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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bill who wrote (174127)	8/24/2001 2:02:38 PM
From: DMaA	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

WOW! I missed this one. Gephardt tried to compare Condit and GINGRICH. This one resonates because I must have heard 10 big media types today bristling about how unfair it was to compare Condit with Clinton. Gephardt Shocker: Condit No More of a Security Risk Than Gingrich House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt defended Wednesday night his decision not to urge Rep. Gary Condit to recuse himself from the House Intelligence Committee, suggesting that the California Democrat was no more of a security risk than former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. Gephardt made the explosive comparison between Condit and Gingrich in an interview with WEVD radio's Alan Colmes. COLMES: Can [Condit] function effectively as a congressman, as a member of the Select Intelligence Committee, with all the pressure, with all the focus on him right now? GEPHARDT: Well, we've had other cases here where members have been through an ethics investigation and no one has claimed that they should step aside. When Speaker Gingrich was in a long ethics process a few years ago, he was privy to all the information that's secret in our country that Intelligence members are privy to. No one at the time on the Republican side said that he should not take those briefings while he was in the ethics process. (END OF EXCERPT) Last weekend, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle acknowledged that Condit's sordid personal life made him a ripe target for blackmail by a hostile foreign intelligence service. While Condit is the focus of a potential homicide investigation, complete with allegations that he attempted to destroy evidence and suborn perjury, Gingrich was accused of misusing the 501(c)(3) tax exempt status of GOPAC. The former speaker admitted to filing a misleading statement with House Ethics Committee probers, for which he paid a $300,000 fine, but was cleared of all other charges. But despite the national security risk posed by Condit's continued access to U.S secrets, Gephardt told Colmes that he hasn't pressed the California Democrat for the truth about his involvement in the Chandra Levy case, the outcome of which could impact the Democratic Party's chances to recapture the House in 2002. COLMES: Have you talked to him as minority leader? Have you tried to talk to him about this? GEPHARDT: I have talked to him in the past, but not a lot about this. I have not questioned him. I don't think that it's my responsibility or my role. (END OF EXCERPT) The House minority leader said he still believed Condit is cooperating with investigators, despite recent revelations that he ditched potential evidence of his involvement with another woman just hours before Washington police searched his apartment. "Look, we have a system that says you're innocent until proven guilty," Gephardt told Colmes. "We have an ethics process that works, and I'm sure it will all come to bear in this case at the right time." But the leading Democrat refused to shut the door on the possibilty that further developments could prompt him to seek Condit's removal. COLMES: Could you foresee you ever calling for his resignation? GEPHARDT: Well, you know, you never know what's going to happen. ... Ultimately his future will be decided by the voters in his district as it always is on all of us. And if other facts come between now and then that the Ethics Committee needs to take up, they'll take them up in due course and they'll do a good job. newsmax.com