| At the Crossroads of a Presidency by ZACK NGUYEN Monday August 10, 1998 I have not written a column concerning the Clinton Administration in quite a while. There seemed little else to say. Clinton is a hardened criminal, and has been one almost since the instant he entered politics twenty years ago. Certainly he is cozy with organized crime, with links to a highly profitable drug smuggling operation out of Mena, Arkansas. It is possible that he has connections with the American intelligence community that go back to his days at Oxford. |
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| Many people who had information about Clinton's crimes or dalliances wound
up receiving threatening phone calls (in the case of Sally Perdue) or receiving
threatening visitations (in the case of Kathleen Willey). This is all, of course, aside from the fraud, money laundering, bribery, witness tampering, assault and obstruction that continues to surround Clinton and his Arkansas friends. One must wonder if Bill Clinton has done anything legal at all in the last 20 years. And now, finally, in spite of the best efforts of the media, Congressional and Senate Democrats, the White House, Congressional and Senate Republicans, the "Justice" Department, and at times, Ken Starr himself, it seems that a report from the Office of Independent Council will be released, possibly by the end of the month, that details impeachable offenses committed by Bill Clinton. If leaks from the OIC are to be believed, the report will contain very little on Monica Lewinsky and the "stain on our national conscience", but will instead focus on other, far more serious crimes by Clinton. Let us be frank. If Bill Clinton is forced out of office because he dallied an intern and lied about it under oath, he should count his lucky stars and leave quietly. Indeed, he should count his lucky stars that Ken Starr has been a willing participant in the cover-up of the death of Vince Foster. Though it is not widely known (because it was not widely reported), one of Starr's top prosecutors, a man named Miguel Rodriguez, resigned in 1995 in disgust over Starr's refusal to investigate serious conflicts in the official story of Foster's death. The sudden turn-about in Starr's behavior -- subpoenaing the President and muscling Monica Lewinsky into an immunity deal -- indicate that Starr has finally found something resembling a backbone and is tired of covering for Bill Clinton only to have his reputation destroyed and his background investigated by the White House. But what of the big picture? While the country is preoccupied with a soiled dress and Presidential testimony, what of the larger scandal -- the damage done to the Constitution? Will the law of the land survive? Even if Clinton loses an impeachment trial in the Senate, might he refuse to leave office? What will Congress do then? Will it even come to an impeachment vote? Well, I have been wrong before. I honestly did not believe Bill Clinton would ever face this much peril during his term of office, regardless of his crimes. I did not believe Starr had the guts to face down the President of the United States. Much still remains to be seen. I believe our Constitutional form of governance is fundamentally sound. Of course, governing by the Constitution is a concept so foreign to most of our representatives that they don't even try to justify themselves by it anymore, rather they just trot out empty phrases about "our Founding Fathers" whenever they think they can get an advantage over their adversaries. With this is mind, it is not out Constitutional government that needs fixing, it is the hapless fools that govern by it that need fixing. In particular, Senator Orrin Hatch from Utah recently made a world-class fool of himself on "Meet the Press" this weekend, claiming that if Clinton would just explain himself and apologize, all would be forgiven and everyone could move on with the country's business -- as if Monica Lewinsky is the only thing Clinton has ever done wrong. For that very reason, I sincerely doubt Clinton will apologize. Apologizing on national television, and then being hit with impeachment resolutions from a myriad of other crimes, would do no good and would be a waste of Clinton's political capital. Like the good citizen that I am, I sent Senator Hatch an e-mail detailing my concerns:
Here is his response:
Since Senator Hatch's e-mail address was posted on the Free Republic website, it is very possible that he sent literally hundreds, if not thousands of these canned responses all over the nation Monday morning. What Senator Hatch was thinking when he suggested that Clinton could beat the perjury rap by simply saying he is sorry is anybody's guess (try that strategy the next time you fail to pay your taxes and see how far it gets you.) Couple this with the dead silence amongst Republicans and I must wonder exactly what Clinton has gleaned from the 900 FBI files on Republicans that were stolen by the White House. It does not matter if Bill Clinton apologizes from every rooftop. Perjury is still perjury, and obstruction, fraud, assault, and racketeering are still crimes -- and lying is still wrong. If this is a hint of how the Republican Senate plans on handling Clinton's crimes, every thinking American should head for the hills. Whether the Republicans will do the right thing and stand up for truth and justice remains to be seen, though it is obvious that they are willing to use any and every excuse to rid themselves of the responsibility of doing what is right. Until we insist on expecting absolute integrity from our elected leaders, the unelected bureaucracy, the media, and back it up with our wallets and at the voting booth, we will be stuck with men and women like Orrin Hatch, and can only hope that they somehow purge our government of it's corruption for us. I don't like those odds either. |
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