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

To: Les H who wrote (8245)	10/8/1998 6:24:00 PM
From: Volsi Mimir	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 67261

Judge Orders Release Of Jones-Clinton Documents By Deborah Zabarenko Thursday October 8 4:37 PM EDT dailynews.yahoo.com WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Potentially embarrassing documents in the Paula Jones sexual harassment lawsuit against President Clinton will be released, a judge ruled Thursday, even as Jones' lawyers considered settling the case. Clinton's deposition in the Jones case, in which he denied having sex with Monica Lewinsky, will be among the documents ordered unsealed by U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright. The other unsealed papers include Jones' deposition, in which she is believed to have discussed ''distinguishing characteristics'' of Clinton's genitals. Several other women witnesses were deposed by Jones' lawyers to testify about their alleged sexual involvement with Clinton in the past and their pretrial testimony would also be released, although their names might remain secret. As members of Congress voted to launch an impeachment inquiry over Clinton's cover-up of his relationship with Lewinsky, Wright ruled in Little Rock, Arkansas, that because Clinton did not protest her earlier decision to unseal the documents, they will be released on Oct. 19. That is one day before a three-judge federal appeals panel will consider reinstating the case against Clinton, which was dismissed by Wright in April. Lawyers for Jones have been in contact with Clinton's attorneys to reach a settlement. Jones initially sought $1 million and rejected a counteroffer of $500,000. An offer of $700,000 from the Clinton team is under discussion. Jones dropped her earlier demand for an apology from Clinton. In addition, eccentric tycoon Abe Hirschfeld offered to pay Jones $1 million to settle the case, and held a news conference Thursday to display a bank check for that amount made out to Jones' attorneys. ''My offer has only one reason: to get rid of Starr-gate as soon as possible,'' Hirschfeld said, referring to independent counsel Kenneth Starr, whose legal team investigated the Lewinsky matter. USA Today quoted unnamed sources Thursday as saying Jones would consider accepting a package that included both the $700,000 from the Clinton team and the $1 million from Hirschfeld, but neither one alone. Nisha Mohammed, a spokeswoman for the Rutherford Institute, a conservative Virginia-based group that arranged for Jones' legal representation, insisted that the Clinton offer was still being considered, and that any ''package deal,'' which included the Hirschfeld offer, would only be considered if it were approved by the Clinton team. Hirschfeld made his first fortune by building parking garages, briefly owned The New York Post newspaper and has run unsuccessfully for several political posts. He is free on $1 million bond pending resolution of an indictment alleging state income tax fraud. Hirschfeld has pleaded not guilty to the charges of failing to pay taxes over a six-year period. Hirschfeld said his settlement offer in the Jones case was part of a plan involving Clinton's resignation and the movement of Vice President Al Gore to the presidency, after which Clinton would be named ''honorary president emeritus.'' Starr, in Hirschfeld's scenario, would be given the next vacant position on the U.S. Supreme Court. Hirschfeld stressed that he was setting no conditions on his settlement offer. Jones alleged in her lawsuit that Clinton asked her for oral sex in 1991 when she was an Arkansas state employee and he was governor. Clinton has denied Jones' allegations. Both Clinton and Lewinsky, a former White House intern, denied having a sexual affair in sworn pretrial statements in the Jones case in January. But Lewinsky's testimony to Starr's grand jury contradicted that previous statement, and Clinton acknowledged an ''inappropriate'' relationship in his grand jury testimony in August.

To: Les H who wrote (8245)	10/8/1998 7:45:00 PM
From: jbe	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 67261

His [Clinton's] lying is not unique. However, as in Watergate, lying is being cited as an impeachable offense.... (I left out the part about the lying being connected to obstruction of justice, since the lying/perjury charge is a separate, independent count in the Starr referral.) Les, I think what some people here would argue is that certain instances of alleged Presidential (and Vice-Presidential) lying were not investigated thoroughly enough, certainly nowhere near as thoroughly as Clinton's alleged lying. Let's take the Iran-Contra mess, for example. Personally, I did not follow the mess all that closely, and I may have something wrong here. Nevertheless, on checking out the Walsh report, I was struck by several things. I would like to cite two excerpts from the Walsh Report, even though they may seem old-hat to you. The first comes from the Executive Summary, and relates to Vice President Bush's "I was out of the loop" claim. Independent Counsel's investigation did not develop evidence that proved that Vice President Bush violated any criminal statute. Contrary to his public pronouncements, however, he was fully aware of the Iran arms sales. Bush was regularly briefed, along with the President, on the Iran arms sales, and he participated in discussions to obtain third-country support for the contras. The OIC obtained no evidence that Bush was aware of the diversion. The OIC learned in December 1992 that Bush had failed to produce a diary containing contemporaneous notes relevant to Iran/contra, despite requests made in 1987 and again in early 1992 for the production of such material. Bush refused to be interviewed for a final time in light of evidence developed in the latter stages of OIC's investigation, leaving unresolved a clear picture of his Iran/contra involvement. Bush's pardon of Weinberger on December 24, 1992 pre-empted a trial in which defense counsel indicated that they intended to call Bush as a witness. fas.org The second excerpt comes from the Conclusion: The underlying facts of Iran/contra are that, regardless of criminality, President Reagan, the secretary of state, the secretary of defense, and the director of central intelligence and their necessary assistants committed themselves, however reluctantly, to two programs contrary to congressional policy and contrary to national policy. They skirted the law, some of them broke the law, and almost all of them tried to cover up the President's willful activities........ The disrespect for Congress by a popular and powerful President and his appointees was obscured when Congress accepted the tendered concept of a runaway conspiracy of subordinate officers and avoided the unpleasant confrontation with a powerful President and his Cabinet. In haste to display and conclude its investigation of this unwelcome issue, Congress destroyed the most effective lines of inquiry by giving immunity to Oliver L. North and John M. Poindexter so that they could exculpate and eliminate the need for the testimony of President Reagan and Vice President Bush. fas.org I also seem to remember Walsh's saying in an interview not too long ago that he, personally, was reluctant to lean too hard on President Reagan, because the President seemed genuinely confused about what had happened. On looking back, Walsh said he thought perhaps the President may have already been showing signs of Alzheimer's... jbe

To: Les H who wrote (8245)	10/8/1998 8:35:00 PM
From: Daniel Schuh	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 67261

Sure, Les. The Watergate coverup never really ended. About the closest Nixon came to coming clean was saying "Mistakes were made". And the tapes were never really made public either, until fairly recently. I posted some interesting revelations from the tapes here, see www2.techstocks.com , for a news story from a year ago. Nixon may or may not have ordered the original breakin, but he ordered other similar stuff. The Iran-Contra coverup never really ended, and maybe it never will. The bimbogate coverup lasted what, 9 months at the outside? It involved evasive testimony, maybe perjury, maybe not, in a politically motivated civil suit, now moribund. The suit had nothing to do with any Presidential action, and the evasive, maybe perjurous testimony had no bearing on the resolution of the case so far. But incomplete cooperation with the Starr inquisition now counts as not just perjury, but obstruction of justice, misprision of felony, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and who knows whatever other charges they'll come up with. Meanwhile, the House leadership has informed us that saying anything bad about Ken Starr is obstruction of justice too. Maybe they'll go for treason still. But of course, that's wholly irrelevant to the preferred "facts" so objectively presented in the Starr report. Not to mention the "facts" in the form of the numerous other charges floating around here that Starr couldn't dig up any evidence on worth reporting.