- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Diane Johnson, author My thoughts are mostly on the hijacking of constitutional government in
America. The right-wing threat that has unbalanced even the reasonable members
of the Republican Party. The lack of any credible congressional or media
figures now that they have all given in to their hate-Clinton frenzy, with
complete indifference to the sentiments of normal people outside the Beltway.
The impossibility of protest when elected officials and media both ignore what
people feel and say, and, worse, distort it; the failure of the print media to
cover the various marches the other day; or its failure to raise the
reasonable questions about hypocrisy (i.e. Henry Hyde’s past) that were apparent
to everyone. And the fact that we can’t impeach or otherwise get rid of
irresponsible pundits. If only we could impeach George Will and Cokie Roberts!
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Fran Lebowitz, author Absolutely, the bombings were an attempt to deflect attention from
impeachment. Clinton is hardly a subtle man — even his most ardent
supporters cannot accuse him of subtlety, and certainly not of irony. He is
irony-free. Obviously, I’m not a fan of Saddam Hussein but it’s interesting to me how he’s been singled out. Unfortunately, the world is filled with people in power who are equally as bad. It’s not that I’m in favor of
Saddam, but I think he should be placed in like company because I think it
makes everyone else — all these other horrendous people — seem like
nothing compared to him. Certainly what’s going on in Bosnia cannot be
better than what’s going on in Iraq. Certainly Gadhaffi is not Adlai
Stevenson. Singling Saddam out seems almost arbitrary to me. There’s
something very false, very tinny about the whole thing. I watched the
bombings on TV last night — the green glow of the bombs, which is nice and
arty but you can’t really see anything — and it seemed very unreal. When
we announce a bombing, it doesn’t seem like a real war except that real
people get really killed.
I’m in favor of nothing. I hate all these people. I think the Congress
is a disgrace, I think the president is a disgrace. It’s embarrassing to be
a human being in this era. I feel disgraced by my fellow man — all of
them. Especially my fellow citizens, because they’ve been convinced to
become consumers instead of citizens. They go around interviewing dozens of
idiots who talk about how great the economy is, which it is for about 12
people, by the way. They interview 8-year-olds! The economy is
incredibly great if you happen to own an enormous company or if you have
tons of capital in the stock market.
Should Clinton resign? No. Absolutely not. I happen to be a democracy
fan and he was voted into office — though I didn’t vote for him. People
who voted for him could not have been surprised by his behavior or his
taste. There’s no chance this man will resign. You can catch him with a gun
in his hand standing over a body and he won’t resign and people would keep
saying the economy is fantastic. I’m a fairly old-fashioned, angry person.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Barbara Ehrenreich, author of “Blood Rites: Origins and the History of the Passions of War”
I don’t know how anybody in their right mind could think that the
bombings were anything but a way to deflect attention from impeachment.
It’s perfectly clear. I no longer think Clinton should be impeached, I
think he should be arrested. If you want a high crime and misdemeanor, it’s the use of military force for private and personal reasons. Prior to the
bombings, I thought he should resign, that it would be better for the
Democrats — not that they make a whole lot of difference these days
compared to Republicans. I did not understand my progressive friends who
have been rallying to his cause — I don’t see what Clinton ever did for
progressives or African-Americans. The bombing is the high crime
and misdemeanor. And he’s just using the troops as if they’re his own
little personal hit squad. If it works, it just shows what fools the rest
of us are.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
David Sedaris, NPR commentator and author of “Naked” and “Holiday on Ice,” currently studying French in Paris
I just love the name — “Operation Desert Fox.” It brings to mind a topless pin-up, or what Playboy would call Miss Arizona in the magazine. I think Desert Fox is a much better name than Desert Storm.
This morning in my French class I called Saddam Hussein a lunatic but what I said was “maniac” — which in French means he wants to keep his house really, really clean. So my teacher corrected me on that.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Ishmael Reed, author
If they remove Clinton, though I was an early critic, I’ll be reluctant to vote in future elections. I mean, suppose Mellon Scaife and
Falwell and Robertson don’t approve of the results? Will we have to go through
this again?
I questioned [Clinton's] character right after
the first election. I was suspicious of his moralizing about behavior in
the inner city, about how African-Americans ought to try to improve their
morals. On the other hand, I don’t want to live under a theocracy, which
is what the [Republicans] seem to have in mind. White countries like the
United States seem to find it very easy to bomb third world countries and
that’s happened throughout history.
