culture to a large degree. flip on the television set and it has had a profound influence on this entire nation and it has on this entire nation and it has to be affirmed. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com president clinton said today he is very pleased with his first year in office. but not a bit happy about how it's ending. >> let him look into it. i just want to go back to work. >> whitewater is not going away. >> republicans smell blood. >> the seismic shift to the right -- >> his re-election campaign is heating up. >> clinton has won a second term as president of the united states. >> political trouble for the president. >> possibility of impeaching the president must now be addressed. ♪ ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ don't stop thinking about tomorrow ♪ ♪ don't stop, it will soon be here ♪ ♪ it will be here better than before ♪ >> bill clinton was a president who was turning the corner to a different time in american life.

that song, "don't stop thinking about tomorrow," became the theme of the clinton presidency. >> 46-year-old bill clinton of arkansas was sworn in today. right back there at the capitol building. >> bill clinton, the first baby boomer president, what he represented was a fresh start. hopes were high. very high. >> the office of president of the united states. >> congratulations. [ applause ] >> bill clinton defeats the man with the best resume in modern american political history, george bush. it seemed impossible. >> a new season of american renewal has begun. >> he was like a meteor. he came on the scene smart, well spoken, appealing and kind of fun. >> let's listen to president bill clinton tear it up. ♪

>> clinton comes to office brimming with energy, enthusiasm and self-confidence. the first few months would be a real trial for him. >> president clinton and his staff are regrouping after an embarrassing political setback. >> his choice for attorney general was before the senate judiciary committee apologizing for hiring illegal immigrants. >> we got off to a rocky start for a number of reasons. there were hiccups in the appointment process and policy hiccups. >> senate critics bash bill clinton's policy on gays in the military, calling it confusing. >> it hasn't been easy. that's the way president clinton described the first three years -- months of his administration. >> you dreamed of being here. what's the difference between the dream and the reality? >> the reality is that from the day i got here, we had a world of work to do. i enjoy coming to work here every day. it's an enormous privilege. even the tough days are good days.

>> you had an enormously charismatic and popular president who didn't seem to understand how to move the levers of government. >> bill clinton came into office with some bad news. turned out the deficit was much worse and they thought. he had to figure out a way to get us out of a recession. the 1993 budget was an attempt to do that. >> i had hoped to invest in your future by creating jobs, expanding education, reforming health care and reducing the debt without asking more of you. but i can't. >> when we finally put out a budget, it was something for everyone to hate. the republicans hated it because it had tax hikes. and it had cuts for the democrats to hate. >> the stakes seemed enormous. there was a sense that if this didn't pass his first year might be a failure. his whole presidency might be a failure. >> from the early morning to the early night, the nation's first lobbyist was at it all day. his morning run with senator

joseph lieberman was a way to pay him back for coming out for the plan yesterday. >> bill clinton had total faith in his ability to persuade. he always thought if he got anybody in a room one-on-one he could change their minds. >> most of the rest of the day was spent like this on the phone to capitol hill to so many members that this afternoon mr. clinton said he'd lost count. >> it's close. this is the clinton presidency. all the other stuff we want to do will not happen unless we approve this plan. >> as majority leader, i was very much concerned about what the outcome was going to be. we needed 50 votes and we were at 49. bob kerrey, senator from nebraska, he had genuine doubts. >> will you tell us what you're planning to do, senator? >> no. >> until he went to get up to speak in the senate, i wasn't sure what he was going to say. >> president clinton, if you're watching now as i. suspect you are, i tell you this. i could not and should not cast a vote that brings down your presidency. >> by the slimmest of all possible margins, the president

saved his budget bill and the political clout of his administration. [ cheers and applause ] >> after 12 long years, we can say to the american people tonight we have laid the foundation for the renewal of the american dream. >> passing the budget was a victory because we didn't lose. but usually you could get one member from the other side. >> every single republican in the congress voted against it. >> republicans viewed bill clinton's presidency as illegitimate. they thought george h.w. bush deserved a second term. from the very beginning, they were not going to work with him. >> president clinton said today he's very pleased with his first year in office, but not a bit happy about how it's ending, under a cloud of controversy over his personal life and business dealings. >> the white house is anticipating questions about whitewater. >> the whitewater controversy. >> whitewater. >> whitewater. >> whitewater affair.

