WHY THE PRESIDENT CAN'T GET WHITEWATER BEHIND HIM

Bill Clinton did an impressive job keeping his cool Thursday night while responding to questions at a press conference about the Whitewater imbroglio. Most of the questions and answers were lacking in specifics, and little was offered to clear the air. Still, the president did himself a service by stepping forward. Significantly, he admitted mistakes were made in figuring how much money he and his wife had invested in Whitewater, and he promised to release additional tax returns that might shed light on the now-controversial venture.

The respite for the White House was short-lived, however, as new questions arose over the weekend about shady Arkansas financial deals and improper White House influence over supposedly independent investigatory processes. Older questions were also given more urgency because of new revelations. And another White House/Rose Law firm aide was reprimanded by the president (and demoted) and still another was subpoenaed before a grand jury.

The Clintons' tax returns for 1977-1979, released as promised, did affirm that the president was correct in acknowledging he had overstated his losses; but the returns sparked even more questions than they answered. One being: How did the Clintons clear $98,000 in eight months on the highly volatile commodities market (where between 75 percent and 90 percent of all individual investors lose money) at a time when they had little money of their own to invest? And, did information Ms. Clinton receive, leading her to make the investment, constitute insider trading?

Other questions emerged from the tax returns, but they were quickly shunted to the background as documents of a criminal investigator for the Resolution Trust Corp. (RTC) were released. The documents suggested Federal Bank officials had tried to persuade the examiner to state against her professional opinion that Bill and Hillary Clinton had gained no benefit from the failure of the Arkansas savings and loan, Madison Guaranty.

Jean Lewis, the RTC's senior investigator on Madison, asserted in notes of the conversation with the Washington official that "Whitewater did cause a loss to Madison," which ultimately benefited James McDougal and "his business partners," the Clintons. Noting that Whitewater was showing no cash flow while its mortgages and notes were being paid, Ms. Lewis asked: "If you (as the Clintons) aren't putting money into the venture, and you also know the venture isn't cash flowing, wouldn't you question the source of the funds being used for your benefit?"

Lewis went on to say: "I pointed out that these business partners are intelligent individuals, the majority of them being attorneys, who must have concluded that McDougal was making payments for their benefit...I further pointed out that I would produce the answers that were available, but that I would not facilitate providing 'the people at the top' with the 'politically correct' answers just to get them off the hook."

Special counsel Robert Fiske has said he would immediately look into this matter to determine if wrongful influence towards a criminal investigation was asserted.

This controversy was knocked out of the spotlight, however, when Time Magazine and the Washington Post revealed that two senior White House aides -- George Stephanopoulos and Harold Ickes -- had inquired last month about removing one of the investigators in the civil investigation into Madison.

The Post reported: "The efforts to find out whether Stephens [the investigator -- a prominent Republican attorney] could be replaced represents the first time the White House has been shown to have actively attempted to affect the handling of the politically sensitive investigation. One area of the RTC civil investigation concerns the potential liability of the Rose Law Firm, including former partner Hillary Rodham Clinton, for its representation of Madison."

Both the Washington Post and Time Magazine stories brought into question Deputy Treasury Secretary and acting RTC head Robert Altman's version of events. Altman, who was the recipient of one of the phone calls from Ickes and Stephanopoulos and who had already altered his story four times about contacts between the White House and his office, was forced to change part of his story again.

Jim Leach, the leading Republican critic of President Clinton's involvement in Whitewater said too much should not be made of this latest White House revelation; more serious issues are at stake.

But the revelation, and the re-writing of stories again, was none-too reassuring.

The Whitewater affair is a complex matter, which is why we refer to it as an "imbroglio": a difficult or intricate situation; an entanglement. And we would agree with the president that some aspects of the matter have been blown out of proportion. But many important questions, which get to the heart of democracy in America, are unanswered. We renew our call for full Congressional hearings.