It was bound to happen — that [Republicans like Bob Livingston would admit
to having affairs]. I’ve been seething at the hypocrisy while watching the
Judiciary hearings. These people are demanding of Clinton moral standards
which they don’t live by themselves. I think the right and right-wing
groups are so dead-set on getting Clinton that they’ve cowed the
so-called moderates.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
David Horowitz, author and Salon columnist
Who knows what’s happening? Who knows why this was done? Who knows whether
the judgments that went into these decisions were militarily justified and
morally sound? And that is precisely the problem.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Anne Lamott, author and Salon columnist
It’s so confusing. I don’t actually know what I think. I’m a Clinton supporter and I’m totally opposed to war. I love to see the consternation
on the faces of the Republicans. It was such a brilliant coyote-trickster
thing for Bill to do. It’s fun to watch the Republicans’ suppressed rage
because usually they take so much pleasure in things militaristic. I know I
don’t believe in war and that if this were a Republican who had behaved the
same way Bill Clinton behaved I’d be up in arms. If it were Newt Gingrich
or George Bush I’d be really sickened. And if it were George Bush or Newty
Gingrich who had had his way with Monica Lewinsky and then gone to war the
day before impeachment proceedings, I would take to the streets.
Saddam is heinous, like Richard Allen Davis, who killed Polly Klaas.
You basically think they should be issued suicide tablets and coerced into
taking them, although you don’t actually support capital punishment. I feel
the same way about Saddam as I do toward Davis. You don’t get to sanction
their murder, you don’t get to take them out, but I tell you — the more I
read about what UNSCOM knows about Iraq, then I really do think, Bomb! Bomb!
Bomb! though at heart I’m really opposed to war. I find it all as
confusing as shit.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Camille Paglia, author and Salon columnist
I was absolutely horrified by the timing of the bombing of Iraq. I have been calling for the censure and not impeachment of Clinton since January and indeed may have been the first national columnist to mention the word “censure.” I called my congressman — one of the wavering moderate Republicans — to support censure this week. Therefore I was all the more disgusted by the grotesque timing of the bombing raids on the eve of impeachment. I think that it is very fishy indeed, and that this simply confirms that the missile attacks Clinton ordered from Martha’s Vineyard this summer were similarly oddly timed to coincide with politically embarrassing events in Washington.
Whether or not Saddam Hussein is a tyrant who deserves to be bombed into the Stone Age is a matter that should be agreed upon by the family of nations. President Bush’s decision to commit our armed forces to the war against Iraq was strengthened by the coalition of nations supporting American firepower. In this case we are painfully isolated in the eyes of the world with Tony Blair — Clinton’s wanna-be double — tagging along like the kid brother on an outing. You cannot demonstrate the rule of international law by breaking international law. What message are we sending to the world at large? How are we poisoning the Arab world against us for generations to come? What is the real motivation of these bombings? Iraq poses no threat whatever to American security. Even a present danger to the oil fields cannot be substantiated. Indeed, the president isn’t even attempting to make the claims in terms of American commercial interests, which are controversial in and of themselves on ethical grounds.
Why is it that American tax dollars are being wasted in this military exercise when there are so many pressing matters of social concern at home, from the declining state of urban education to health care to care of the elderly? I am not a pacifist. I believe in war for a just cause. World War II, for example, was a just war. Without American involvement Hitler would have gone on to destroy England and rule the world. I would have been proud to serve in the military. However, I regard this bombing, which has been pulled out of a hat like a rabbit, as completely unjustified on all grounds. Despite the positive end results of weakening Saddam Hussein’s military infrastructure, there are innocent Iraqi citizens who are suffering injury, death or loss of property from a decision made in Washington, immorally hastened on political grounds. This should be a cause of profound embarrassment to citizens in the United States.
James Zogby, president of the Arab-American Institute, the political and policy arm of the Arab-American community
We oppose the bombing. Sanctions have gone on now for eight years and
the Iraqi people have paid the price but their regime has not. The bombing is not designed to create positive change in the country, but to inflict more
punishment. I do not support the Iraqi regime, but periodic bombing or
sanctions do not constitute a real policy of change — it perpetuates
the policy of punishing the people.
The United States and Britain have broken from the world consensus.
We stand today virtually alone. I’m terribly distressed that the
president, having gained so much in the way of credibility, public
acceptance and support for his leadership after his speech in Gaza, has
squandered that only two days later by bombing Iraq. I spoke to someone
in West Bank who said how tragic it is that two days ago people were
waving American flags and today some are burning them.
We’ve asked for a policy of engagement with the people of Iraq that
delinks economic from military sanctions. People do not rise up and rebel when they are in despair and starving. We’ve never seen that
happen anywhere else in the world. We’ve only seen change when they can
feed their children and have a modest standard of living. Even though
they mouth concern all the time, I don’t think anyone cares about the
people of Iraq.