>> the president, the first lady, a bad real estate deal, a failed s&l. >> whitewater, nobody knew what whitewater was. >> the story begins in 1978. hillary and bill clinton when he was governor of arkansas invested in a land development project. it was a fiasco. >> the clintons say they lost almost $70,000. their partners are now the focus of widening federal and congressional investigations. >> the press starts asking more and more questions. who was involved? where did the money go? what happened to all the records? >> the more puzzling questions may concern whether the white house engaged in a cover up. >> in washington by the '90s, there was a giant scandal machine. i was part of the scandal machine. i remember having this kind of uneasy sensation that what began with watergate, which is a noble crusade by the press, out of that came this kind of scandal culture. >> this is one of those stories

that has been fed as such stories tend to be by the way the administration has handled it. >> whitewater development is not going to go away. there are too many questions and there's too many implications of breaking the law. >> do you support the idea of naming a special prosecutor to investigate the whitewater affair? >> i have nothing to say about that. i have said, we have turned the records over and there's nothing else for me to say about that. >> pressure was mounting in the media the more they resisted, the more suspicious people became. there were now calls for the appointment of an independent counsel, which was a really serious issue. at this point, he still thought this thing will go away. so he went along with it. >> i just want to do my job. i don't want to be distracted by this anymore. let them look into it. i just want to go back to work.

tais really quite simple.est it comes in the mail, you pull out the tube and you spit in it, which is something southern girls are taught you're not supposed to do. you seal it and send it back and then you wait for your results. it's that simple.

you won't see these folks they have businesses to run. they have passions to pursue. how do they avoid trips to the post office? stamps.com mail letters, ship packages, all the services of the post office right on your computer.

get a 4 week trial, plus $100 in extras including postage and a digital scale. go to stamps.com/tv and never go to the post office again. the president of the united states. [ applause ] >> when he comes to office, a few democrats say fix welfare first. but bill clinton and hillary clinton really wanted to do health care first. you can say that the search for health care reform was the great democratic holy grail. >> for 60 years this country has tried to reform health care. president roosevelt tried. president truman tried. president nixon to tried. president carter tried. every time the special interests were powerful enough to defeat them. but not this time. [ applause ]

>> it was a masterful performance. and i think the president has re-engaged the congress and the american public on health care and probably will have some success with it. >> if we do not guarantee health insurance to every american, then we have failed all americans. >> hillary clinton was given enormous responsibility by her husband to do this very hard thing, to reform health care. >> in a hostile political environment, you don't come up with something this complicated and do it in public. but the process always requires political input. they didn't do it right. and as a result, congress got very defensive. >> clearly, the president is asking you to trust the government, more than you trust your doctor and yourselves. >> protesters have been trailing the president around the country. and today, he started debating them. >> you have people holding up signs, saying no socialized medicine. most of them have parents on medicare. you want to repeal medicare,

ma'am? >> since last september when the president proposed his health plan, the clintons have campaigned endlessly for it. the result? in almost every poll the plan's popularity has plummeted. >> health care reform very quickly became a kind of smoking ruin. it just crashed and burned. >> the administration officials acknowledge now it was a mistake when hillary clinton's task force drafted a health care bill in secret. then sprung it on congress. >> this had been the major issue they wanted to sell to the public and the clintons understand the defeat is both policy, but it's also going to be political. >> it was a really challenging time. some of those events were beyond president clinton's control and some of them he seemed to be right in the middle of. >> there was whitewater still ticking along in the background. and then, paula jones filed a sexual harassment lawsuit. >> a former arkansas state worker accused then governor bill clinton of sexually harassing her in 1991. the white house is denying everything.

