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Politics : Clinton's Scandals: Is this corruption the worst ever? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Zoltan! who wrote (7691)	10/3/1998 8:17:00 PM
From: Trippi	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 13994

How do you explain the difference between the MSNBC Live/online surveys and the public polling? What I'm asking is why does MSNBC have 90% plus wanting resignation or impeachment -- and most noted public polls have the combined resignation/impeachment number at anywhere from 29% to 41%? Could it be that the public polls really are a random and therefore accurate sample of American opinion -- and that MSNBC respondents are self-selecting and therefore skewing the results? Could it be that most of America is not watching MSNBC and that those that are watching are people that have already made up their minds and oppose the President? Like its the Larry Klayman fan club? So us Dem's have maybe 10% if that of MSNBC's viewing audience? All the talking heads in the world couldn't change those numbers. Gotta remember to ask Larry about that next time he's on. FOX viewership can't be much different -- all those shows and it turns out Larry and the rest of us are fighting over the 3% with open minds -- while the rest of America is watching -- well something else -- because they just don't care. Trippi

To: Zoltan! who wrote (7691)	10/3/1998 8:36:00 PM
From: J. M. Blackburn	Respond to of 13994

To All: This is where you can get a "Perot" petition calling for Clinton's resignation. Enough of signatures should get someone's attention. JMB perot.org

To: Zoltan! who wrote (7691)	10/3/1998 8:48:00 PM
From: Les H	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 13994

Justice for Webb Wall Street Journal So now amid everything else, Janet Reno's Justice Department is going into court to run interference for Webb Hubbell against Ken Starr. You've got to give these people an A for whatever word is beyond chutzpah. Here we have an Attorney General who has been digging in her heels for nearly two years over the appointment of an independent counsel in the campaign finance scandal, with three preliminary investigations of that mess currently wending their way through her Public Integrity Section. Last week, however, Justice had little trouble heaving its full weight against Independent Counsel Starr, submitting a brief against him and in support of Mr. Hubbell. What a spectacle. Here's a guy who has been convicted of bilking his partners in the Rose Law Firm (which we guess is similar to lying to your closest colleagues), who as a Justice Department official himself participated in the early firing of all the sitting U.S. attorneys and ran information out the back door to the White House, and who sits on the edge of yet more scandal and possible indictments involving hush money after his own, initial indictment. Somehow, the Clinton Department of Justice finds this fit material for a friend-of-the-court brief. In the amicus brief it filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, the department said Mr. Starr had exceeded his authority when he charged Mr. Hubbell with tax evasion. At issue here is U.S. District Judge James Robertson's July dismissal of the Hubbell tax case, largely on the grounds that Mr. Starr had exceeded his mandate. Mr. Starr has since petitioned the Court of Appeals to reinstate the case. Now Justice has surfaced to argue that the district court "correctly concluded that the independent counsel did not have the authority" to bring the indictment. There are a couple of ways to characterize this action, one of them even relatively benign; any way you slice it, though, it smells bad. After Mr. Hubbell pleaded guilty to embezzling from his former Rose Law Firm partners in a deal with Mr. Starr's office, he promised to cooperate, but didn't. He served 18 months in prison. Mr. Starr then launched a hush money probe after learning that Mr. Hubbell had received more than $700,000 in payments from Clinton supporters after leaving Justice and before going to prison, The tax evasion charges stem from these suspicious payments. This is not the first time the Justice Department has litigated against independent counsels. Independent Counsel Donald Smaltz has fought a long legal war with Ms. Reno over his efforts to aggressively pursue his own case. Early in 1995, Mr. Smaltz requested an expansion of his investigation into allegations of cash payments by Arkansas poultry giant Tyson Foods to then-Governor Clinton. Mr. Smaltz told the PBS program "Frontline" earlier this year that Ms. Reno "refused to expand my jurisdiction or refer the matter we were looking at as a 'related matter' " under the independent counsel statute. At this juncture, the tension between Justice and these independent counsels gets interesting. The next time he wanted an expansion, Mr. Smaltz took an alternative route provided by the statute--going straight to the three-judge Special Division panel of the Court of Appeals that appoints and oversees special prosecutors. The Justice Department litigated against Mr. Smaltz, filing a brief by top Public Integrity Section officials Lee Radek and Jo Ann Farrington. They argued that the "concurrence" of the Attorney General was necessary for any expansion. Now Mr. Starr has taken the same route to the judicial panel for his Hubbell request, doubtless encouraged by the judges' response to the Radek-Farrington brief. The Special Division found against Justice in April 1996, stating that the "plain language" of the statute "in no way suggests that the concurrence of the Attorney General is required before the court can refer a related matter." One has to wonder what is going on here. The benign explanation is that Justice's bureaucrats, being bureaucrats, can see nothing else in front of their eyes than a turf battle with the Office of Independent Counsel. But their amicus brief raises an unavoidable question: Just who represents the United States? The Department of Justice, or the Office of Independent Counsel? One of the reasons a President gets to appoint an Attorney General and other top Justice officers is so that some sensible political judgment can avoid an unseemly spectacle such as this. But of course with the Clinton Administration we're long past any such normal conduct. The President already has divided Justice against itself, using the department's attorneys only recently to file his stillborn claims of executive privilege. Justice's lawyers got their heads handed to them then, and most likely will again in defense of Webster Hubbell.