Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Bill Clinton Scandal - SANITY CHECK -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bill who wrote (4792)	9/22/1998 9:17:00 PM
From: dougjn	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 67261

<<I believe he flat out lied about his comments to Betty Currie, his intentions in making those comments, the gift retrieval process, his willful non-recall of several events>> His comments on what he said to Bettie Curry I thought were not inconsistent with her testimony. Just a lot more limited. Same with the gift retrieval process. The willful non-recall, given at least partial recall on almost all of what he was asked, would I think be very difficult to sustain. Sure, its possible to believe any failure to recall is entirely willful, and possible to not. Normally it takes something like Haldeman's 52 flat "I do not recall" answers to lead to a perjury conviction on that account. Re: the specific touching of breasts and lower areas issue, that is a pretty specific disagreement with Monica. But I think it ends up less stark than it appears. He specifically and explicitly said in his GJ testimony that he thought the definition required direct touching (and when asked if that meant through clothing or with an object he said no). He also said it required an intent to arouse or gratify (as the language clearly did). So accidentally or fleeting or incidental touching by Clinton that Monica in her own mind may have made much of, may not have met the definition in Clinton's mind. Or, perish the though, even in the mind of a notional impartial observer. Anyway, for impeachment to come down to those sorts of distinctions seems truly obscene and ridiculous beyond belief. And as I've said before, it is also perfectly plausible that Monica may have exaggerated in her own mind, and now believe, or wanted to say, to look like it was all more mutual (and without believing such a lie would make any difference), that more happened than it really did. It certainly seems that only rarely did even Monica's testimony indicate that her factual recollections are clearly at variance with Clinton's recollections. Certainly Monica herself has said repeatedly on the tapes, we hear, that she had lied all her life, easily, and often. I think if there isn't clear evidence that Clinton is guilty of obstruction of justice, jury tampering, or misuse of office through the assertion of privileges or lying to his staff and Cabinet at the same time as to the press, then he's largely out of impeachment waters. There would remain the Jones deposition perjury. But he Does still have the I tried to avoid technical perjury by word parsing defense. And even if he did step over the line, there remain his reasons for trying to play it close to the line, which are somewhat sympathetic: i.e. he abhorred the Jones lawyers dragnet into his personal life, even though the Lewinsky questions had nothing to do with harassment, for the purpose of leaking the information and harming him politically as well as Monica and others. Finally, and relatedly, there is the very strong argument that the Lewinsky line of questions was not material. The Senate will not vote impeachment. Doug

To: Bill who wrote (4792)	9/22/1998 10:26:00 PM
From: dougjn	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 67261

Actually, in looking back over parts of the Starr report in detail, even Starr only claims the President perjured himself three times in the GJ testimony. Two of these strike me as a real stretch. The third as difficult or impossible to convincing prove. The first is that Clinton lied under oath when he testified that he believed that oral sex perfumed on him was not covered in the Paula Jones explicit definition. That's a Starr stretch. It is not an impossible construction at all of that tortured wording, esp. in light of its evolution through the Judge's excluding a part of the definition that unambiguously would have included oral sex performed on Clinton. The third was that Clinton lied when he said his inappropriate relationship with Lewinsky began in 1996, when in fact it began in Nov. 1995. That also seems a real stretch. I do not recall the OIC specifically asking about the Nov. 95 encounter. Indeed I don't recall the OIC calling any attention to the issue of exactly when the relationship began at all in their questioning of Clinton. Clinton just spoke of it as beginning in 1996. He also said it began during the government shutdown. Which turned out to be in Nov 1995. This one is an almost ridiculous attempt by Starr to play gotcha on a simple error or mistake. The second claimed second lie under oath is the only credible GJ one. Its the touching of Lewinsky's beasts and lower regions issue. Doug