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Politics : Did Slick Boink Monica? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: MulhollandDrive who wrote (4559)2/4/1998 12:35:00 PM
From: Zoltan!  Read Replies (4) | Respond to of 20981
 
I Believe

By Michael Kelly

Wednesday, February 4, 1998; Page A19

I believe the president. I have always believed him. I believed him when he
said he had never been drafted in the Vietnam War and I believed him
when he said he had forgotten to mention that he had been drafted in the
Vietnam War. I believed him when he said he hadn't had sex with Gennifer
Flowers and I believe him now, when he reportedly says he did.

I believe the president did not rent out the Lincoln Bedroom, did not sell
access to himself and the vice president to hundreds of well-heeled special
pleaders and did not supervise the largest, most systematic
money-laundering operation in campaign finance history, collecting more
than $3 million in illegal and improper donations. I believe that Charlie Trie
and James Riady were motivated by nothing but patriotism for their
adopted country.

I believed Vice President Gore when he said that he had made dunning
calls to political contributors "on a few occasions" from his White House
office, and I believed him when he said that, actually, "a few" meant 46. I
believe in no controlling legal authority.

I believe Bruce Babbitt when he says that the $286,000 contributed to the
DNC by Indian tribes opposed to granting a casino license to rival tribes
had nothing to do with his denial of the license. I believed the secretary
when he said that he had not been instructed in this matter by then-White
House deputy chief of staff Harold Ickes. I believed him when he said later
that he had told lobbyist and friend Paul Eckstein that Ickes had told him to
move on the casino decision, but that he had been lying to Eckstein. I
agree with the secretary that it is an outrage that anyone would question his
integrity.

I believe in the Clinton Standard of adherence to the nation's campaign
finance and bribery laws, enunciated by the president on March 7, 1997: "I
don't believe you can find any evidence of the fact that I had changed
government policy solely because of a contribution." I note with approval
the use of the word "evidence" and also the use of the word "solely." I
believe that it is proper to change government policy to address the
concerns of people who have given the president money, as long as
nobody can find evidence of this being the sole reason.

I believe the president has lived up to his promise to preside over the most
ethical administration in American history. I believe that indicted former
agriculture secretary Mike Espy did not accept $35,000 in illegal favors
from Tyson Foods and other regulated businesses. I believe that indicted
former housing secretary Henry Cisneros did not lie to the FBI and tell
others to lie to cover up $250,000 in blackmail payments to his former
mistress. I believe that convicted former associate attorney general
Webster Hubbell was not involved in the obstruction of justice when the
president's minions arranged for Hubbell to receive $400,000 in
sweetheart consulting deals at a time when he was reneging on his promise
to cooperate with Kenneth Starr's Whitewater investigation.

I believe Paula Jones is a cheap tramp who was asking for it. I believe
Kathleen Willey is a cheap tramp who was asking for it. I believe Monica
Lewinsky is a cheap tramp who was asking for it.

I believe Lewinsky was fantasizing in her 20 hours of taped conversation in
which she reportedly detailed her sexual relationship with the president and
begged Linda Tripp to join her in lying about the relationship. I believe that
any gifts, correspondence, telephone calls and the 37 post-employment
White House visits that may have passed between Lewinsky and the
president are evidence only of a platonic relationship; such innocent
intimate friendships are quite common between middle-aged married men
and young single women, and also between presidents of the United States
and White House interns.

I see nothing suspicious in the report that the president's intimate, Vernon
Jordan, arranged a $40,000-per-year job for Lewinsky shortly after she
signed but before she filed an affidavit saying she had not had sex with the
president. Nor do I read anything into the fact that the ambassador to the
United Nations, Bill Richardson, visited Lewinsky at the Watergate to offer
her a job. I believe the instructions Lewinsky gave Tripp informing her on
how to properly perjure herself in the Willey matter simply wrote
themselves.

I believe that The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, The New
York Times, Newsweek, Time, U.S. News & World Report, ABC, CBS,
NBC, CNN, PBS and NPR are all part of a vast right-wing conspiracy.
Especially NPR.

Michael Kelly is a senior writer for National Journal.
washingtonpost.com