As opinion polls give President Clinton a lift after the screening of the videotape of his grand jury testimony, efforts are being made behind the scenes to save him from the full rigours of impeachment by Congress.
One poll shows that the President's job approval rating has risen six points to 66 per cent following the videotape screening. But four out of five questioned in the CNN/Gallup/USA Today poll also believe he lied under oath to the grand jury.
The White House is sending out strong signals to congressional leaders that they should consider a censure or reprimand for President Clinton instead of proceeding with a long-drawn-out impeachment process, which is not favoured by a majority of the electorate.
At the same time, the President's legal team has sent a letter to the House Judiciary Committee, which is dealing with the impeachment process, complaining that the Starr report has been "grossly unfair" to Mr Clinton.
The letter accuses Mr Starr of presenting a "very one-sided" version of the evidence by leaving out a crucial part of Ms Monica Lewinsky's testimony to the grand jury.
The White House press secretary, Mr Mike McCurry, said here yesterday that the report by the independent counsel, Mr Kenneth Starr, "found room for thousands and thousands of salacious details that have titillated this country and embarrassed this country before the world, but it didn't find room" for one sentence from Ms Lewinsky's testimony, where she said: "No one ever asked me to lie. I was never promised a job for my silence."
In fact Mr Starr does refer to this part of her testimony, but in a dismissive way when he says: "She explained they both understood from their conversations that they would continue their pattern of covering up and lying about their relationship."
The Republican Senate majority leader, Mr Trent Lott, has helped increase speculation that the White House is trying to strike a deal with Congress to drop the impeachment process.
Following a proposal from Democratic Senator John Kerrey that President Clinton should appear before the Judiciary Committee, Senator Lott said yesterday: "Any time the President comes forward and comes clean in a formal setting . . . it would probably be a positive development."
But he went on to say that the problem would be what happened after that. Some observers believe that the Republicans will go ahead with the impeachment process because of the impending elections. Republican and Democratic leaders meet today with senior committee members to discuss the way forward and the release of further documents from the Starr investigation.
Mr McCurry has responded positively to Senator Kerrey's suggestion, seeing it as a way to find "a constructive solution to this matter and to bring it to closure."
But he said that such a solution would have to be worked out with Congress on a bipartisan basis and have the support of the American people. It would be "highly inappropriate for the White House to try to suggest what that will be."
Meanwhile President Clinton showed that he was focusing on important foreign policy matters by holding a summit in a hotel here with the Japanese Prime Minister, Mr Keizo Obuchi.
He told reporters he had not read the reports on his grand jury testimony. "I think it's important that I focus on what I'm doing for the American people," he said.