>> it's just humiliating what he did to me. >> true or not, this lawsuit is a major embarrassment to president clinton. if lawyers can't get the suit dismissed, he may be forced to answer these charges under oath. >> there was scandal, scandal, scandal, scandal. it a really concerted attempt to eat away his moral authority. >> the midterm election is two weeks away, and the republicans, to put it bluntly, smell blood. >> house republicans are representing what they are calling a contract with america. >> as much as anything else this was a rally for newt gingrich, possible speaker of the house. >> we are for this contract as a first step towards renewing american civilization. >> during the 1980s, newt gingrich had had gained this reputation as someone who investigates scandal, use the media, every tool available.

that's the gingrich who had his eyes set now both on president clinton but also on retaking control of the house. >> good evening. there's a seismic shift to the right in it political landscape of america tonight. >> it doesn't take a genius to see it's going republican. republican, republican. >> this is truly a wildly historic night. >> the republican victory in '94 had a shocking effect on bill clinton. because president of the united states was suddenly marginalized and newt gingrich, the speaker of the house, was the big man in town. ♪ >> last september the house republicans signed a contract with america. we signed this contract and made some promises. you elected us. and for the last 93 days we have been keeping our word. >> president clinton, republicans have dominated political debate in this country since they took over congress in january. do you worry about making sure that your voice is heard in the coming months? >> no. the constitution gives me relevance. the power of our ideas gives me relevance.

the record we have built up over the last two years and the things we're trying to do to implement it give it relevance. the president is relevant. >> the press assumed and i assumed that clinton was toast. that he was never going to be able to come back. >> watch the electricity lines! >> we had an explosion downtown. >> we have had some kind of explosion. >> here in oklahoma city today a a car bomb demolished a federal office building with hundreds of people inside. >> this occurs the day after a news conference in which the president found himself insisting that he is indeed relevant to our nation and its agenda. here we are the next day finding one of the first places we look is indeed the white house. >> the bombing in oklahoma city was an attack on innocent children and defenseless citizens.

>> i was on air force one that day going from washington to oklahoma city. the mood on the plane that morning was very somber and very scared. >> in oklahoma city today, president clinton spoke of the great grief and the spirit of healing. >> your pain is unimaginable. and we know that. >> it was a moment that did play to bill clinton's natural strengths. to channel emotion and connect with people at the human level. >> you have lost too much. but you have not lost everything. and you have certainly not lost america. >> clinton's response, i think, not only helped the country through a terrible, terrible moment, but helped right his raadminion.

♪ the commander-in-chief bill clinton, this photo op had extra meaning on a day when the president was considering the prospect of sending american airmen into the bosnia conflict. >> the end of the cold war caused the world in many places to unravel. one of those places was the former yugoslavia, a country that is falling apart and people were dying by the thousands.

>> americans are very generous about putting their treasure and lives on the line around the world. but we have to be very disciplined and very careful where we do it. >> when president clinton came into office, there was a reluctance to get american forces involve we were trying to figure out what is america'moral responsibility? if, in fact, people are being killed and we know about it. >> stunning news from somalia. the deadliest battle yet involving u.s. forces. >> the battle began after this jeep carrying americans was blown up. two u.s. helicopters was shot down. >> president george bush as his parting gesture sent in a humanitarian mission to rescue the somalis from this terrible famine. it turned from a humanitarian mission into a terrible military catastrophe. >> 12 american soldiers killed. >> why let the somalis drag dead

g.i.s by ropes through the streets of mogadishu? >> we have gone way beyond what our original intention was in somalia and it's time to get out. >> after two days of stinging criticism, the president said today the u.s. needs to, and i quote now, conclude its role in somalia. >> if the american people are to say yes to u.n. peacekeeping, the united nations must know when to say no. >> there was enormous pressure on the clinton administration not to commit the united states to similar operations in the future. fast forward. rwanda. >> good evening. fighting is going on tonight in the small african nation of rwanda. >> 20,000 are believed dead after five days after massacres. >> in this orgy of violence, three women can be seen pleading for their lives. they're first savagely beaten and then hacked to death by soldiers. >> village after entire village wiped out by extremists. >> because of the horror of somalia, there was no will whatsoever to intervene in rwanda. even though there were many

early warning signals that a modicum of intervention could have stopped that genocide. >> the savagery is turning out far worse than anyone imagined. >> 700,000 to 800,000 people would be killed at one time. they weren't killed by bombs. they were killed by machetes and then the thought that we could have done something about it. as clinton began to realize that, it tortured him and it changed him. he said it's his biggest regret of his presidency. >> in eastern bosnia, this has been one of the darkest days in the history of the united nations. the serbs have captured srebrenica. >> there had been made these safe zones around eastern bosnia. one of them was srebrenica. >> once again bosnian civilians forced to flee their homes in terror while the western european nations and united states do nothing about it. >> this is the tragedy of srebrenica. now overrun by bosnian forces.

