♪ nbc news presents "a day with president carter". >> president george bush. >> president reagan. >> barack obama. ♪

>> the president was not unaware of the cameras while we were there. >> 32 cameras and 25 producers. ♪ >> giving nbc news the access was a way to show americans how the place operates. >> we had amazing access to the white house that day, especially compared to the limited access we have to the white house now. ♪ >> this is a very busy day for you, i know. there are no rules for days like today. >> no rules. president's office. >> i can do that. >> mr. president.

>> i was the anchor of "nbc nightly news" and we were continuing a series that nbc had kind of invented, which is a day in the life of the president. >> good evening and welcome to the house. 100 days into the presidency of bill clinton. you'll be at the president's side as he makes tough decisions throughout the day. >> giving nbc news the access to a day in the white house was a way to show americans how the place operates, what it looks like behind the scenes. to give you a small glimpse of the people who make the place run. >> we were literally showing how the white house operates from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. we only had a few weeks to plan this, not only covering the white house that day, but we had to put a program on the air the

next night. >> bill wheatley and i had known each other a long time. he didn't like things not really in total control. >> this was a big logistical and even creative challenge to get all of this done. >> he wanted to know where we're going next. i kept saying to him, just got to follow the lead here, bill. >> throughout the day we'll show you the other side of life here at america's house, the familiar rituals and the new gadgets this new generation brings to power. >> nbc knew how to do this. i was there all day with the team. it was an amazing experience to see all of nbc descending on the white house. it was very exciting for us at the white house to have that kind of access and to have our camera crews and producers there from dawn tonig nighttime and t

have tom brokaw interviewing the president and hearing his thoughts as he was going through what was a very tumultuous first 100 days. >> the challenge in doing a day in the life of a president, republican or democrat, is to try to make it authentic. they're obviously going to stack the deck against you. they're going to create opportunities that will make them look good. >> we were, of course, aware that nbc was going to be in the house, as they said in those days. and we were curious as to what was going to happen and we were advised to be discreet. >> clinton was dealing with bigger problems than we knew at the time, an enormous deficit, what america should do in the post cold war world and also how to attack a problem like health

care. >> we came in as the first generational change, the first post war president. i think it was shaped by all that ambition. this was a real moment for all of us. >> good morning. >> it was both exciting, but also at the same time it was 24/7. i think without exception everyone on staff particularly in those first many months were working nonstop, seven days a week. >> it was on a day when i drove through the gates at 6:00 a.m. when i didn't consciously think i am driving into the gates of the white house for my job. >> the chief of staff position has been referred to as the chief javelin catcher.

there's some truth to that. >> i think all first 100 days are important and critical for any president. i think in the case of president clinton, they were particularly important. republicans had held the white house for 12 years. so that was a big, major sea change both in terms of direction, policy, but also the staffing of the government. he needed to meet, get to know and establish relationships with world leaders. we had to develop a serious specific economic plan. then i would say finally even in the first 100 days, any president has what i call ufos, unforeseen occurrences that you don't plan for.plosion of unkno detonated onto the world trade center towers. there are still people trapped.

>> every president who comes in as a definite idea of how my first 100 days will unfold, and it almost never turns out that way. >> this is the latest in a day of remarkable events here at waco. we have not seen anyone come out, including the 17 children inside those buildings. >> you have the bombing of the world trade center and the standoff at waco, things he could not have planned for in advance, but were basically a test of whether someone who was a governor of a fairly small state could instantly hit the ground running as a credible president of the united states. >> mr. president, it's been 100 days and one week that you've been in office. that's just a little more than three months. does it seem like that period of time, or does it seem much, much longer? >> on the hard days it seems longer, but it's amazing how quickly it passes. it seems that the inauguration was only yesterday. >> one of the things that

surprise ed us was that he want to be as spontaneous as possible. we didn't have to worry about security people to tell us where to go or how to get there. >> you think in retrospect you tried to do too much at once? >> no. >> every president has a kind of different personal approach to the office and conduct. the greatest contrast i ever saw was between bill clinton and ronald reagan. that day that i was with bill clinton, he'd gone out for a jog. and then he would lead them into the oval office which would be kind of a jaw dropping experience for them, except he could not have been dressed more inappropriately for really what is one of the most semisacred places in american politics. that never would have happened with ronald reagan. he never appeared in the oval office except when he was completely pulled together, suit, tie and treating the oval office as the temple that in a

