Drama Seen Turning Into a Thomas-Hill Tug-of-War : Judiciary: In camera’s eye, both are viewed as equally credible, with each seeking to convince viewers he, or she, has been seriously victimized.

“Are you a scorned woman?” Sen. Howell Heflin (D-Ala.) asked Oklahoma law professor Anita Faye Hill under the glare of network television cameras and an audience of millions.

“No,” replied Hill, who has alleged that Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas sexually harassed her when he was her boss.

“Do you have a martyr complex?” Heflin subsequently asked.

This time Hill responded with laughter. “No, I don’t,” she said.

For television expert S. Robert Lichter, this exchange at Friday’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing was not only great television--it was immensely effective.

“Heflin speaks in ordinary language instead of Senate-speak,” said Lichter, co-director of the Center for Media and Public Affairs and co-author of three books on the media. “He’s asking the questions that ordinary people ask in their own minds and, by framing them so starkly, he casts doubt on them. ‘When you say, ‘Do you have a martyr complex?’ you have to laugh.”

Lichter, a respected analyst of the role of television in politics and popular culture, said that the drama boiled down to a high-stakes tug-of-war between Thomas and Hill to convince millions of viewers--as well as 100 U.S. senators--that he, or she, has been gravely victimized.

In the camera’s eye, Lichter said that Thomas and Hill were equally credible--although Hill benefited Friday from far longer exposure. He said that he believed television viewers were likely to come away from the marathon session believing whatever, and whoever, they believed before they tuned in.

Lichter contrasted the proceedings to the experiences of Lt. Col. Oliver L. North during the Iran-Contra hearings and defeated Supreme Court nominee Robert H. Bork.

“In trials by media, we’ve gotten used to clear winners and losers,” said Lichter, who watched the hearings in his office here. “Ollie North came out a winner; Bork was a loser,” “I’m not seeing that here. I’m seeing both sides doing a good job.”

First, Lichter said, in “a great performance,” Thomas forcefully and eloquently cast himself not as a victimizer but as a victim--of a political process out of control. Lichter said that “the notion of an honor turned into an ordeal will draw a response from the public.”

But Hill, her voice tremulous at times but her poise never cracking, then connected with viewers as also convincing when she provided a detailed account of her complaints against Thomas. “By concretizing these charges, she makes them much more damning,” Lichter said.

To win the battle of public opinion as shaped by television coverage, Republicans on the Judiciary Committee “need to present some evidence of her motivation” to lie, Lichter said. Despite establishing some inconsistencies in Hill’s story, he said, they did not do so Friday.

Beyond the overriding struggle, Lichter discerned a subplot in the efforts of both Democratic and Republican senators to come across as fair-minded to the viewing public.

“We’re seeing a post-Oliver North hearing in which the Senate is well aware that the senators’ own conduct could backfire on them--such as by badgering a witness, which they were accused of doing with North,” Lichter said. “After the Watergate hearings, it was felt that the Senate could only gain from such hearings. North showed that’s not so.”

Lichter was least impressed by the performance of Judiciary Chairman Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.). As Biden pressed Hill to repeat explicit details of Thomas’ alleged harassment, Lichter said, “Biden is coming across like Geraldo Rivera: ‘Isn’t this awful. Tell us more! Tell us more!’ ”