the bosnian/serb general walked in as if a conquering hero. >> the general came swaggering in to srebrenica. and some of the most chilling video that will always remain with me. he said, don't be afraid. we're not going to hurt you. he instructed soldiers to give them sweets and candies and things like that. as soon as the cameras were turned off, the men were put on buses, taken out, lined up, and machine gunned to death and just because they were muslim. >> bosnian serbs face new charges of genocide. madelyn albright displayed photographs of mass graves. >> there were terrible things going on in bosnia, but it took the visuals to prove it. >> the sarajevo market was crowded with monday morning shoppers when death fell from the sky. >> bill clinton decided to use force. the idea that he would be the american leader who would get nato to participate in its first

military campaign was not something that was predictable. >> more than 60 nato jets began pounding bosnian serb positions around sarajevo overnight. >> allied fighters and bombers, most of them americans, swooped down on bosnian serb military positions around sarajevo. >> booze kneeian government troops are racking up stunning gains around north bosnia. >> the campaign will make clear that they have nothing to gain and everything to lose by continuing to slaughter innocent civilians. >> president clinton finally came to the right judgment. we don't have to put a boot on the ground. we don't have to send in our tanks. we can just bomb those bullies, and it worked. >> good evening from paris. this was a historic day for american diplomacy. the serbs and the croats of the largely muslim bosnian government committed themselves to a lasting peace. this scene would not have been possible without the united

states leading the europeans on a peace offensive that europe was unable to all off on its own. >> seize this chance and make it work. you can do nothing to erase the past. but you can do everything to build a a future. >> this was a major breakthrough for clinton in terms of foreign policy. it was clear that he had begun to see himself not just as a domestic figure, but as a world figure. whoa that's amazing...

hey, i'm the internet! i know a bunch of people who would love that. the internet loves what you're doing... so put your idea online with a domain name from godaddy. enter your idea and we'll find you a one of a kind name. we've helped 17 million people find the perfect domain name for their website. get your domain name and start building your website for free!

the feeling grew pretty quickly that an era of bipartisanship was through and finished. the sense among republicans is that it's political trench warfare. they are completely dedicated hour by hour, day by day to trying to ensure that bill clinton doesn't get a second term. >> this year, the republicans that control congress is sending a budget to the president's desk that is like nothing we have seen for decades. >> house republicans emerge from a morning meeting with outlines of a plan they are hoping will save $270 billion over seven years. >> the big savings are the most politically dangerous ones from medicare and medicaid. >> if these health care cuts come to my desk of this size, i would have no choice but to veto.

>> clinton figured out a very deliver bit of jujitsu. to say that newt gingrich wants to make your grandmother destitute. >> think about a party whose last stand is to frighten 85-year-olds. you'll understand how totally, morally bankrupt the modern democratic party is. >> the speaker of the house has made an unprecedented threat. yesterday mr. gingrich said he was willing to let the united states default on its debt. >> the republicans decided to go to the wall and to shut down the government. >> we're prepared to negotiate on the budget issues, but let's not threaten the country with shutdown. >> the president said we really ought to meet at the white house in the oval office. it came down to whether or not we were going to cut medicare deeper. the president said something i'll never forget.

it may cost me the election, but i cannot do this. >> the washington passport agency is closed for lack of funding. >> due to the shut down of the federal government -- >> social security. >> the library of congress. >> national park service is closed. >> 800,000 federal employees will be told to go home today without pay. >> republicans thought that the public would rally to their side, but actually shutting down the government left a lot of americans with a bad taste in their mouths and it ended up hurting republicans. >> the anger and resentment of federal workers is mounting with every passing day and every missed paycheck. >> wake up you bunch of dummies and get with it. >> i'm a registered voter. i have friends that are registered voters. we'll remember come november. >> polls show most americans blame republicans more than they do the president for the current standoff. >> a three-week shutdown ended on saturday. thousands of federal workers across the country were able to go back to their jobs today. >> republicans learned an important lesson. it would make a lot more sense