There are some real dangers ahead. By isolating ourselves from our allies — the Russians and the Chinese — we run the risk of reigniting a conflict
from which we have just escaped. The most dangerous country in the world
is not Iraq — it’s the country that still has tens of thousands of nuclear
warheads. More of an effort to achieve consensus with Russia is absolutely
essential if we’re to have successful foreign policy. We have inflamed nationalist passions and created a situation where they feel terribly alienated from us.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Jonathan B. Tucker, former United Nations weapons inspector and current director of the Chemical and Biological
Weapons Nonproliferation Project at the Monterey Institute’s Center for
Nonproliferation Studies
There were no good options in this situation and the bombing was
probably justified, but it remains to be seen whether the benefits will
outweigh the costs. A key variable will be the number of casualties —
if the costs to the Iraqi people are very high, it would be a major
setback for U.S. policy in the Middle East. As long as Saddam Hussein or
someone like him is in power, there will be continual conflict with
Iraq.
[Saddam] no longer has any reason to cooperate with the United States, and the U.S. government has written off reinitiating United Nations
weapons inspections after the military action. There definitely will be
costs — particularly in our ability to continue the monitoring and
verification of dual-capable facilities in Iraq, something that
UNSCOM was doing effectively.
There were two inspection regimes in Iraq. In the so-called surprise inspections, they were trying to find concealed weapons and documents.
But whenever they had a hot lead, there was no way the Iraqis were going
to let them in and find a smoking gun, so they would just destroy the
evidence or prevent them from getting into the facility. That became a
stalemate.
Less well known is that the inspectors were also monitoring a number
of dual-capable facilities throughout the country potentially capable of
producing chemical and biological weapons but also engaged in legitimate
activities. Some of these plants were involved in legitimate activities, like producing vaccines, but could be converted within a matter of
days or weeks to the production of anthrax or other biological weapons.
The same fermentation tanks used to make vaccines against anthrax could
be used to grow anthrax as a weapon.
It wouldn’t be ethical for the United States to
bomb all of the vaccine plants in Iraq and deprive Iraqi children of
vaccines. But as long as dual-use facilities exist in Iraq it will
have the capability to produce these weapons. How long could ongoing
monitoring and verification have lasted? The United States made the calculation that Saddam was not
going to permit that to happen in perpetuity and they thought the costs
of military action were outweighed by the potential benefits.
Without UNSCOM, we will now be dependent on limited intelligence. You
can’t determine from the air or from a satellite image whether a vaccine
plant is producing anthrax or a legitimate vaccine. You have to have
some way of looking at that facility and getting on site. We must rely
on human agents and defectors, but that is unsystematic and fortuitous,
and it will be impossible to sustain coverage of these facilities.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
William C. Potter, Director of the Center for Nonproliferation
Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies
It’s very unfortunate, but the attack was probably inevitable. I
don’t have great expectations that it will enable us to fulfill the
UNSCOM mission. It’s really important to observe connections between what is happening in Iraq and a number of other challenges to
nonproliferation. To not have acted would have undermined the
nonproliferation regime. Both national governments and international
organizations must fulfill their nonproliferation obligations — fulfill
U.N. Security Council Resolution 687, respond in South Asia to the
Indian and Pakistani nuclear tests and proliferation developments on the
Korean Peninsula, address the challenge posed by the difficult economic
situation in Russia and observe disarmament obligations under the
Nonproliferation Treaty. The nonproliferation regime is under siege and
it was necessary for the credibility of the United Nations, UNSCOM and
the United States to respond to Iraq’s clear violations of U.N. Security
Council agreements.
I’m not very optimistic that we’re going to be able to substantially
degrade Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. UNSCOM has worked
very hard over the past seven years with some success, but there are
many unanswered questions. After our inability over many years to
eradicate weapons of mass destruction on the ground, it would be
presumptuous to assume we could do so in a few days of missile strikes.
Saddam Hussein has demonstrated — both by his tremendous investment in
Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction program and neglecting his own
populace by foregoing oil sales he could have had if he had cooperated with
the United Nations and UNSCOM — that he’s prepared to do anything to maintain an active weapons program. It will be exceptionally difficult to make a
dent in his program, certainly to eradicate it, short of a much more
massive military action, which the United States is
unprepared to undertake.
It’s not just about weapons, there’s also a human dimension here: There are
personnel, scientists and engineers who remain in Iraq and retain the
technical know-how to, in a short period of time, reconstitute their
program. The military action is designed to make that reconstitution
effort more difficult. This has been targeted not just at weapons or
military sites but also those security sites that provide support for
Saddam.