way it is. >> every day in the bill clinton white house was chaotic, this day more so than most. there is a quality disorganization. the white house staff wasn't really pulling together. partly it was the way they handled the transition. it's a lesson for future white houses. if you have a bad transition and you are late in creating the white house staff, then you're not going to be as successful in getting up and running quickly. >> i would think people looking back on these first 10 0 days would say he had a very ambitious agenda, knew whaet he wanted to accomplish, worked hard, pushed his staff well. >> there were pride points to be sure, but it's not a straight line. >> there were no limits on what i could ask him at that point. the hard part was always trying to get him to not just be in a campaign mode, but be in a presidential mode so he would

share with us the burden of decision making, the change in his life since he became president. >> in the original special you'll see maybe we tried things that didn't work out. >> we probably had a little bit of bad luck in some of the low spots of our first 100 days came right at the end. some of the criticism was fair. we made mistakes, there's no question about that. >> he decided i'm going to take on really tough intractable problems even if it brings my poll numbers down. so he deals with health care and he deals with the deficit and he says hitlet's raise taxes and h says let's figure out what you're going to do in the post coral w cold war world. time magazine was saying there must be something wrong. >> so those first 100 days or

the first year was one of great ambition, some setbacks. but i don't think anyone would fault us for trying. >> i'm not doing piddly little things. i'm trying to do big things. bringing this deficit down and increasing jobs and health care for americans and welfare reform. those are big, big things. i've loved these hundr100 days week. i'm going to do the best i can to push the rocks up the hill. >> this was a difficult decision, but one that the president thought had to be made. e that the president thought had to be made it's customized home insurance from liberty mutual! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ don't settle for silver #1 for diabetic dry skin* #1 for psoriasis symptom relief*

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hello, folks. >> every white house is trying to stage a perfect day or spin the story, but as it turned out

they had a major setback on a foreign policy crisis in bosnia. overnight coming into that day when we were shooting. the bosnia conflict was basically genocide. it was serbian bosnibosnians wi out muslim bosnians. it overwhelmed the white house and divided the national security team. >> a war that has taken more than 100,000 lives in less than one year will go on. >> you're the commander in chief. you've got to make a decision about whether or not you're going to bomb a foreign country and whether that's the best way to deal with that very complex situation. >> president clinton, elected to fix the american economy, this morning faces the prospect of sending american forces into harm's way, bosnia. the u.n. peace plan was rejected overnight. the president summons his national security staff. >> there are no rules for days

like today. >> no rules. >> there was a lot of criticism that the president was too risk averse at first. overnight what really had set the white house back that day was that president mihad reject a plan to for a peace keeping effort in bosnia. >> did you find out about the bosnian rejection last night before you went to bed? >> yeah. i stayed up until i found out. this is a war with enormous potential to spread to other countries and complicate the lives of the united states and the western allies. the explosive potential there is enormous. you've got ethnic cleansing, a civil war, an invasion. it is a very difficult set of circumstances. >> it was a looming crisis in terms of the human rights implications, the military implications and what that would

mean throughout the region. >> and here he is as a president without serious foreign policy experience or diplomatic experience, trying to deal with all this in realtime, making decisions that will change american history. >> with no major allies agreeing to support military action, the president stepped up the pressure on europe today. >> it was a complex, difficult, it seemed at times almost insoluble issue. the question at the time, of course, was what kind of military interaction should there be? >> press secretary deedee meyers heads for her morning briefing. >> the president is committed to further action to end the bloodshed, to stop the bosnianserb campaign of ethnic cleansing. he's still on that track.

>> the national security advisor was going to be at a reception for the hall of fame baseball player. >> national security advisor lake takes a break from bosnia to meet a childhood hero. >> we heard he was going to the reception. we were at the reception. >> i got my priorities right here. >> he pulled him to the side and said would you please do an interview with us? >> i'm a man of my word. >> right now? >> yep. >> tim russert was very much in charge that day. >> one crew real fast.