for them to try to govern with the president than to try to confront him. >> the whitewater investigation unfolds and hillary clinton becomes the focus of prosecutors' interests. >> the first lady arrived to a crush of cameras. there were vocal hillary rodham clinton supporters and detractors. >> it's the first time of a sitting president has been forced to appear before a grand jury and testify under oat >> she was subpoenaed by the independent counsel kenneth star who wants to ask her about the missing law firm building records that mysteriously appeared in the first family quarters. >> you have independent counsel, kenneth starr, a prosecutor with unlimited financial resources and unlimited time, who is doing nothing except investigating you. if you had anything to hide, that's not a situation you want

to be in. >> these reemerging issues add up to political trouble for the president, just as his re-election campaign is heating up. >> the '96 campaign for re-election was under way. clinton started reaching out to an old adviser from his days in arkansas, dick morris. by that point was mostly working for republicans and established a plan with dick morris to help him reposition himself. >> morris calls his strategy triangulation, an effort to position clinton in the political middle. >> how could he come over here and asome days i'm a republican? >> no. you don't say somedays you're a republican. you take the best from each party and you bring it together in an amalgam of what the people want. >> i have learned about the good ideas that it each side has that we can all embrace. >> they are shifting to the right. he campaigns by saying i'm not going to be soft. i'm not going to be one of these bleeding heart liberals. >> an officer killed in the line of duty. a father, gunned down at work. a student, shot at school.

>> deadly assault weapons off our streets. 100,000 more police on the streets, expand the death penalty. that's how we'll protect america. >> from '93 up until '96, he enacts nafta, crime bills, welfare reform. almost all of that is coming out of republican and conservative policy circles. >> liberal democrats felt betrayed by bill clinton. they believed that clinton had sold out to the right wingers and to the penny pinching conservatives. >> this bill is welfare fraud, not well fair reform. >> despite the break in the own ranks over this bill, white house officials are still confident when the choice coming down to bill clinton or bob dole, their fellow democrats don't have anywhere else to go. >> what clinton did to steal away issues from republicans actually worked. >> president clinton has won a second term as president of the

united states. >> can you imagine what this must feel like? particularly when you think how far down mr. clinton seemed to be just two years ago for him to ascend to this pinnacle again is the act of truly a master politician. >> bill clinton is christened the comeback kid because he was resilient. no matter what doubts you had about him, no matter what charges you laid against him, every day he walks into the white house and with a laser focus says let's focus on getting the job done. >> it is time to put politics aside, join together and get the job done for america's future. [ applause ] >> this has been election '96. bill clinton has been re-elected and the country goes on. >> you have a bipartisan group here to come together and hail this agreement.

>> 1997 was a happy time for bill clinton and a happy time for america. budget was balanced. think of that. >> by '97 there's a feeling there can be some cooperation they were reaching across party lines. things were getting done. >> we can say with pride and certainty that those who saw the sun setting on america were wrong. the sun is rising on america again, and i thank you all. >> today, as you may already have heard, there are serious allegations about the president having had a sexual relationship with a young white house aide. let's go to abc's -- no. let's go to first to the president. >> kenneth starr, independent counsel, is investigating allegations that you suborn perjury by encouraging a 24-year-old woman, former white house intern, to lie under oath about her having had an affair with you.

mr. president, is that true? >> that's not true. that is not true. you won't see these folks they have businesses to run. they have passions to pursue. how do they avoid trips to the post office? stamps.com mail letters, ship packages, all the services of the post office right on your computer. get a 4 week trial, plus $100 in extras including postage and a digital scale. go to stamps.com/tv and never go to the post office again.

one laugh, and hello sensitring a bell? then you have to try always discreet. i didn't think protection this thin could work. but the super absorbent core turns liquid to gel. for incredible protection... snap! so it's out of sight... ...and out of mind. always discreet. for bladder leaks. i've discovered incredible bladder leak underwear that hugs every curve. can't tell i'm wearing it, can you? always discreet underwear. for bladder leaks.