It is very important for the United States to invest more in multilateral diplomacy — at a minimum that means paying our U.N. dues. It’s difficult to make a case for broader support of the United Nations when the U.S. is delinquent. It also means recognizing that nuclear weapons
states, including the United States, have nonproliferation obligations
that they have not adequately filled.
An unfortunate side development is the erosion of what had
been very close U.S.-Russian cooperation for nuclear nonproliferation. In
part because of economic difficulties Russia has been experiencing, they have been increasingly inclined to put shorter term economic
considerations above longer-term nonproliferation objectives.
President Clinton’s three-day pulse check of the Wye peace agreement in Israel and its occupied territories seemed oriented more toward photo ops than tangible progress. On the one side, Palestinian President Yasir Arafat proudly greeted the landing of the first American president at Gaza International airport, a powerfully symbolic moment to the increasingly independent Palestinians. On the other, the domestic political crises of both Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cast a serious pall over the proceedings.
In fact, very little progress was made. Israel steadfastly refuses to pull back troops in the West Bank until Arafat clamps down on violence and abandons plans to announce Palestinian statehood in May.
“No one can seriously expect Israel to hand over another inch of territory unless and until such an unambiguous correction is made,” Netanyahu told reporters Sunday after a meeting with Clinton. He further sniped at recent skirmishes in the West Bank and Palestinian statehood, saying, “Violence and peace are simply incompatible,” and, “It is very difficult to make peace with a state that doesn’t exist.”
Meanwhile, Clinton’s visit to Gaza on Monday had all the trappings of an official state visit. The president met with the Palestinian National Council, which voted to remove language from its charter calling for the destruction of Israel. “This moment would have been inconceivable a decade ago,” Clinton told Palestinians. Arafat, giddy with delight, mused, “Your presence here made us relive the golden days of Palestine.” Netanyahu also welcomed the vote, describing it as “a real change, a positive change.”
A Tuesday meeting of Clinton, Arafat and Netanyahu at Erez Crossing, a border outpost in Gaza Strip, was less successful. The leaders met to discuss work of committees mandated under Wye to handle weapons confiscation and border crossings. But the trio had little, if anything, to say about their 90-minute chat. Clinton described it as “frank,” but offered little in the way of tangible results, saying only, “I have achieved what I came here to achieve.”
Salon spoke with Allan Solomonow, director of the Middle East peace program at the American Friends Service Committee, a nonprofit Quaker organization in San Francisco, about the implications of Clinton’s visit. Solomonow is currently based in Israel.
At the close of Clinton’s visit, where does the peace process stand?
Wye stands very little beyond where it was when it was signed. There’s been a little progress, but that progress has been so slow, and so grudging in coming along, that it has continued to erode hope. Out of necessity, people are lowering expectations for the final-stage negotiations, which are what really count.
Have you observed any points of progress in Clinton’s visit?
No.
Not even the Palestinian National Council’s vote to remove anti-Israel language from its charter?
This was progress in appealing to the Israeli people in terms of policy. Even though Netanyahu praised that vote, the last word today was that there was no certainty of the further promised Israeli troop redeployment Friday. The fact that that should not happen in the context of the vote having taken place is a setback.
How have the Israeli and Palestinian people reacted to Clinton’s visit?
What has happened has been on a symbolic level. Palestinians are enormously excited by what Clinton said and how he said it. This is the first visit that Clinton has made to any Arab territory and he chose the Palestinians, and that has not been lost on them. He’s communicated in a deeply personal way and has shown a stronger awareness and sensitivity to Palestinian concerns than has ever been expressed by any American official I know of, and that has buoyed the spirits of many Israelis and a large number of Palestinians.
Where it breaks down is that there is great cynicism on whether this, like so many other statements and opportunities, is going to have any tangible impact for Palestinian lives in the foreseeable future.
The Israelis were very supportive of Clinton’s speech. It was a powerful statement of peace, reciprocity and mutuality and about the future of the two being kind together. Netanyahu is on his way out and there’s strong feeling that he has failed to provide leadership that’s likely to help Israel either economically or diplomatically.
The word I’m picking up in Jerusalem today is that Netanyahu will call for elections within the next 48 hours. If he calls the elections, he is in a little bit better electoral maneuvering position than he would be if he waited for the government to fall. If he dissolves the government, he can set the date for the new elections and pick a date that will be favorable to his Likud Party and its coalition members. Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, a popular general who might run for prime minister, can’t run until 90 or 100 days have passed since his resignation from the army. Netanyahu could call early elections and disable him from running.