>> that was a stroke of both good fortune and a little cleverness on our part. >> national security advisor tony lake gives his first television interview since taking office. is military action of some kind by the united states now unavoidable in your judgment? >> i don't think it's unavoidable. the best solution would be the possibility of stronger action could still lead to some sort of diplomatic solution to the thing. but clearly we're at the point where we have to consider stronger actions. >> the role of the united states in the world as a leader for justice, for social good is a weighty burden for the sole superpower at that time. >> there were so many parties involved in what was going on. he was struggling to try to make the best decision. he had a very strong foreign policy team, but they were not always in sync. what i do remember about the day is if the president could deal with these issues on one hand and deal with domestic issues on the other hand and keep on moving.

>> the commander in chief bill clinton welcoming the seniors from the air force academy football team. this photo op had extra meaning on a day when the president was considering the prospect of sending american airmen into the bosnia conflict. when you looked into the faces of those young air force cadets, did it pass through your mind at all that young men may have to go into hostile skies in bosnia? did that give you some pause as commander in chief? >> sure. i think the president should not put the lives of young americans in harm's way unless there is a clear national interest and/or a foreign national commitment under treaty or law. >> that's your most sacred responsibility, the security of the american people and to defend our liberty and democracy when the situation calls for it to commit troops and knowing

full well what that entails. >> in the end, this administration is going to take care of the problems of america at home, but no president of the united states after the cold war can simply walk away from the problems that are gripping the world. we just don't have that option. >> bill clinton had complicated views about whether america should be the world's police and they were not fully formed when he became president. it took years for them to unfold. here as you see him dealing with bosnia, you see the beginning of that process. >> more on the bosnia crisis as diplomats and leaders of the fighting factions gather in ohio for peace talks. >> ultimately you had the dayton accords and a tremendous and positive change that's taken place that has endured largely to this day. >> tonight i want to speak with you about implementing the bosnian piece agreement and why our values and interests as americans require that we

participate. >> in 1995, america had solved the bosnibosnian problem by staa negotiation in dayton, ohio, that ended the bosnia war with peace. >> america has always been freedom's greatest champion. >> here we are a couple of decades later with america involved in wars that seemed as if they're going on forever. in retrospect, it looks very different. that's why it's a much bigger accomplishment. >> mrs. clinton has been doing a little better, i think, than mr. clinton in terms of the reviews. >> she just had one thing to do. that's why. ews. >> she just had one thing to do. that's why an alternative to pills voltaren is the first full prescription strength non-steroidal anti-inflammatory gel to target pain directly at the source for powerful arthritis pain relief.

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it shortens colds! zicam zinc that cold! ♪ the first lady's first stop in a very full day. >> good morning. >> she's all business in a meeting with senators. hillary rodham clinton's assignment for health care takes her role as a first lady to a controversial level for some in politics. >> the stakes are high for all americans but they are particularly high for older

americans. we can do a much better job and save money at the same time. that's what we intend to do. >> what we are looking at now is a historic first. no first lady in american history had been appointed to a job, an official job of this degree of responsibility. hillary clinton has been appointed to come up with a plan to change health care for the better for all americans. >> she's doing health care. we're going to have a wonderful health care program in this didn't because of mrs. clinton. >> president clinton had talked about health care, the need to reform health care, the rising cost of health care and the effect not only on our economy but on specific families and his thoughts about how the system could be reformed and improved. it was novel certainly to have a first lady with the kind of confidence and skill and policy chops that she brought to it. >> bill clinton hugely admired

and respected hillary clinton. he thought that she was up to this challenge. >> mr. president, it's no secret, we've all been reading the press clips and reviews in the first 100 days of the administration. mrs. clinton has been doing, i think, a little better than mr. clinton in terms of the reviews. >> she just had one thing to do. that's why. >> it's health care. has that turned out to be tougher? have you said to him some nights, thanks a lot, mr. president? that's a tough, tough issue. >> i remember when we did that interview, they created this kind of protective cloak around them in a verbal sense to make sure that they were saying the right things to protect each other. >> and bill told me because he had worked on health care as a governor that it was the most complicated issue he'd ever even thought about. he was right. it is. >> good morning. how are you?

