<<I smell big backlash coming. >>
I agree, but I doubt it will show at the polls. I don't think there will be any change at all in voting patterns. The Republicans haven't picked up any strength, but no one is happy with the Democrats either. Look for little, if any, change in the composition of the house and Senate - that in itself would be a defeat of sorts for the Republicans.
<<Many previous Independent Counsels have said they would long ago have dropped the Lewinsky line of inquiry entirely>>
A couple have also said that Starr did the right thing. It's not as cut and dried as you might like.
<<E.g., the absolutely ridiculous thundering Starrism, that asserting privileges, from attorney client to executive privileges, any of them, all of them, constitute abuse of office and obstruction of justice>>
Agreed, but.......the President did the country and the Presidency a disservice by pursuing that legalistic line of defense. Of all the things he has done related to this scandal, the hairsplitting and stalling seem to be what the public has objected to the most.
<<His report is stuffed with overreaching claims, as well as a thorough going effort to convict the President though lurid detail which Starr fervently and piously hoped would be as prejudicial as possible.>>
Notice that you use the same sort of hyperbole (lurid detail, prejudicial as possible, etc.) when you discuss Starr. You are doing the same thing to him that you accuse him of doing to Clinton. Your basic premise is completely accurate, IMHO, but you are still attacking him on a visceral level instead of an intellectual one, in order to try to influence people. |