To what extent did Clinton’s and Netanyahu’s domestic leadership problems have an impact on the visit?
I don’t know how to interpret the impeachment question, except to say that it has been a leading item in the news. I’ve just come back from Syria, Jordan and Egypt, where it’s been the No. 1 item on television news.
It’s simply widely assumed that Netanyahu is so deeply obligated to the right wing that he’s not in the position to yield on the peace process even if he wanted to.
Was it significant that when Clinton addressed Palestinians, he emphasized that the impact of their decisions was more important to the Israeli people than their government?
I read this as Clinton doing what Netanyahu had done earlier when he appealed to the evangelical right wing in the United States. In this case, Clinton has gone directly to the people of Israel. I see this as an implied rebuke of Netanyahu.
How historically significant was Clinton’s visit to Gaza?
The president specifically referred, in front of all of the Palestinians, to the pain and grief they had shared and actually specified the problems of separations from families, the restrictions of movement and very pointedly to settlement activity, land confiscation and house demolitions — which are all ongoing policies of the Israeli government. For Clinton to make these observations after having met with Netanyahu the night before has not been lost on the Palestinians.
Should Clinton’s Palestinian visit be perceived as an official state visit?
Not official. A lot of people have said that, but you just can’t go that far. But it is a strong suggestion and it’s one that is resonating with Israeli politicians. The Israeli government resisted Clinton landing in Gaza very fiercely for exactly that reason. They vetoed the idea of Clinton’s speaking to the Palestine authority prior to speaking to the Israelis. Hence, Clinton gave the Israelis the courtesy of the first visit.
Other than troop redeployment, Palestinian statehood and West Bank violence, did any other issues surface?
Political prisoners have become a real issue. The Israelis don’t want to release any prisoners who have blood on their hands, and the Palestinians clearly have no interest in the release of common criminals, which complicates their security problems. I would observe that there are a large number of political prisoners who are in between, people who have been detained but who haven’t been charged or tried yet. Israeli security has given the go-ahead to Netanyahu to release these people. That would be a very good step if Netanyahu would go ahead and overrule the right and let them go. This has alienated some of the states who have been closest to Israel on the peace process — there were protests in Jordan just a few days ago involving unions and professional leadership.
What are the next steps Secretary of State Madeleine Albright will take in this process?
Madeleine Albright, if you watch television, seems oddly divorced and distant. I got very little reading from what she said. The only step available right now is to bring a little more pressure on the Israelis to hold back on settlements, to go ahead with redeployment and to begin serious efforts at final-stage negotiations. That’s probably the least likely thing the Israelis are going to do, because if elections are going to be called, there isn’t going to be room for diplomatic leverage over the next three or four months. We’re faced with a race between initiatives that may or may not come and increasing violence and skirmishes between the Palestinians and the Israelis.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Nelson Polsby, congressional expert and professor of political science at UC-Berkeley
The whole thing is doomed, the project of impeaching the president is doomed. If anybody is serious about impeachment, it seems to me elementary that it has to be bipartisan. And if this is the best case Starr can make I certainly don’t blame the American people for turning it off. I don’t think the merits are very interesting anymore. What’s interesting is whether [Starr's testimony] in effect fortifies or undermines the case for impeachment, and it seems to me mostly, because of the Republican inability to attract any Democratic sympathy — which was emphatically not the case in 1974 — it means it’s a big waste of time.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Peter Wallison, partner at the Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher law firm and a former White House counsel to President Reagan
I thought Starr did very well today. But in order to determine whether his case was bolstered or weakened you’d have to know what people expected. He has been the subject of attacks — on the nature of his investigation, on his personality, on his alleged partisanship — and the person who appeared on television today would not have validated those impressions. He seemed to be a reasonable person — not the demon or the partisan that a person like James Carville, for example, has portrayed him. In that sense, Ken Starr helped himself today.
There was probably no way that he was going to increase the impact of the referral he had already made. Basically, what we saw was an effort on the part of the Democrats to change the subject, to make Starr the issue. I don’ think that was successful. I didn’t get to see all of [Abbe] Lowell’s questioning today, but again, everything that the Democrats said today was irrelevant to the entire impeachment inquiry.
What this has been since the beginning has been an effort to focus on the prosecutor — to make him the issue, to make his process the issue, to make the committee’s process the issue and to avoid like the plague addressing any of the charges of substance against the president. If this had truly been a high-level kind of inquiry and not simply the low-level attack on Starr it turned out to be, there would have been much more questioning of Starr about the whole question of whether what the president did was impeachable and why Starr thought it may be an impeachable offense. Ken Starr is a recognized constitutional expert, and if any of the Democrats had been serious about this issue they would have engaged in a colloquy or a debate with him over whether this was an impeachable offense.
