Sue Hartigan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Defense Department said Tuesday it had no plans to fire Linda Tripp, whose secret tape recordings sparked the investigation into Monica Lewinsky's contacts with President Clinton. "She's not been demoted, and contrary to the assertions of some, there is no plan to fire Linda Tripp," a Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Mike Doubleday, told reporters. An attorney for Tripp, Anthony Zaccagnini, said in a television interview Sunday that Tripp "absolutely" thought she was going to be dismissed from her $88,000-a-year job as a public affairs specialist. He said she had twice asked to return to her former position at the Defense Department but the Pentagon had refused. Tripp is a Clinton political appointee. Although she no longer directs the Pentagon's Join Civilian Orientation Conference, now scheduled to take place in June, she has been drafting an operating manual for the program, which aims to promote public understanding of military issues. Asked how she was carrying out that job on which she now works from her home, Doubleday said: "I would characterize her as performing her duties as assigned in that regard." "The specific assignments that she is given change from time to time but are certainly commensurate with whatever it is that she has in the way of experience -- in this case public affairs specialist," he said. On Sunday, Zaccagnini said Tripp likely would be called within weeks to testify as a grand jury witness in the independent counsel's investigation into whether Lewinsky, a former White House intern, had a sexual relationship with Clinton. Lewinsky allegedly told Tripp during secretly recorded telephone conversations that she had a long-running affair with Clinton and was urged to lie about it under oath in the Paula Jones sexual misconduct case, charges Clinton denies. The Pentagon considers the many hours that Tripp has spent with the office of independent counsel Kenneth Starr as administrative leave and pays her for that time. Doubleday said he was not immediately sure whether she was submitting time sheets to account for how much time she spends with Starr's staff. -- Two rules in life: 1. Don't tell people everything you know. 2. Subscribe/Unsubscribe, email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] In the body of the message enter: subscribe/unsubscribe law-issues
