An avalanche of animated TV talk shows and overheated media reports all suggest that this strategy is Clinton's best recourse to work his way out of trouble and that the President and his lawyers are finessing how he will go about it. A bare 24 hours before what will be a milestone in the American Presidency -- Clinton will become the first sitting President to testify to a Grand Jury in a criminal proceeding in which he is the prime target -- Clinton has been presenting a picture ofunbelievable calm: When he has not been attending to the usual international crises, he has been spending time in the evenings with his friends playing cards and word games, going out jogging, and fooling around with his dog Buddy.

On Saturday, he had his first lengthy strategy session with his lawyers lasting five hours. Reports also say he has been alone with himself late into the night, mulling over what he is going to say over games of Solitaire. Analysts caution that he is a man given to taking advice till the very last moment and then doing his own thing, often changing his mind at the last instant.

However, judging by fervour with which the mea culpa strategy is being bounced around, that seems to be the chosen play. In fact, by leaking out the possible strategy that the President could change his earlier testimony and acknowledge a relationship, his advisers already appear to have prepared the media and the American public for this reversal. The shock and outrage element has already been vastlydiluted. Virtually everyone knows what is going to happen. What remains to be scene is how the President will change his story without appearing to commit perjury.

The speculation is that he will acknowledge some kind of `sex play' that fell short of intercourse and argue that according to the definition of sex he was provided with, this did not constitute sexual relations. He will then insist that further details, which prosecutors are certain to seek, should remain private. But will Starr and his pack of prosecutors let him off so easily? What the President and his legal eagles don't know is how much does Starr and his team know and what more evidence do they have in their possession. During the Paula Jones deposition in January, Clinton had absolutely no idea that Jones' lawyers knew about his alleged affair with Lewinsky and that they had been tipped off about Linda Tripp's tape recordings of Lewinsky's lurid confessions. So when a Jones lawyer purred, ``Do you know a woman named Monica Lewinsky?'' itcame as a bombshell for Clinton and set of a chain of events which has nearly unhinged his Presidency. Does the Starr team have similar bombshells not yet known to the public?