I certainly think that [Starr's claim that Clinton was
obstructing justice by litigating his privilege claims in court] is a justifiable position. As Starr said, and what I think is clear, is that the president used the privilege to protect himself — to the extent he could until he lost in court — against charges that arose out of his personal conduct.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Jack Rakove, professor of history at Stanford University and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution”
Starr certainly seems to have held his own, as one would expect him to do. He is, after all, a former solicitor general, a former judge and very genial in person; and as press reports suggest, he was well-prepared. Whether anything changed in the underlying politics of the case is another question entirely, because the basic positions are well established. The fact that he seems to indicate that there is nothing to Travelgate, Filegate or Whitewater will make it more difficult for the House to approve whatever impeachment recommendation the Judiciary Committee may forward. It’s not likely that the assertion of executive privilege, whether justified or excessive, would provide a basis for further action on impeachment.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Stephen Saltzburg, law professor at George Washington University and a top Justice Department official in the Reagan and Bush administrations
The Democrats had an opportunity today to emphasize all of what they regard as the unfair aspects of the investigation. The Republicans had a chance to emphasize the potentially impeachable acts. It’s as though you had two different hearings going on simultaneously. At the end of the day, the Republicans will say there are serious allegations here and the Democrats will say the independent counsel overreached and there are serious questions about fairness. I doubt that anyone’s mind on this committee is going to be changed by anything that was said today.
This morning Starr tried to characterize the president as misusing his office and the people around him, and that was not nearly as emphasized in the report. This testimony this morning and his written statement chose to make the case that he misused his secretary, his government lawyers, misused his claims of privilege and misused his staff by lying to them. All of that is an effort to make the case that this is abuse of office. Was I convinced? No. But I do think this was much more effective than the report. What it demonstrated was that it wasn’t necessary — despite all the claims that were made to the contrary — it wasn’t necessary to have all those lurid details in the report.
My conception of the independent counsel is that it is his job to investigate, bring cases and if possible inform Congress of possible impeachable offenses. If Congress then wants to call him as a witness to ask him questions, to clarify anything that he’s submitted, he ought to do that. But in my opinion it is inappropriate for the independent counsel to be the one to marshal the evidence. That was David Shippers’ job, not Starr’s. To put together quotations from other members of Congress and work them into his presentation took on an air of someone who was not independent, who was not doing what the statute asked him to do. Even though he said he wasn’t trying to make the case for impeachment, it was hard to imagine what he was doing if he wasn’t doing that.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Erwin Chemerinsky, constitutional expert and professor of law at the University of Southern California
I think Starr fared extremely well. He kept his composure in the face of difficult questioning. On the other hand, I don’t think anybody’s mind was changed today. Everybody who thought there were impeachable offenses before today still thinks that, and everybody who thinks there is nothing impeachable still thinks that. There’s no way to separate the legal from the political here. His arguments had both legal and political dimensions. He admitted that Clinton has done nothing impeachable in Travelgate and Filegate. I think that’s significant. But he was ambiguous about Whitewater. At one point he said he was going to pursue it and then at another point he said he was not. So [the role of Whitewater is] not clear.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Joseph J. Ellis, Constitutional expert, professor of history at Mount
Holyoke College and signatory in a letter by prominent historians blasting the impeachment proceedings. He is also the author of
“American
Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson.”
Mr. Starr is an intelligent, well-trained
lawyer who, to a lawyer watching, did very well. But I think Starr’s own
personality does not come across well to a popular audience. And Starr’s
testimony was kind of a wash — most feelings of people going in with
pro-Starr and anti-Clinton opinions were underlined, and those people
who came in on the other side found Starr’s testimony less persuasive
than criticisms of his demeanor (leaks to the press and the treatment of
Monica Lewinsky). I don’t think it’s going to make any practical
difference. It’s a foregone conclusion that the committee will vote
impeachment because of the Republican majority and that the House will
not then support that. The tea leaves were there to be read in the
public approval ratings of Clinton beyond the Beltway and in the overall
health of the economy.
The special prosecutor was supposed to present
evidence without all the tilting he did towards a verdict. His behavior
throughout this entire inquiry suggests that he has been out to get
Clinton. But the truth is that, while the original offense was itself a
personal indiscretion of a major sort, Clinton’s perjury before the
grand jury and his failure to cooperate do constitute legal violations.