>> so a war room was set up specifically on health care, which at the end of the day i thought sounded like a good idea to have a dedicated group of people solely focused on this issue given the enormity of it. >> we did not have access to the health care war room. hillary clinton was determined to be secretive about the plan. wanting to prevent really criticism of it. >> the big, big issue for the opposition was idealogical, taking it out of the hands of the private sector and making it another government plan. it was not entirely clear how that would work out. >> i'm here as an american citizen concerned about the health of her family and the health of her nation. >> republicans at the time were saying america has the best health care in the world and if you're going to reform it, you run the risk that you're going to wreck the whole system. >> the main concern obviously is

the cost and how quickly you cover the 30-35 million people and how do you pay for it. >> the opposition to the clinton health care plan was vast and well resourced, millions and millions of dollars that were spent both from congressional articulation of it to paid advertising. >> there was a commercial that was put on television called harry and louise with people talking about their concerns about hillary's health care reform. >> well, the harry and louise campaign, some of it i've tried to block out over the years. >> this plan forces us to buy these insurance through these new mandatory government health alliances. >> the harry and louise ad campaign was a well-produced conversation that really tapped into the central fears that people had about health care. you're talking on a highly personalized endeavor. this was not fec policy. this is some of the most

intimate relationships people have with their medical provider and physician. >> critics of the clintons would say they're going to make this like the post office. and if you think the post office is run well and efficiently, then you can turn your health care over to the post office. >> i think the quicker we get on with it, the better on it's going to be. we're going to have to be very careful. we can't take away from people what they have now. but the more we delay starting it, the more costs are going to pile up and the more people are going to be hurt. i'd like to get after it and get it on. >> when we shot in may of 1993, it was so early and there was something of a honeymoon at least on the health care proposals that hillary clinton was tackling. when the polls started turning against her, the republicans in the senate realized they could stymie her and even though there was a potential deal on the table, they ran away from it.

she did come up with a very well conceived plan, the managed care proposal that it was central to hillary care, became part of the model of obamacare. >> president clinton blames republicans and special interest groups for killing health care reform this year. officials here at the white house admit their strategy didn't help much either. >> in the wake of the failure of health care reform and the fact that democrats lost both houses of congress in the midterm elections of 1994, hillary clinton decided that for the next two years she would have a much lower public profile. >> i think the president and the first lady had justifiable frustration. they had worked very hard. they were understandably, as we all were, frustrated by the inability to break through that. president sclin on tclinton aft defeat of health care said something along the lines of we bit off more than we could chew.

>> i was 24. there were certain days when the pressure was intense and i blamed him for all the gray hair i currently have. blamed him for all the gray hair i currently have only pay for what you need. liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty.

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♪ bill clinton is sometimes called the first mtv president and his white house staff reflects that. there are so many young people running around, the white house

grounds resemble a campus. >> a big part of bill clinton's persona in the spring of 1993 was that this was a young president. he was the youngest since jfk. he was the first baby boomer president. and part of that persona was you were surrounded by some extremely young people on the white house staff of a kind we had not seen before. >> by the time i started covering the clinton white house, i had been through a lot of other cultures in the white house. nixon, for example, jerry ford, who was casual but still had a certain tone to it. jimmy carter was quite casual. he brought the georgia culture to washington, but they had to get that straightened out because you still have to do things in the appropriate way. ronald reagan had the best organized of the white houses because his chief of staff was jim baker and because ronald reagan didn't want to initiate the culture so much as he wanted

to fit into it. george bush 41 was an extension of that. now comes clinton and it's a college dorm. the president's administrative assistant andy friendly looks like he should be carded as he sits just outside the oval office at the right hand of power. >> how old are you? >> 24. >> what do you want to be when you grow up? >> i was 24, just turned 24 right after the president was sworn in. there were certain days when the pressure was intense and i blamed him for all the gray hair i currently have. we got a lot of play certainly at the beginning of having such a youthful staff. i think that was both a combination of people like me in relatively junior roles. there were a lot of people who had worked on the campaign, had proven their worth, worked hard and were rewarded with jobs in

the white house. >> i'm not sure we were that much younger than the junior staff who had worked for president bush before, but it did play into the media narrative of this boomer generation and the young mtv crowd. >> many in washington think the white house has too many young people. white house chief of stthomas mk mccarty. >> i've been pleased that i'm not viewed as a gray beard as i move into my middle years. that was refreshing and reassuring. i think the young people we had