Kenneth Bacon Kenneth Hogate Bacon ( November 21 , 1944 – August 15 , 2009 ) was an American journalist who served as a spokesman for the Department of Defense during the Presidency of Bill Clinton , and later as president of Refugees International , an organization dedicated to advocating for assistance and protection for displaced persons and promoting solutions to displacement crises . Early life and career . Bacon was born in Bronxville , New York . He attended Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter , New Hampshire for high school , graduating in 1962 ; the school honored him in 2007 with its John Phillips Award , which recognizes graduates for their contributions to society . He earned his undergraduate degree at Amherst College , where his father was a dean and also taught political science . After Amherst , Bacon received post - graduate education at Columbia University , where he earned simultaneous Master ' s Degrees in business and journalism . Bacon served in the U . S . Army Reserve from 1968 to 1974 . After two years working in the office of U . S . Senator Thomas J . McIntyre ( D – NH ) as a legislative assistant , he was hired by " The Wall Street Journal " as a reporter ( 1965 ) . He was assigned to the paper ' s bureau in Washington , D . C . , working his way up to become a columnist and editor . Spokesman at Defense Department . William Perry , who had served as US Undersecretary of Defense in the 1970s and had become familiar with WSJ reporter Bacon while in that capacity , was named to serve as Secretary of Defense in the Clinton Administration in 1994 . He invited Bacon to serve as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs , serving as the public face of the Defense Department . In 1997 Bacon was retained in his post by Perry ' s successor at the Defense Department , William Cohen . As part of NATO ' s involvement in the Kosovo War , Bacon represented the Defense Department on a visit to the Balkans in 1999 with Cohen , where they had the opportunity to visit a refugee camp . Bacon had never before realized " the sheer magnitude of one million people leaving their homes and needing food , shelter and medical care " and then returning to their homes after the cessation of hostilities and wondered if all those worldwide who had provided support and assistance to Kosovar refugees could " give the same attention to the refugees in the Congo , Afghanistan and Sudan " . Linda Tripp incident . In March 1998 , Bacon released details of employee Linda Tripp ' s personnel file to a reporter , disclosing that Tripp had omitted on her employment application an incident that occurred when she was arrested for theft when she was 19 years old . Tripp , a Defense Department employee , had been a friend of Monica Lewinsky , who had herself worked as an assistant in Bacon ' s office in 1996 and 1997 ( having been hired on the recommendation of the White House ) . Bacon was criticized for violating privacy laws and harming Tripp ' s reputation . In response to a Defense Department Inspector General ' s report in 2000 that concluded that Bacon had not followed authorized procedures , William Cohen published a letter that had been sent to Bacon in which Bacon ' s actions were called " hasty and ill - conceived " . Bacon issued a statement that the information he released was driven by " a desire to be responsive to an urgent media inquiry " and that the Inspector General ' s two - year investigation did not find any connection to the White House . In a 2003 settlement , following a lawsuit which claimed that the revelations violated the Privacy Act of 1974 , Tripp received a payment of $ 595 , 000 , retroactive promotion and salary increases for the years 1998 to 2000 and the right to reapply for government employment . Refugees International . Bacon recognized that becoming a refugee was a matter of circumstance that could affect anyone , noting that his own " blue - blooded WASP " ancestors were refugees themselves , who " came over from England in 1630 , fleeing debts for all I know " . After leaving his government post in 2001 , Bacon became president of Refugees International , which compels the world ' s leaders to assist the millions worldwide who have fled their homes due to violence or persecution . The organization regularly assists and provides guidance to government and UN agencies , including peacekeeping bodies , on ways to serve the needs of refugees . Bacon focused much of his work on advocating for additional protection and assistance to displaced people from Sudan ' s Darfur region and Iraq . He was also active in drawing international attention to displaced people in Afghanistan , Burma , the Democratic Republic of Congo , Colombia and Thailand . During Bacon ' s tenure as president of Refugees International , the organization doubled in size . In the weeks before the start of the 2003 invasion of Iraq , Bacon suggested such methods as selection of bombing targets outside of densely populated areas as a means to reduce the number of refugees . In September 2003 , Bacon encouraged French participation in the peacekeeping forces in Iraq , based on that nation ' s prior experience in such circumstances . Emphasizing that " the US cannot afford to win the military battle and lose the humanitarian campaign " in Iraq , Bacon advocated for increased numbers of Iraqi refugees to be allowed to enter the United States and for greater American financial assistance to refugees from violence in Iraq , with funding from the State Department rising from $ 43 million in 2006 to $ 398 in 2008 . Five days before his death ( August 10 ) , Refugees International announced that Bacon had endowed a new program to focus on people displaced by climate change . Personal . Bacon wrote an essay about health care reform from his own perspective as a cancer patient , a " matter of life and death " for him , that was published in " The Washington Post " 25 days before his death . He offered prevention and online efficiencies among his recommendations , with his own example of melanoma that could have been treatable if caught earlier given a family history of the condition . He described his difficulties in getting approval for payment of radiation therapy for cancer that had spread to his brain , which his insurer had deemed " not medically necessary " and expressed his frustration with the amount of time he and his physician had to spend in dealing with paperwork . He served as chairman of the Folger Shakespeare Library and was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the International Institute for Strategic Studies . A resident of Washington , D . C . , Bacon died at age 64 of complications related to melanoma , at his second home on Block Island , Rhode Island . He was survived by his two daughters and his wife of 43 years , the former Darcy Wheeler .