The core problem is that the original offense was a personal matter.
Once past that, Starr has very strong legal grounds on which to base his
grievances and charges.
The important institutional issue that now
lingers is: To what extent does Starr’s behavior as special prosecutor
cause us to think that we want to modify the legislation governing the
special prosecutor or do away with the office altogether? I would prefer
to see legislation that reduces or limits the mandate to offenses that
are direct violations of a president’s public responsibility while the
person is in office.
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -
Rory Little, professor of law at Hastings College of the Law and
former associate deputy attorney general under Janet Reno
Nothing
that Ken Starr did, or can do, can change the minds of virtually anyone
involved in this process, or observing it. He presented his case
solidly, and his normal calm demeanor probably won him a few points with
a few people. But his “case” — and it’s not a case, but rather a
presentation in a completely political arena — stands or falls on its
merits, not on his presentation.
No one is being impeached yet. I
think it oversimplifies to say that Starr’s claim is that the simple
litigation of privilege is the obstruction. Rather, Starr would argue that a repeated pattern of Clinton lying to his attorneys and advisors,
and then they in turn transmitting (unknowingly) those lies in court or
in other arenas, adds up to “obstruction of justice.” There is case
precedent for the idea that the obstruction of justice statute’s final
clause — the vague “omnibus” clause — is designed to make anything
count as “obstruction” if done with corrupt intent and an actual effect
of obstruction.
We live in a very different culture than even 25
years ago. Today, being over-technical and using every legal advantage
is often seen as a virtue, not a fault. I doubt anyone will charge Bill
Gates with obstruction of justice, even though a fair amount of his
current litigation conduct looks very obstructionist.
What [Starr's
Whitewater testimony] did was confirm that there really isn’t anything
else there. The most powerful rhetorical point of the entire proceeding
was when Barney Frank said, “Why did you withhold that before the
election when you were sending us a referral with a lot of negative
stuff about the president, and only now … you give us this exoneration
of the president?” It makes Starr look completely partisan, whether
he is or not. (In Starr’s defense, it is, to be honest, unusual for a
prosecutor to announce that, while he has filed certain charges, other
investigative leads didn’t pan out.)
Following nine days of negotiations that had the intensity and drama of a daytime soap opera, Benjamin Netanyahu and Yasir Arafat signed an accord that renews previous vows to push the Middle East peace process forward.
The heated negotiations, which seemed poised to derail at several points last week, were brokered by President Clinton and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who called it a “new chapter in the pursuit of permanent peace.” A surprising turn of events came when Jordan’s King Hussein left his hospital bed at the Mayo Clinic, where he is undergoing treatment for terminal cancer, to coax the leaders out of an impasse.
The accord stipulates that Israel is to pull out an additional 13 percent of its troops from the West Bank and release hundreds of jailed Palestinians. The Palestinians, in turn, say they will ramp up security measures to stamp out terrorism against Israelis and excise calls for the destruction of Israel from the Palestinian charter.
Salon’s Daryl Lindsey spoke with Allan Solomonow, director of the Middle East program at the American Friends Service Committee, a nonprofit Quaker organization in San Francisco, about the implications of Friday’s accord:
What are the chances the peace agreement will actually hold?
The peace agreement has to hold because there’s too much vested interest on both sides. So, the question isn’t whether it will hold but how quickly will it be carried out? There’s going to be a lot of stalling on both sides and probably a little more on the Israeli side because it’s going to be hard for the right wing to swallow. Because it is likely to be implemented slowly, that will fan the fears of both sides, and the possibilities of terrorism are heightened. This obviously could become a vicious circle and slow it down.
Where are the win-wins in this agreement, and what side comes out best?
The wins are really all implementations of the original agreements in the interim. Finally we’re doing what everyone agreed to do about a year and a half ago. All this is doing is bringing us up to the point where we ought to have been then. The only operative question involved now is, when can we move on to the final stage of negotiations, which is what really counts in the eyes of citizens on both sides. Still, it’s a diplomatic victory on the whole for the Palestinians because relative to Israel, a close ally of the United States, they have staved off what might have been a much more disastrous situation.
What do the Israelis and the Palestinians lose in the accord?
Israel, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in particular, lost face by finally having to come back with not much more than he could have negotiated a year and a half ago. Arafat is going to return, and he isn’t really going to be able to deliver anything that in concrete terms improves the everyday life of Palestinians on the ground. They’re both going to be getting a lot of flak from their extremists.
Do you see any inherent vulnerabilities in the agreement?
