, including the one that he would present on the floor of the Senate. The room was quiet for several minutes as he read through the entire transcript.
The vice president broke the silence.
“What is a ‘Wikipedia’?” he asked Ellis, holding up one of the sheets and pointing to the logo printed in the bottom margin.
“It’s a website on the Internet,” Ellis said. “The Internet will explode in popularity over the next few years. Wikipedia is one of the companies that will spring up as information migrates to the Internet—it is an online repository of all human knowledge that anyone with computer access can read, add to, or change,” Ellis answered, looking at the vice president.
“Really,” Mr. Gore said, smiling. “And you say anyone can edit it? How do they keep the articles from being defaced, or keep false information from being placed in the article?”
Ellis smiled.
“Actually, it’s a very clever system. Say you have an article that you’re interested in, like fly fishing. You might read the article and that’s it, or you might register with the site to make some changes and additions—it makes sense, actually, to have fly fishermen keep that particular article up-to-date and accurate. You could also subscribe to it and, thereby, be notified via electronic mail, or email, of any further changes and updates.”
Gore nodded. “So someone comes along and puts bad information into the Internet website, and you fix it. What keeps it from getting into a circle of updates? And how does the website make any money?”
“Good questions,” Ellis said. “Wikipedia would have a group of administrators that oversee the site but don’t make content decisions—they would look at how long each user had been registered with the site, how much content they had added and changed, and if there were any complaints. Some controversial articles, such as ones on abortion, or the 2000 presidential election—” he glanced at Clinton, then back to Gore— “can be ‘locked’ to prevent future changes or defacement. And because so many people use the site regularly, the website sells advertising in the margins.”
Ruff put his hand up after reading the entire speech.
“OK, that was odd. Mr. President, if the facts we are discussing were to come to light, and I was asked to represent you in front of an impeachment hearing, that document I just read would be exactly what I would say. There are even references in there that I don’t know off the top of my head, but I’m sure they’re accurate—clearly I researched the speech before presenting it.”
“Researched it? What do you mean you researched it?” Gore said angrily. “You haven’t given it yet or maybe never will. This is all crazy,” Gore said, shaking his head and standing, walking to the windows and looking out.
“No,” Ellis said quietly. “You losing the 2000 election to George W. Bush because of this scandal, that’s not crazy. It’s true—I was there.”
Gore turned to look at Ellis. Now, they were all looking at him.
“I remember that night,” Ellis continued. “Watching the news, watching the returns coming in. Everyone thought it was a done deal when you lost Arkansas, and then—”
“I lost Arkansas?” Gore asked, incredulous. “Bill’s home state?”
Ellis nodded.
“People had years to stew on this scandal and the others that came before. You get lumped in with the ‘Clinton White House’ and the ‘shovel crew,’ the nickname for Clinton staffers who spent all their time working to keep more scandals from coming out. But you lose Arkansas, and then it looks like you’ll win Florida and take the election. Instead, it gets hung up in a statewide, county-by-county recount of every vote.”
Ellis got out the USA Today that he’d shown Mr. Clinton on the morning at the bakery and passed it around.
“Hanging chads—do you know what those are?” Ellis asked the room. No one responded. “Those are the little pieces of paper that are punched out of a paper ballot. Sometimes, they don’t get punched enough to fall out and remain attached to the ballot. Attorneys for Mr. Bush and Mr. Gore will spend days arguing about hanging chads, about what counts as a real vote and what does not. There will be a lot of discussion about absentee ballots and disenfranchised voters, and it will go on for almost a week, until the U.S. Supreme Court refuses to hear arguments on the recount. As Bush seemed to be the winner in Florida, his brother, the governor, and the Florida Secretary of State declared George W. Bush the victor and therefore the winner of the election.”
The room was quiet.
“What seemed like a victory was actually a very negative thing,” Ellis continued. “Many people thought that Bush stole the election, and the controversy followed him through his short term in office, weakening him. And the office.”
Clinton watched the others in the room and nodded, making a decision.
“OK, here’s what we’re going to do,” Clinton said. “I’ve read in the information from Dr. Ellis that two more incidents are supposed to take place between Ms. Lewinsky and myself in February and March of this year. I’m here to promise that those will not happen—especially the famous blue dress incident.”
The others in the room, all except for Dr. Ellis, nodded.
“Next, let’s put together some options and meet again in one week to see how best to get a handle on Lewinsky and this Linda Tripp person—from what I’ve read, our activities are over for a while before Monica decides to confide in her friend Tripp. It is she who, on the advice of a book agent, records the conversations that later end up as the primary evidence against me.”
Ellis nods. “That’s right. And Monica’s need for revenge. If you can figure out a way to let h
er down easily, it would go a long way toward preventing the impeachment.”
Clinton nodded, jotting something down on a pad of paper.
Ruff nods. “OK, that seems like a prudent course. The Whitewater stuff is running its course, and David Kendall has a good handle on all of that. I don’t know where this DNC fundraising thing is going to go. The key here is to get in front of the matter, find out who might talk, and then convince them to keep it zipped up. As for Monica—Bill, that is the most important part. No further contact, especially anything—” he looked around, uncomfortable “—that could be traced back to you. You must smooth things over with her, and then avoid all further contact.”
Clinton nodded and stood.
“Excellent—let’s move forward on this immediately. And believe me, I want to see this problem solved as quietly and quickly as you both do. Thank you for coming,” Clinton said to Ruff and Mills. “Can we get together again tomorrow and figure out how to proceed?”
Ruff and Cheryl nodded and turned to leave—she opened the door and held it open as he wheeled past her, already deep in discussion with her.
Vice President Gore walked around the couch as if to leave—he’d still been standing over by the windows, looking out at the Washington Monument—but Clinton put up a hand and then pointed at the couch.
“OK,” Clinton said, looking at Gore, “now we can get on with the real reason we met.”
Gore looked at Clinton, then glanced at Ellis.
“What do you mean?”
“My weakened presidency doesn’t just cost you the election,” Clinton said quietly, his usual jovial manner gone in a heartbeat. Ellis noticed that the president had kept it light while his Counsel was in the room, but now he’d turned serious.