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

To: MulhollandDrive who wrote (19399)	12/14/1998 5:28:00 PM
From: Zoltan!	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 67261

December 14, 1998 Putting It Behind Us The late Jim McDougal famously and rightly said that the Clintons were "sort of tornadoes moving through people's lives." Except for one difference: Nature's tornadoes eventually stop. What reason is there to think this one ever will? Yet apologists and even some pundits keep saying that a censure vote would "put it all behind us." We should be so lucky. If Tornado Bill blows away impeachment and "wins" merely a censure, it will come roaring down on us yet again. What will be the next shoe to fall? Judiciary Counsel David Schippers warned that "we uncovered more incidents involving probably direct and deliberate obstruction of justice, witness tampering, perjury and abuse of power," but desisted in raising these incidents because the Justice Department and Independent Counsel said investigations were nearing completion. Democrats cried foul, but the history of the President personally and his Administration generally gives every reason to expect a lot more secrets remain to be exposed. Across town from the Judiciary Committee as it took its historic vote last week, for example, a federal judge was dealing with the Administration's handling of some 900 FBI files, an incident on which the President has supposedly been "exonerated." When Ken Starr said last month he wouldn't send a Filegate impeachment referral to Congress, it merely indicated he had found no evidence that President Clinton himself had been involved in the handling of the files. He didn't say the case was closed. Last week Federal Judge Royce Lamberth agreed to allow testimony by Linda Tripp, who worked in the White House Counsel's office at the time, in a suit the conservative group Judicial Watch has entered on behalf of officials whose files were mishandled. She is prepared to testify that when she worked in the White House Counsel's office, she saw FBI files on Republicans piled up high in the office of resigned Associate White House Counsel William Kennedy, previously a partner in the Rose Law Firm. When Mr. Kennedy was questioned in a deposition about whether he had kept files of Republicans in his office, he visibly choked on camera before making a carefully phrased denial. There is also the campaign-finance shoe. We have before us a magazine called China Today, a Communist organ out of Beijing. And on the August cover of China Today is a new national hero, Ng Lap Seng. He's the famous figure from the campaign finance hearings who was sometimes known as Mr. Wu. Mr. Ng, recall, was the shadowy Macau moneyman who funneled more than $900,000 through Charlie Trie to the Clinton re-election effort. Our Micah Morrison reported in February on Mr. Ng's ties to both Asian organized crime and the People's Liberation Army in Macau. The China Today cover story highlights Mr. Ng's services for the home team. No mention of the Clinton scandals, of course, but we do learn that Mr. Ng has received another in a series of Chinese government plums, appointment to the Preparatory Committee for the Macau Special Administrative Region -- the group that will carve up the Portugal-administered enclave as it is handed over to the Communists in December 1999. Indeed, the skies keep opening up even as the impeachment hearings proceed. Last week, Rep. Lindsey Graham revealed how in the days after Mr. Clinton suggested to a credulous Sidney Blumenthal that Monica Lewinsky was "stalking" the President, allies such as Rep. Charlie Rangel began suggesting that "the poor child" had "emotional problems" and was "fantasizing." This would have been Miss Lewinsky's reputation today, thanks to the President's efforts, had she not saved the semen-stained dress, thanks to advice from Ms. Tripp. Stepping into the Rose Garden last Friday just moments before Henry Hyde called the roll on the first article of impeachment, President Clinton said he'd accept the consequences -- if the vote were for censure or rebuke. He never uttered the word "impeachment." Then he turned and strode back into the Oval Office while reporters shouted questions about whether a reasonable person could conclude from the evidence that he was guilty of perjury. Against the mountain of impeachment, the various controversies that continue to bedevil this administration may seem like bumps in the road. But Bill Kennedy and the FBI files, Charlie Trie and Ng Lap Seng's money, Sid Blumenthal siccing Congressmen on Monica -- all these flow from the same font, namely character at the top. So it's not surprising that the landscape of the Clinton Presidency is littered with undetonated landmines that will be going off for years. Walking away from the Rose Garden Friday afternoon, Bill Clinton had the look of a man who knew it wasn't soon going to be behind him, or us. interactive.wsj.com