allergytry new xyzal®.ou have symptoms like these for relief is as effective at hour 24 as hour one. so be wise all take new xyzal®. ♪

in the course of an investigation into the whitewater scandal, special prosecutor, kenneth starr would discover that clinton had an affair with an intern in the white house. >> kenneth starr opened a federal grand jury probe into allegations about the president's relationship with monica lewinsky and whether there was a coverup. >> what does all this have to do with whitewater and what is ken starr doing in this business? >> ken starr was going to pursue clinton until they caught him doing something and the something was monica lewinsky. >> a couple weeks ago a woman named linda tripp walked into ken starr's office and says, i have these tapes. i have about ten phone calls of a young woman named monica lewinsky and in it she talks about having had a sexual relationship with the president. >> monica lewinsky bares her soul about her love for bill clinton to her friend, linda tripp. linda tripp gives those tapes to paula jones' lawyers and kenneth starr's office.

ken starr knows that the president has to give a deposition in the jones case. >> part of the danger for the president lies in what he said under oath to lawyers for paula jones. mr. clinton denied in his deposition having a sexual relationship with monica lewinsky. >> did the president agree with lewinsky to denye -- deny their affair under oath? >> if the president, in fact, encouraged this woman to lie under oath or ask someone else to encourage her, that's a crime. >> it's a different order of magnitude than any of the previous charges that the president had to put up with for seven years. >> what the white house is in for is another legal nightmare. >> hey, ho, clinton's got to go. hey, ho, clinton's got to go. >> this was a howl coming up in the media and from republicans. people were horrified after this. it was overpowering. >> i want you to listen to me. i'm going to say this again.

i did not ve sexual retions with that woman, miss lewinsky. i never told anybody to lie. not a single time. never. these allegations are false, and i need to go back to work for the american people. thank you. [ applause ] >> i think from the very beginning, the people who knew him the best if they were honest with themselves knew that something had happened. >> why do you think in the face of the president's very strong denial a lot of americans still apparently don't believe him? >> in part, it's because many of you apparently don't. >> this theme that the press and mr. clinton's political enemies are responsible for problems of credibility is being pressed vigorously by some of the president's aides and friends. >> the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspireing against my husband since the day he announced for president.

>> so when people say there's a lot of smoke here, your message is where there's smoke -- >> there isn't any fire. >> hillary clinton was half right. it wasn't a vast conspiracy. it was a small conspiracy. there were some republican activists and lawyers who did plug into the lewinsky scandal, helped feed it to "newsweek" and the special prosecutor. they were republicans they were republicans conspiring together. maybe it wasn't the vast conspiracy, but it was a conspiracy. >> the law is the law. the law is sacred. the facts have integrity. and we're going it go about our job. thanks very much. >> this is not something we ever thought we would see. the president ending up in that kind of a battle. you couldn't take your eyes off it. >> mr. president, monica lewinsky's life has been changed forever. her family's life has been changed forever. i wonder how you feel about that and what, if anything, you'd like to say to monica lewinsky at this minute.

>> that's good. [ laughter ] that's good, but at this minute, i'm going to stick with my position and not comment. >> bill clinton is a fighter. but ultimately, there's a famous dress that has dna evidence. >> at this point, we believe that fbi technicians do know whether there was a substance on that dress. >> it becomes clear he wasn't always telling the truth. >> over the years, there have been dramatic late night speeches from the white house. national tragedies and national triumphs. but nothing like the speech that we're about to hear from there tonight. >> indeed i did have a relationship with miss lewinsky that was not appropriate. in fact, it was wrong. it constituted a critical lapse in judgment and a personal failure on my part for which i

am solely and completely responsible. i misled people. including even my wife. i deeply regret that. >> that's where the '90s took us. president of the united states had to testify under oath about a woman in the oval office. this would have been inconceivable in the time of john f. kennedy. but the '90s weren't the '60s. >> the president's mea culpa sparked a lot of reaction from people who watched the speech from new york -- >> i still like the president. >> to california. >> he should have laid more of his cards on the table. >> there was skepticism in houston. >> what else has he lied about? >> and cynicism in minneapolis. >> if hillary don't mind, it shouldn't be anybody else's business. >> it all came down to this, some three dozen boxes containing the case that independent counsel, ken starr, has built against the president.

