Vincent Foster

We are shocked, shocked at reports that President Clinton was a philanderer when he was governor of Arkansas. At least we would be if we had been in a coma for all of 1992. The story that is now dominating the front pages and radio and television evening news broadcasts is old wine in new bottles, so to speak. There is nothing really new except some naughty details. They are titillating reading, we won't deny that, though how true they are is unknown.Do the details inform Americans more about Bill Clinton's fitness to be president than did the reporting on this story in the winter and spring of 1992?

SHADES OF WATERGATE and Iran-contra. By invoking attorney-client privacy and hinting at executive privilege in refusing Senate demands for evidence in the Whitewater investigation, President Clinton is taking a risk he long wanted to avoid. Such defenses have a negative connotation going back to the scandals that destroyed the Nixon presidency and rocked Ronald Reagan's.In actual substance, there are no grounds for equating the dubious Whitewater real estate/savings and loan deals Mr. and Mrs. Clinton undertook before moving into the White House with the malfeasance in office of Watergate and Iran-contra.

With more than normal urgency, the Senate Judiciary Committee has unanimously approved the nomination of Jamie Gorelick to be deputy attorney general. This is the No. 2 job at Justice, and has been unoccupied for over a month, since Philip Heymann resigned. For several months before he resigned, Mr. Heymann and Attorney General Janet Reno had been suffering from what they termed "bad chemistry." As a result, a lot of the in-house heavy lifting had been handled by the No. 3 man, even before Mr. Heymann left.

UNPRECEDENTED IS A word that should be used carefully in dealing with an institution as venerable as the American presidency. Yet "unprecedented" is the precise word to describe the issuance of the first subpoena ever issued to a first lady. Let it be emphasized that Hillary Rodham Clinton is not a "target" in a criminal investigation and if she were she would not have been ordered to appear Friday before the Whitewater grand jury. But let it also be emphasized that her subpoena strongly suggests the grand jury is considering possible obstruction of justice -- a serious federal felony.

Roger Altman's resignation as deputy secretary of the Treasury and Jean Hanson's as Treasury general counsel were no surprises. The Whitewater casualty list is getting long enough to be a political liability for President Clinton.Mr. Altman and Ms. Hanson still deny they did anything improper in briefing the White House counsel, Bernard Nussbaum, about a Resolution Trust Corp. criminal investigation into Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan, an institution linked to President and Mrs. Clinton and the Whitewater Development Co. Mr. Altman and Ms. Hanson also minimize misleading Congress about the briefings.

Robert B. Fiske Jr. has model credentials to head an independent counsel probe of the tangled story of the Madison Guaranty S&L, the Whitewater Development Corp., Capital Management Services and President and Mrs. Clinton. We say that even though he comes from the law firm at which Lawrence Walsh once practiced. Mr. Walsh's seven-year, $37 million Iran-contra effort is a model of how not to manage an investigation.Mr. Fiske has several advantages. He is nearly a generation younger than Mr. Walsh and more likely to stay firmly in charge of a large, young and energetic staff.

THEY'RE SUPERACHIEVERS, shining stars in their hometowns, all-everything in college, rockets on the fast track. They come to Washington riding high, ready to flex their stardom for a new president.They don't know the Imperial City, beneath the pomp and glitz, has brutal claws.Once in the White House, they throw themselves into 7 a.m.-to-9 p.m. work, lunch at the desk, often Saturdays, too. No marathon is too tough, especially if the new president is a boyhood pal.But things go wrong: Foul-ups, media firestorms, broadsides at the president's staff.

WASHINGTON -- Ever since the shocking death of White House deputy counsel Vincent Foster, the news media have been torn between two impulses -- exploring what happened, and showing proper sensitivity to what was a genuine personal tragedy.Not surprisingly, Clinton White House insiders and many Americans at large have been appalled at the spectacle of television and the press probing into the open wounds of Clintonites crushed by the event. It has seemed to many a heartless performance, and in some of the more excessive cases it has been.

WASHINGTON -- Vincent Foster, the deputy White House counsel who killed himself on July 20, left a note that read in part: "Here ruining people is considered sport."He was wrong. In Washington, ruining people is not a sport.It's a job.Reporters are supposed to report without fear or favor, not worrying if people are ruined in the process.But what happens when the press is supposed to investigate itself?Not much, as it turns out.One line in Foster's note said: "The press is covering up the illegal benefits they received from the travel staff."

WASHINGTON -- The independent prosecutor investigating the Whitewater affair plans to announce today that no criminal charges should be brought against White House or Treasury officials for their discussions about an inquiry into a savings association linked to the Clintons.Lawyers and administration officials said yesterday that, because the findings relied extensively on grand jury testimony, the counsel, Robert B. Fiske Jr., believed that most of the details about the discussions of the handling of the earlier inquiry by savings regulators into Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan Association must remain secret.