The Stupid Party?
Independent Counsel
David Barrett
This is very interesting:
This may turn out to be as big as Iran-Contra or a like scandal. It may determine the fate of future presidential races. This time, however, it's not your typical second-term fubar. The allegedly guilty parties are Democrats and the president in question is none other than our old friend, Billy the Trouser Snake, in trouble YET again:
...And they're doing their level best to keep Barrett's reports from being released and to mitigate any fallout that might accompany the counsel's revelations.
...But who is doing the real obstructing of justice in this case? No, not the Democrats:
I agree.
The two political parties really do approach the matter of politics in very different ways. For the Democrats, politics is a religion and they are its Gnostic high priests. Unless they're Bill Clinton types, who are just in the business for personal power or other gain (and both parties have people like this), the Democrats' worldviews are bound up inextricably in their politics -- it's often the main vehicle for self-actualization, even for many amateurs like the KosKidz.
For most Republicans, politics is either an unpleasant necessity or a country club game for rich boys and girls. They do not take it seriously. Further (to their credit, actually) most Republicans in public office don't let their profession entirely take over their character, as do most Democratic politicians. That is to say, many (by no means all) Repubs act on principle or with some sense of personal limits driven by personal conscience, unlike Democrats, for whom power is always principle -- even when they do think they're acting from principle, like Jack "Brave Sir Robin" Murtha, they're usually dead wrong. This is far and away the exception rather than the rule , since deomcrats regard politics not as a Game of Kings (or Kingmakers), but as warfare carried on by other, more vicious, means. To carry the warfare analogy further, Republicans approach politics in an 18th century manner: very rule bound; almost a gentlemanly thing. Democrats are much more 20th century: fangs out, car bomb timers set, and gas chambers cranked up -- total war.
As Napoleon proved to more than one Fredrician-style army and Nelson proved to the "fighting instruction" admirals, those who bind themselves to silly rules and niceties most often lose when facing those who don't. The US as a whole needs to learn this as it conducts its "War on Terror" (which is always to say, the latest campaigns in the millennia-long War on Islam). The Republicans can either go on pretending they're in a game for gentlemen (and ladies) and will wind up wafting their silk hankies and dipping their snuff as the minority party, or they can beat the Democrats at their own game and then rule the country on principle (which would be a nice change....)
Just a thought...
Monk
[Independent counsel David] Barrett ... was assigned the duty of looking into whether [a] former Housing and Urban Development Secretary ... Committed tax fraud in trying to cover up payments to a former mistress.
Yet, as published reports have indicated, he soon discovered that he was onto something much bigger. He found unsettling evidence that Justice Department officials were actively interfering with the probe and even conducting surveillance of Barrett and his office. Worse, there were indications that [the President] was using key players at the IRS and Justice to harass, frighten and threaten people who somehow got in the ... President's way.
This may turn out to be as big as Iran-Contra or a like scandal. It may determine the fate of future presidential races. This time, however, it's not your typical second-term fubar. The allegedly guilty parties are Democrats and the president in question is none other than our old friend, Billy the Trouser Snake, in trouble YET again:
Like most independent counsels, Barrett didn't set out on such a mission. He was assigned the duty of looking into whether former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros committed tax fraud in trying to cover up payments to a former mistress.
Yet, as published reports have indicated, he soon discovered that he was onto something much bigger. He found unsettling evidence that Justice Department officials were actively interfering with the probe and even conducting surveillance of Barrett and his office. Worse, there were indications that Team Clinton was using key players at the IRS and Justice to harass, frighten and threaten people who somehow got in the former president's way.
The pattern was set early on, when the White House sicced the FBI on Billy Dale, who had served as the director of the White House Travel Office since the days of John F. Kennedy. They mounted a baseless probe of Dale's finances, while chasing after his daughter, his sister and others. Dale was guilty of holding a job coveted by presidential pal Harry Thomasson. But rather than simply firing Dale, the Clinton White House chose to destroy him.
By all accounts, the 400-page Barrett report is a bombshell, capable possibly of wiping out Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential prospects. At the very least, it would bring to public attention a scandal that would make the Valerie Plame affair vanish into comical insignificance.
Democrats know this.
...And they're doing their level best to keep Barrett's reports from being released and to mitigate any fallout that might accompany the counsel's revelations.
Using provisions in the independent-counsel statute that permit people named in a report to review the allegations against them and file rebuttals, attorneys close to the Clintons have spent the better part of five years reviewing every jot and tittle of the charges arrayed against their clients and friends.
This careful and continuous monitoring of the report explains why Sens. Byron Dorgan, Dick Durbin and John Kerry took the highly unusual step earlier this year of trying to slip into an Iraq-war spending bill an amendment to suppress every word of the Barrett report. (Every other independent counsel finding has been printed in its entirety, with the exception of small sections containing classified material.)
...But who is doing the real obstructing of justice in this case? No, not the Democrats:
Alert Republicans, pushed by talk-radio listeners and bloggers, managed to short-circuit that effort, but Democrats patiently pursued their goal. They got what they wanted recently, when the House and Senate met to iron out differences in yet another appropriations bill. Democrats inserted language that would prevent public release of the 120 pages of the report listing the Clinton transgressions. They offered what may have looked like a good deal. They promised not to object to letting Barrett continue with any prosecutions already underway.
Republicans negotiators, led by Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., and Rep. Joe Knollenberg, R-Mich, took the bait. They agreed to keep the public in the dark about the important stuff in exchange for a big, fat nothing. Unbeknownst to Bond and Knollenberg, Barrett shut down his grand juries three years ago.
The move represents more than just boneheaded politics. It's grossly irresponsible. If the report contains the kind of bombshells that have been hinted at in reports published by The Wall Street Journal and National Review, among others, the public not only has a right to know, Congress has a duty to investigate.
I agree.
The two political parties really do approach the matter of politics in very different ways. For the Democrats, politics is a religion and they are its Gnostic high priests. Unless they're Bill Clinton types, who are just in the business for personal power or other gain (and both parties have people like this), the Democrats' worldviews are bound up inextricably in their politics -- it's often the main vehicle for self-actualization, even for many amateurs like the KosKidz.
For most Republicans, politics is either an unpleasant necessity or a country club game for rich boys and girls. They do not take it seriously. Further (to their credit, actually) most Republicans in public office don't let their profession entirely take over their character, as do most Democratic politicians. That is to say, many (by no means all) Repubs act on principle or with some sense of personal limits driven by personal conscience, unlike Democrats, for whom power is always principle -- even when they do think they're acting from principle, like Jack "Brave Sir Robin" Murtha, they're usually dead wrong. This is far and away the exception rather than the rule , since deomcrats regard politics not as a Game of Kings (or Kingmakers), but as warfare carried on by other, more vicious, means. To carry the warfare analogy further, Republicans approach politics in an 18th century manner: very rule bound; almost a gentlemanly thing. Democrats are much more 20th century: fangs out, car bomb timers set, and gas chambers cranked up -- total war.
As Napoleon proved to more than one Fredrician-style army and Nelson proved to the "fighting instruction" admirals, those who bind themselves to silly rules and niceties most often lose when facing those who don't. The US as a whole needs to learn this as it conducts its "War on Terror" (which is always to say, the latest campaigns in the millennia-long War on Islam). The Republicans can either go on pretending they're in a game for gentlemen (and ladies) and will wind up wafting their silk hankies and dipping their snuff as the minority party, or they can beat the Democrats at their own game and then rule the country on principle (which would be a nice change....)
Just a thought...
Monk
posted by Monk | 12:20