>> the office of independent counsel submitted a referral to the house of representatives containing substantial and credible information that may constitute grounds for impeachment of the president of the united states. i should totally get that domain name... get your great idea online too... get your domain today, and get... ...a free trial of gocentral from godaddy

tonight the independent counsel's report has been delivered to congress.

the possibility of impeaching the president must now be addressed. >> book schieffer has his hands on the report now. bob? >> i've got it here, dan. we just got it here. i'm going to skip -- >> starr produces this very lengthy report with all the minutia of their sexual interaction. >> i'm going to read part of the heading under physical evidence for you. >> if we may, we want to be careful here, this is daytime television and there are children in the audience. so i do encourage to you paraphrase. >> okay. i'll do my best. >> while the president was on the telephone, according to her, he -- let me just read this to make sure we don't -- >> i remember reading it on an airplane. and it was like reading the raciest novel i'd ever read in my life. it was it was almost too hot to handle. >> miss lewinsky raised her jacket in the back and showed him the straps of her revealing underwear. >> he unzipped his pants and

exposed himself and they had sex of a kind. again, he stopped her before i would say he was completed would be the way to put that. >> there was something icky about pursuing this and there was no dignity here from anybody. >> prosecutors emphasize the real issue is not sex but the president alledgedly subverting the legal system by getting others to lie and obstructing justice. >> the evidence suggests that the president repeatedly tried to thwart the legal process in the jones matter. >> the constitution says a president can be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors. but the constitution does not define what those terms mean. so they're up to congress to define. >> i do not think that unless these misconduct raises the level of assault on our fundamental political system that they're impeachable, even if every one of them is true. >> this was not an impeachable

offense. it's very painful. it's very embarrassing. but has nothing to do with the running of government. there were a number of republicans who knew this was all nonsense but they were going too along beuse they were ing forced by the par >> htory unfoldi in th nation's capital today as a somber house of representatives voted for only the second time in american history to impeach a president of the united states. >> after a lifetime of striving for a celebrated rank among american presidents, this diligent student of history was handed his place today. one he did not want but can never give back. >> i want the american people to know today that i am still committed to working with people of good faith and goodwill, of both parties, to do what's best for our country. it's what i've tried to do for six years. it's what i intend to do for two more. until the last hour of the last day of my term. >> it was up to the house to decide whether there was grounds to impeach the president and then it is up to the senate to

conduct the trial and act as essentially the jury. >> the said william jefferson clinton is hereby acquitted of the charges in the said articles. >> the president of the united states found not guilty. >> clinton lied under oath. he did not challenge the constitutional system of the united states. so, he's not removed from office. >> three out of four americans are saying, we know bill clinton is a scoundrel and yet we think he's effective as president. >> the really amazing thing is how bill clinton bounced back from that. he just kept climbing in the polls, notch, notch, notch, notch, notch. incredible. >> by the end of the 1990s, it looks like a different country for many americans. the economy is booming and our deficit is gone. >> 1999 was the longest peacetime economic expansion in u.s. history. >> clinton was one of the greatest politicians the white house has ever seen. he was a great leader in the

sense of being a charismatic, well-intentioned, visionary president. but he undermined himself with his personal foibles. >> as mr. clinton moves into his final year in office, he's already sharing the spotlight with the candidacies of his wife and vice president. >> it's one of the tragedies of the clinton years that this period of real prosperity and real peace leads to a more polarized america. bill clinton leaves the country more divided than he found it. >> he came with these enormous expectations. the expectations of a generation behind him. and although he had some big achievements, he also had some enormous setbacks. that cycle of achievement and setback came to define his presidency. >> we know the sun will always rise on america as long as each new generation lights the fire of freedom. our children are ready.

>> the thing about bill clinton is he never stopped trying find a sliver of ground in which you could build agreement and move the country forward. i think that brand of politics, in spite of clinton's flaws, in spite of the things, you know, we all wish he had done differently or not at all, gosh, the country could use that. >> al gore surprised no one when he declared his candidacy in june. on the gop side, 1999 belonged to the man with the money, texas governor george w. bush. pat buchanan left his republican home for the reform party where donald trump is threatening to challenge him for the nomination. and the story that rivalled the presidential race -- >> so the answer is, yes, i intend to run. >> hillary clinton made her senate campaign official facing off with new york mayor rudy

off with new york mayor rudy giuliani. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com hv is changing dramatically now with 150 channels that might be available in the near future. >> there's a lot of things we do that you couldn't have on network television. >> people are trying to do something adventurous. >> tv has a detrimental, damaging, developmental effect on our young people. >> excellence is hard. it's very rare, which is why there are few good shows. >> that was cool. ♪ ♪