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

To: bonnuss_in_austin who wrote (218530)	1/14/2002 10:45:30 PM
From: RON BL	Respond to of 769670

Monday, Jan. 22, 2002 Feds Paid 9-11 Suspect to Be in U.S. Remember that Egyptian student charged with lying about an aviation radio found in his hotel room near the World Trade Center on Sept. 11? This will warm your heart: Your tax dollars were paying for him to be here. The U.S. Agency for International Development, one of countless federal agencies that shouldn't even exist and in fact often do more harm than good, admitted today that Abdallah Higazy was here on a student visa through a program it arranged. The program uses your money to train Egyptians "in business, health, English and education, often by placing them at American universities," the Associated Press reported today. You have to wonder why Higazy was freeloading on the taxpayers' dole. After all, he is the son of an Egyptian diplomat, AP reported. He was staying at the Millennium Hilton Hotel, not exactly your standard student slum, for a whole month. USAID mouthpiece Susan Phalen claims it isn't clear why Higazy was put up at the Hilton or who got stuck with the tab. ``This may not be ultimately a terrorism case,'' Magistrate Judge Frank Maas said at Higazy's hearing Friday. And maybe it isn't. But why is the government squandering our money on tuition and possibly even hotel rooms for any foreign students? Give 'em enough rope ...

To: bonnuss_in_austin who wrote (218530)	1/14/2002 10:46:23 PM
From: RON BL	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

Enron 'Scandal' Should Prompt Indictments - for the Clintons No one can say President Bush hasn't tried. As part of his campaign pledge to move the country beyond eight years of partisan squabbling over Clinton-era corruption, he never mentioned Whitewater or Monicagate or any other of the dozen or so gates that metastasized during the 1990s. After he was elected, Bush gave his silent approval when, the day before he took office, independent counsel Robert Ray announced he wouldn't prosecute President Clinton for blatant and repeated instances of perjury before a federal grand jury and a federal judge. Days later his Justice Department quietly removed the noose from around the neck of Chinagate kingpin James Riady, allowing the Clinton benefactor to walk away from the most serious scandal in American history, in exchange for a token fine and community service that Riady was permitted to perform on the honor system back home in Indonesia. Bush has kept the prosecutorial dogs muzzled in the U.S. Attorney's Office in New York, as dueling grand juries heard evidence all summer implicating Bill, Hillary and even former first brother Roger Clinton in a pardons-for-cash scam where a fugitive billionaire, a major cocaine dealer and even a Mafia don got White House shakedowns. It got so bad that when outgoing Clinton staffers vandalized the White House and Air Force One stewards reported items missing after the Clintons' last flight home, President Bush gritted his teeth, smiled as though it never happened and refused to let his aides investigate. In short, in the interest of political comity, George Bush handcuffed justice and allowed the former first family to make a total and complete mockery of the law. Now, however, as the partisan squabbling and media hysteria reach a fevered pitch over the Enron scandal, Democrats herald the arrival of "Bush's Whitewater." It's clear the president's strategy to give the Clintons a break and stem the tide of political retribution has failed - and failed miserably. Without so much as a hint of Bush administration impropriety, the Democrat-media machine has ginned up no fewer than eight federal and congressional probes into the energy giant's collapse. Politicians who decried the money spent probing the real Whitewater scandal - "Seven years, $70 million dollars - and for what?" they complained - can barely conceal their burning desire for new impeachment hearings that will install a Democrat in the White House in 2004. How should Bush respond? Simple. Unshackle the U.S. Attorney's Office in New York and let prosecutors there show Washington's political ingrates what criminal wrongdoing really looks like. It's time to take the muzzle off lead prosecutor Elliot Jacobson, who at last word was heading up the probe and who clearly had enough evidence to file charges against Roger Clinton by last summer. It's well past time to move against the Clinton family's Golden Girls, Denise Rich and Beth Dozoretz, both of whom told Congress last year that if they told the truth about Pardongate, "it might tend to incriminate me." And it's time to publicly call both Bill and Hillary Clinton before the Pardongate grand juries - and, unlike what happened in Whitewater, let the grand jurors themselves decide if the evidence warrants prosecution. Democrats now foaming at the mouth over "Enrongate" didn't know when they had a good thing, and in fact, it's now plain that Bush's indulgence only engendered their contempt. Now that the Washington scandal machine has Bush in its crosshairs, it's time for the president to make sure the rules apply to both sides equally - and if that means prosecuting Bill and Hillary Clinton, so be it.

To: bonnuss_in_austin who wrote (218530)	1/14/2002 10:47:13 PM
From: RON BL	Respond to of 769670

Dingell: I'll Grill Rubin on Enrongate Calls Michigan congressman John Dingell, the ranking Democrat on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said Sunday he intends to call former Clinton administration Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin to testify in upcoming hearings into the collapse of energy giant Enron. Dingell was asked by "Fox News Sunday's" Brit Hume whether he intended to question the former Clinton official after reports of his involvement in the scandal surfaced on Friday. "If you watched me when I ran investigations, and I ran a lot of them and they were very, very effective, we had everybody in and we saw to it that we got all the facts," Dingell said, before adding, "Absolutely, yes." Late last year as the energy giant was sliding into the financial abyss, Rubin reportedly attempted to intercede with the Bush Treasury Department. Administration officials now say Rubin pressed Treasury Undersecretary Peter Fisher to contact credit agencies in an effort to persuade them not to cut Enron's credit rating. Fisher told Rubin that such an action would be inappropriate, raising questions about why the Clinton administration financial czar involved himself in the first place.