That's one point of view, brees. Personally, I don't think the Constitution is in any grave danger, it's all politics. Do you think the Paula Jones suit was about truth and justice, and devoid of political motivation? Do you think Starr's set up tactics with Tripp, Lewinsky, and Clinton was about truth and justice, and not "getting Clinton" by any means possible? Do you think the Starr report publication and the Clinton videotape dump were about truth and justice, and not a political miscalculation by Newt and the Republican leadership? I disagree.
There's been one previous impeachment proceeding that went to trial in the Senate, and it was on a clearly political matter, Andrew Johnson's reluctance to impose a punitive reconstruction policy on the South following the Civil War. Johnson won that battle but lost the broader war, and I don't think many would argue that our country was the better for Johnson losing out on the broader matter. I have little admiration for Clinton as either a person or a politician, I don't think he's very good on either front. He has some evident tactical political skills, but that's about it. But I have no idea how the long running Starr inquisition is supposed to encourage a better class of people to enter the political arena.
Clinton was stupid to engage in the Lewinsky affair, especially so with the ongoing Jones suit hanging over his head. But Starr came up with nothing against Clinton on all the preceding scandals, though he leaked plenty of dirt in the meantime. And the Lewinsky matter, while personally reprehensible, has little to do with Clinton acting as President, unless you buy the argument that any lack of cooperation with Starr was "obstruction of justice". Which would seem to imply that not only should the President be subject to politically motivated civil suits while in office, a fairly bad precedent in itself, but that in allegedly criminal matters, he does not have the right to defend himself legally. But a Special Prosecutor has the right to use "the full force of the law", in the form of tactics usually reserved for mafia dons and drug lords, to try to bring the President down. All in pursuit of truth and justice, of course.
Constitutional crisis? I don't think so, the one good thing that might come out of this is the end of the Independent Counsel Act, which I think everybody will agree at this point is dead in its current form when it comes up for renewal next year. |
