No grand conspiracy, Neocon, just a small circle of friends. Back to nytimes.com .
Another friend of Marcus also briefly considered assisting the Jones lawyers.
In June 1994, Rosenzweig, a lawyer at a small law firm in Washington, with experience working in the Justice Department, expressed interest in doing legal work on behalf of Ms. Jones, but he did none, lawyers involved in the case said.
Although the billing records show communication between Porter and the Jones lawyers from 1994 to 1997, he denied in a written statement last fall doing legal work for Ms. Jones.
Because Porter is a partner at the firm where Starr worked until he took a leave of absence last August, any role played by Porter in the Jones case could have posed a conflict of interest for Starr once he became independent counsel. Starr has said he did not discuss the Jones case with Porter.
Starr has acknowledged contacts with Davis, specifically six telephone discussions the two had in 1994, before Starr became independent counsel. In fact, Starr has been criticized for not disclosing the phone conversations to Attorney General Janet Reno when he was seeking to expand his investigation to the Lewinsky matter. Starr has said it did not occur to him to mention the conversations because he did not do work on the Jones case and simply offered his publicly stated position on a point of constitutional law that Presidents are not immune from civil lawsuits.
Funny, I missed that part. Porter, a partner in Starr's firm, worked with Smith in planting the (false, if Jones is to be believed) Arkansas trooper story that traumatized guileless Paula so. Starr actually talked to front-man Davis, 6 times, while partner Porter was working behind the scenes with him. But I'm sure Starr never talked to partner Porter about the matter. Nope. It never would have occurred to either of those two. Never would have occurred to Starr that a partner of his working behind the scenes to generate the Jones lawsuit might possibly present conflict of interest problems either. Nope, impossible for someone with Starr's integrity.
In November 1997, Rosenzweig went to work as a prosecutor in Starr's office. And from November to January, Rosenzweig spoke several times by telephone with Marcus and discussed the Jones case, a lawyer with knowledge of the conversations said. But Bakaly, a spokesman for Starr, said that Rosenzweig did not tell any of his colleagues about what he learned about developments in the Jones case.
By this time, Mrs. Tripp was cooperating with the Jones lawyers. She was also taping her conversations with Ms. Lewinsky, which her friend, Lucianne Goldberg, a Manhattan literary agent, had incorrectly assured her was legal. In December, Mrs. Tripp became frantic that she might be prosecuted because such taping is illegal in Maryland, where Mrs. Tripp lives. Mrs. Tripp and Ms. Goldberg thought of a possible solution: perhaps she could receive immunity from prosecution from Starr.
Ms. Goldberg called Smith, the Chicago financier, and Porter for advice on how Mrs. Tripp might approach Starr. In a teleconference during the first week of January 1998, Ms. Goldberg talked to Porter and Marcus. Meanwhile, Marcus sought new lawyers for Mrs. Tripp. Conway suggested an old friend, James Moody, a Washington lawyer and fellow Federalist Society member, whom Mrs. Tripp retained.
Because he was Starr's former law partner, Porter did not want to be the first one to call the independent counsel's office on behalf of Mrs. Tripp. So Marcus made the call to Rosenzweig.
Funny how it all started out with Smith and Porter planting the false Arkansas trooper story with Brock, and ended with Goldberg going to Smith for advise on how to "discretely" approach Starr. Though it seems quite improbable that Starr (or at least Rosenzweig) didn't already know all about the developing situation at the time. Again, no vast right-wing conspiracy, just a small circle of friends. Smith and Porter were there at the beginning and the end. Porter was there almost every step in between. Except when guileless Paula decided she needed to clear her name, right, Neocon? But this is all "guilt by association", eh, Neocon? All innuendo, totally unlike saying Gore writes like the Unabomber.
Sorry for the impolite lapse here, but the whole thing smells a lot fishier than the very circumstantial obstruction case that's supposed to be an impeachable offense. |
