First Lady Says Intern Furor Will Die Out

First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton predicted Wednesday that the controversy over her husband’s alleged relationship with former intern Monica S. Lewinsky will “slowly dissipate over time,” and said she is confident that the public will stick by the president.

“Americans are smart, fair-minded, savvy and I think they see things for what they are, draw their own conclusions and know the evidence of their own experience,” Mrs. Clinton said, providing her explanation for the president’s sky-high public approval rating in several polls since the Lewinsky story broke.

She added: “And they are satisfied that life is better [and] our country is stronger.”

In a conversation with a small group of reporters invited to the White House, the first lady sounded confident and almost serene about the allegations that her husband had an affair with Lewinsky and then sought to cover it up.

Her attitude was in marked contrast to her take-no-prisoners tone two weeks ago, when she charged that “a vast right-wing conspiracy” was to blame for her husband’s troubles.

“I don’t anticipate that this will evaporate,” she said. “But I do anticipate it will slowly dissipate over time by the weight of its own insubstantiality.”

Her comments reflected a clear change in course in the White House’s public strategy for overcoming the controversy, aides said, from bitter fury to sunny cheer.

Last week, the emphasis was on attacking the president’s attackers--from independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr (who was publicly branded as “corrupt” by one White House aide) to television pundits (denounced as “overpaid and immoral” by another White House aide).

“We made our point and the public accepted it,” White House Communications Director Ann Lewis said. “But those issues are our opponents’ agenda. It is very important that we not be diverted to someone else’s agenda. . . . Our goal now is to focus on what’s important.”

So as of now, the words and actions coming from the White House over the next few weeks will aim to reinforce a few recurring themes: that the charges against Clinton are unproven and unimportant; that the president is hard at work on more important issues, from education to Iraq; and that the public is right to be more interested in results than allegations.

In effect, the White House hopes to take the recent poll numbers--which along with showing high approval of the job Clinton is doing indicate a strong desire for the Lewinsky issue to go away--and reinforce them.

That message has an added advantage. One aide said that it warns Republicans in Congress that if they tangle with Clinton--either by rejecting his domestic policy proposals or by flirting with the idea of impeachment--they are playing with fire.

“What has rocketed [Clinton] into the stratosphere was that for a few days there, the American people were being told that there was some threat to this president . . . and they didn’t like that,” presidential advisor Paul Begala said. “We’re in the delightful position where good policy is good politics.”

Echoing the point, the first lady said the public has rallied around her husband because he “has sent a signal to the American people about what is important.”

“It’s an inspiration to me, personally, to see my husband get up every day and do the work he was elected to do and be focused on trying to continue the work he has begun on the budget,” she said.

When a reporter asked, politely, whether she had “thought any more about a direct and frank conversation by the president with the country about these allegations,” the first lady turned steely.

“I’m not going to add anything to what the president has already said,” she said. “And I think any of you who think hard about this issue would have to agree that he has taken the right position.”

“We’ve already seen how so much of this charge and countercharge does not withstand the scrutiny of much attention at all,” she said. “. . . So I just advise everybody to just take a deep breath and watch this develop.”

She also said: “You know, there used to be this old saying that a lie can be halfway around the world before truth gets its boots on. Well, today the lie can be twice around the world before the truth gets out of bed to find its boots.”

But, in keeping with her new, more positive tone, she even managed to say a few nice words about the news media.

When a reporter asked about her charge of “a vast right-wing conspiracy,” she said she had found the news coverage that followed “quite interesting.”

“There’s a lot of information out there that I commend all of you for the work you’ve been doing to bring to public light,” she said.