There have to be vulnerabilities. The whole question of the release of Palestinian prisoners was part of the original agreement. There’s certainly a real possibility that one or more of those prisoners is going to do something nasty when they get out. The road that is going to bring or permit people to travel freely between the West Bank and Gaza is also a little dicey. The Israelis have real fears, but I think they’re ones that can be met if there’s a reasonable amount of trust on both sides.
What political impact will this agreement have on the Palestinians, the Israelis and the Americans?
It appears as though the United States, after quite a period of waffling, has actually made a decent effort. You have to give some credit to Albright and to Clinton and to American diplomacy. It could have done more, it could have done more quickly, but it finally got something done, and that’s appreciated in the Middle East.
For the Palestinians, [the accord represented] very modest victories and it will be looked at, at least within Hamas and extremists within the Palestinian community, as a setback — that there’s nothing tangible to give to people and consequently the only real alternative is violence.
As far as the Israeli right is concerned, they will split but most of them will start demonstrating. There may even be some acts of violence or terror. And I suspect that there’s a good chance the Israeli government will fall before the end of the year. I might even go out on a limb and say by Thanksgiving. There’s been a vote of confidence pending since the last session in the spring and that won by one vote. Now, with some of the right alienated, I think one or more small parties is likely to pull out of the coalition and bring it down within the next couple of weeks. Netanyahu would have to call new elections, and I can only say that we really don’t know what elections would bring, but the likelihood of the Likud being swept out of power and Labor being brought back in is significantly greater. Especially after this agreement because public view on all sides is that Labor is more capable of fulfilling its commitments on these issues than the Likud is.
How will the accord impact Netanyahu’s political base?
It narrows it. Netanyahu’s base is already very fragile. He was holding things together with gum, tape and paperclips, and I think this just slightly puts it over the brink. He’s always been a loner. He doesn’t have any faction irrevocably committed to him. Now he doesn’t really have a political program to bind what’s left together.
Given his domestic scandal, and recent criticism of his foreign policy, what does this success say about Clinton’s international stature?
It goes up a step. He has to be given credit for doing something, but it took so much energy and zig-zagging. This was really a very small step in terms of the peace process that buys Clinton a little more time. But the truth is that our European allies, who have a very substantial amount of energy invested as well as economic investment, want to see much more happen. They need more economic stability to happen sooner to cover their investment and it’s going to require much more of a diplomatic initiative. All these issues were supposed to have been resolved by 1994.
How does the accord affect the prospects of Arafat’s declaring a Palestinian state next May?
I think he’s going to step back from that. He’s received too much, he’s grown close enough to the U.S. government that he would really jeopardize that fragile alliance by declaring a state. If he’s using it as a card, flashing it when he has to, I think that card is now in reserve.
Why were there so many dramatic episodes in this round of negotiations? It seemed a lot like a soap opera.
The American pressure. The Israelis had to respond to this. There was very firm American pressure behind the scenes. Pressure specifically on Israel to not use this specific excuse to pull out. And the Americans really saw through it when the Israelis were packing their bags, which I hear were empty, and putting them into the vans to go back to the airport.
How instrumental was King Hussein’s role in getting peace negotiations back on track?
Here is a member of the Arab leadership who stuck his neck out, who’s expected to die — as Arafat is — within a year, who has come out of the Mayo Clinic and gone to bat in a very independent way. He offered criticisms of the Palestinian position, he offered gentle criticisms of the Israelis and he’s emerged as a mediator. It’s going to be a real loss if he dies before the final agreements are concluded. He and the Egyptian government are both good bridges between the two [the Palestinians and the Israelis]. They clearly want peace running both ways.
Why was the Jonathan Pollard espionage issue such a hot-button topic?
I can’t figure that out. This is the craziest cockamamie thing to bring up at the last minute. It’s a red button for the Americans. My only interpretation is that Netanyahu was desperate. He felt he had to give a stronger sign to the Israeli right, and this is a good issue for them. He brought it out.
How will the American Jewish community react? Do you think there will be any impact on November elections?
I don’t think it will have much of an impact on the elections. I think the Jewish community on the whole is very supportive of the peace process. I think it will be very relieved at what’s happened. I think on the whole it is going to shift the American Jews, who are already fairly critical of the Netanyahu government, a shade or two further away from what little support they have left for Netanyahu. They don’t like the cards Netanyahu has been playing: increasing the settlements, working on the Pollard issue, unwillingness to give up land for peace. These are issues that have resonated with American Jewery. It’s been very evident in the negotiations that Netanyahu is just not where American Jews are at. [To them] he is needlessly preoccupied with security to the exclusion of peace and justice.
