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

To: greenspirit who wrote (34867)	2/22/1999 7:33:00 AM
From: jimpit	Respond to of 67261

THE WASHINGTON TIMES washtimes.com OPINION Published in Washington, D.C. 5am -- February 22, 1999 EDITORIAL Janet Reno's long knives First it was Charles La Bella. Now it's Kenneth Starr. Apparently one Saturday Night Massacre isn't enough for Attorney General Janet Reno. Just prior to the Senate vote on whether to remove President Clinton, unnamed Justice Department officials put out the word to various newspapers that the department was planning to investigate alleged improprieties on the part of Mr. Starr and his deputies in the Office of Independent Counsel. The articles not only laid out the department's worries about Mr. Starr, but the focus of the probe and the evidence to warrant it. From the president's perspective the timing of the leaks could not have been better. It played up concerns that Mr. Starr was some kind of out-of-control prosecutor, thereby fortifying the resolve of Democrats to vote against removal and providing political cover to Republicans inclined to vote with them. A clearly frustrated Orrin Hatch, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, sharply criticized the leaks in a letter to Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder. If there is credible evidence of wrongdoing by Mr. Starr's office -- and it isn't clear that such evidence exists, Mr. Hatch said -- then there ought to be an investigation. But the leaks, he said, "appeared in the press while the Senate was conducting final deliberations on the Articles of Impeachment against President Clinton. The timing of these articles could not be more suspicious." Mr. Hatch, who is hardly one of the more partisan Republicans out there, has every reason to be suspicious of this department. He was one of the senators who watched in dismay as Ms. Reno did in the highly regarded career Justice Department prosecutor Charles La Bella after he made the mistake of calling for the appointment of an independent counsel to investigate the Clinton-Gore fund-raising scandals. (For the record, FBI director Louis Freeh also supported the appointment.) Not only did Ms. Reno studiously dismiss his recommendation and refuse to appoint the counsel. She also used her long knives to cut off his appointment to take over the U.S. Attorney's office in San Diego, where he was the interim U.S. Attorney. One is reminded of the famed incident known as the Saturday Night Massacre in which Richard Nixon ordered the firing of Watergate special counsel Archibald Cox, which led to the resignation of his attorney general, Elliot Richardson, and the firing of his deputy, William Ruckleshaus. Ms. Reno clearly doesn't want that kind of political murder on her record. So she did in Mr. La Bella out of the public spotlight, which was easy enough since no one in the media but this newspaper's Jerry Seper was looking anyway. Now she's trying to build a case against Mr. Starr that would allow her to do him in too. Ms. Reno certainly has the authority to fire Mr. Starr, and given the administration's relentless effort to demonize him -- one would think it was Mr. Starr who stalked a junior intern, lied about it under oath and obstructed justice -- the Clinton team must be wondering what she is waiting for. If there is to be an investigation, as Mr. Hatch suggests, then it ought to be fair and impartial, something which Ms. Reno has proved she cannot be. Recall that the whole point of creating an independent counsel in the first place was to ensure that an administration bent on its own survival should not have the luxury of investigating itself; it had a conflict of interest. By that logic it certainly shouldn't have the luxury of investigating one of its "enemies," in this case, Mr. Starr. Mr. Starr argues that if there is to be an investigation, it should be done by an outside or separate independent counsel, someone on the order of former Attorney General Griffin Bell. As long as everyone understands that this is less about Mr. Starr's wrongdoing than it is about deflecting attention from Mr. Clinton's, the outside counsel is the way to go. Copyright © 1999 News World Communications, Inc. washtimes.com ------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------ THE WASHINGTON TIMES washtimes.com Inside the Beltway Political tidbits and other shenanigans from around the nation's capital By John McCaslin Remembering Hillary It suddenly dawned on us why first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton is contemplating a run for the U.S. Senate. To make a name for herself. Seriously. So future generations will know who she was. This realization came about after we opened a letter from Dorothy Welsh of Avon Lake, Ohio. "I am a mother of four children, ages 9 to 2 years of age," Mrs. Welsh begins. "I was reading a book to my seven-year-old daughter on Great American Heroines. The book is old, but I am finding that those are the best ones to read to my children. "I was reading to her a short chapter on Dolley Madison. I asked her if she knew what the title 'First Lady' meant? She didn't, so I explained the title and the functions of the first lady's job. I then asked her if she knew who our current first lady is? "She didn't miss a beat and answered Monica Lewinsky. Unfortunately, she was serious." Copyright © 1999 News World Communications, Inc. washtimes.com ----------------------------------------------