Bill Clinton: “I think on the--I've told you what I think about these meetings. Now, let's go back to the facts of the meetings. We now…”

“I think on the--I've told you what I think about these meetings. Now, let's go back to the facts of the meetings. We now know that Mr. Altman's counsel checked with the ethics officer in Treasury before he came over and gave the briefings to the White House. But I have said--so it appears at least that the counsel thought that Mr. Altman had an ethical clearance to come and do this briefing. We certainly know that no one in the White House, at least to the best of my knowledge, has tried to use any information to in any way improperly influence the RTC or any Federal agency. Would it have been better if those had not occurred? Yes, I think it would have been. Do we have people here who wouldn't do anything wrong but perhaps weren't sensitive enough to how something could look in retrospect by people who are used to having problems in a Presidency or used to having people not telling the truth? I think that we weren't as sensitive as we should have been. And I've said before, it would have been better if that hadn't occurred. But I think the one thing you have to say is, you learn things as you go along in this business. None of this, in the light of history, will be as remotely important as the fact that by common consensus we had the most productive first year of a Presidency last year of anyone in a generation. That's what matters, that we're changing people's lives. That's what counts. And I'm just going to keep working on it. Yes.”