The Reliable Source

By Lloyd Grove Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page C03

Clinton's Secret White House Tapes

During his presidency, Bill Clinton faithfully kept an audio diary, recording his impressions by speaking into a tape recorder at regular intervals. Now Clinton has a collection of around 80 audiotapes, from early in his first term till the end of his second, to help him write his $10 million presidential memoirs.

Robert Gottlieb, Clinton's editor at Knopf, yesterday confirmed the existence of the tapes. "I can tell you I know that he did that. I assume they will be of help to him," Gottlieb told us yesterday, adding that "I haven't the faintest idea" what's on the tapes. "I'm waiting."

But a few former members of Clinton nemesis Kenneth Starr's staff expressed surprise that such tapes were not turned over to the Office of Independent Counsel to satisfy subpoenas issued during the Monica Lewinsky and previous investigations.

"Are you [bleeping] me?" gasped one former Starr staffer when we told him about the tapes. "This absolutely blows my mind, unless the tapes have nothing in them about Monica Lewinsky or any of the other investigations," continued this lawyer, who demanded anonymity. And even the decision of whether they were or weren't relevant would normally be the determination of a court, the lawyer added.

It's possible, of course, that Clinton struck an agreement with Starr excluding the audio diary as irrelevant to any probe. Clinton's office in New York referred us to his Washington lawyer, Robert Barnett, who declined to comment.

But historian Taylor Branch, an old friend of Clinton's, told us that history has been badly served by a legal environment that discourages the keeping of diaries and other notes by presidents and White House aides because they are vulnerable to subpoenas.

"I hope he did make tapes," said Branch, who advised Clinton on how to preserve White House documents and other artifacts for historians. "I can tell you that I did present Hillary Clinton with a tape recorder."

-- Anonymous, October 03, 2001