-Caveat Lector- Aides See a New Rift as Gore Criticizes Clinton's Conduct By JOHN M. BRODER and DON VAN NATTA Jr. ASHINGTON -- President Clinton is angered and hurt by Vice President Gore's conspicuous efforts to distance himself from Clinton's behavior in the Monica Lewinsky scandal, according to presidential aides and advisers. They say the vice president's words have created a friction that never before existed between the two men. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Reports of public support masking private anger. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- "This is the most tense their relationship has ever been," one close Clinton adviser said this week. "The president is very upset," this adviser said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "To the people who he is very close to, he is expressing how hurt he is and his dismay at the vice president. It is not a passing thing. He is very upset." The president considers Gore's repeated condemnations of Clinton's actions and false statements arising from his relationship with Ms. Lewinsky to be acts of ingratitude bordering on disloyalty, several of the president's advisers said in interviews over the past several days. Gore called the president's behavior "inexcusable" three times in a television interview that aired last week on the day he announced his campaign for the presidency. He said Clinton had compromised the dignity of the presidency by his actions and that, "particularly as a father," he felt Clinton's relationship with Ms. Lewinsky was "terribly wrong." And Gore, using convoluted language whose meaning was eminently clear, said that Clinton had lied to him. The interviewer, Diane Sawyer of ABC, prodded Gore with repeated questions about the president. But Gore never cut her off by saying he had already answered the questions, a point raised by two Clinton aides who were critical of the vice president's performance. Publicly, the president has said he "took no offense" at Gore's remarks and that he has said far worse things about himself. But in private, the president was described by aides as "livid" and disappointed by the vice president's comments, while at the same time aware that Gore must deal with questions about the Lewinsky affair and establish an identity separate from the president's to run a credible campaign for the White House. After nearly seven years of an extraordinarily warm and close working relationship with the vice president, Clinton is painfully coming to grips with the fact that Gore must emerge as his own man. The president's feelings are compounded by the prospect of his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, setting up housekeeping in New York and running for office in her own right. Adding to Clinton's anger was what aides perceived to be "gloating" by members of the Gore team at the success of their efforts to distance the vice president from the president's personal misbehavior. "I know Gore's people are calling people saying we've got separation from Clinton," a member of the president's inner circle said. "And they are sort of bragging about it." The motives for Clinton's aides and advisers to talk about the president's feelings toward Gore were not entirely clear. They may have been trying to help the vice president establish distance from the president by portraying Clinton as angry. They may have been trying to demonstrate their closeness to the president. Or they may simply have been honestly reporting how Clinton and his inner circle have reacted to Gore's statements. Gore's advisers acknowledged that the vice president has tried to put space between him and Clinton on matters of personal morality, which has become a rhetorical centerpiece of his emerging campaign. They are happy that the vice president got a prominent platform for his disavowal of the president's conduct. And, privately, they admit that there is an element of payback for what they see as the president's meddling and second-guessing about the progress of Gore's campaign. Last month, Clinton told The New York Times that he believed Gore's campaign was off to a stumbling start and said he had advised his understudy to loosen up on the campaign trail. The second-guessing has continued, with the president's aides questioning Gore's decision to announce a forward-looking campaign for the presidency on the same day that he gave an interview to Ms. Sawyer criticizing the president past actions. "We don't mind the vice president saying what the president did was inexcusable," said James Carville, a political consultant and adviser to the president. "But we're glad the vice president is starting to talk about the many good things the president did, rather than the one bad thing." Joe Lockhart, the president's press secretary, said that he and Clinton had discussed Gore's announcement, a carefully staged event in the vice president's hometown of Carthage, Tenn., on Wednesday, June 16. Clinton was in Europe at the time for a meeting of leaders of the major industrial democracies and Russia. "The president and I had the same take," Lockhart said. "He was trying to do too much by announcing and trying to separate on the same day." Lockhart said that the vice president did a good job in his announcement speech of defining who he is and why he is qualified to be president. But his comments in the television interview about his differences with Clinton gave reporters license to write Gore-blasts-Clinton stories on the same day. Aides to the president and vice president said that the two men had spoken several times since Gore's announcement and interview, but refused to characterize the tone of the discussion. A presidential confidant said of Clinton, "I don't think anyone feels worse about what happened than him. He lives with it every day; he lives with those consequences. But he'd rather not have to be reminded of them by his vice president." One adviser to the vice president said that he was not aware of any friction between Gore and Clinton, but said that it is natural that their relationship would change because of the changed circumstances. For the past seven years, Gore has been the president's loyal deputy, entrusted with an unusual amount of authority and visibility. Now, as he seeks to forge his own identity and make a case for elevation to the highest office, he must define the ways he is different from Clinton. That is bound to lead to conflicts, this Gore adviser said, and perhaps suspicions of disloyalty on the president's part. "His job as vice president has been to do everything he possibly can to make Clinton the best president he can," the adviser said. "That yields one kind of relationship. Now Gore is doing something else too. It's not necessarily about tension in the relationship. It's just a very different relationship." He added, "The president is pretty sophisticated and understands that." DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! 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