Washington Times
05/23/00
EDITORIAL � May 23, 2000
Job security, Janet
Reno-style
It took the FBI three and a half years to provide congressional
committees investigating 1996 campaign-finance abuses with an
explosive memo. In it FBI Director Louis Freeh told his deputy
he had urged Attorney General Janet Reno and Lee Radek, one of
her top aides, to recuse themselves from the investigation and
seek the appointment of an independent counsel. It also took a
congressional subpoena before the FBI would provide the memo.
Why?
In the Dec. 9, 1996, memo from Mr. Freeh to FBI Deputy
Director William Esposito, Mr. Freeh said he based his
recommendation on earlier comments by Mr. Radek to Mr.
Esposito. Mr. Radek heads the department's public integrity
section, which, at the time, was organizing its campaign-finance
task force to investigate fund-raising irregularities. According to
the memo, Mr. Radek had told Mr. Esposito that he was "under a
lot of pressure not to go forward with the investigation." In
addition, Mr. Radek allegedly told Mr. Esposito that Miss Reno's
job "might hang in the balance." At the time the memo was
written, it's worth recalling, news articles were filled with
statements by White House officials indicating that Miss Reno
might not be returning as attorney general for President Clinton's
second term.
Predictably, and ever so conveniently, Mr. Radek told the
Associated Press, which first reported the memo's existence, that
he had "no recollection of ever saying [to Mr. Esposito] I was
under pressure because the attorney general's job hung in the
balance." Similarly, Miss Reno declared, "I don't have a
recollection of [Mr. Freeh] stating it and talking about pressure
because of the job."
The convenience of their faulty memories aside, what might
Miss Reno and Mr. Radek have done if they had intended to tank
the Justice Department's campaign-finance probe? Miss Reno
might have appointed an inexperienced, unqualified staffer to
lead the investigation. She in fact made such an appointment, and
by all accounts the investigation rapidly evolved into a chaotic
mess. Mr. Radek might have issued a "cease and desist" order to
a Los Angeles U.S. attorney's office conducting an aggressive
investigation of Mr. Gore's role in an illegal fund-raiser at a
southern California Buddhist temple. In fact, Mr. Radek issued
such an order � under the pretense that the probe might require
an independent counsel; subsequently, the Justice Department's
investigation of the temple fund-raiser languished for months.
Miss Reno might have dismissed strong recommendations to seek
an independent counsel that she received from Mr. Freeh in 1997
and from the prosecutor she personally selected to lead the
department's investigation after it had become enmeshed in
chaos. She in fact rejected both recommendations. Miss Reno
and Mr. Radek might have attempted to avoid staffing the
department's task force with experienced FBI agents and using in
their place investigators from the inspector general's office at the
Commerce Department. As Jerry Seper of The Washington Times
reported last week, another memo by Mr. Freeh confirmed that
Justice indeed attempted to sidestep the use of FBI agents for its
task force.
In pursuit of Congress' oversight function, Sen. Arlen Specter,
who chairs a subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee
investigating the Justice Department's handling of the
campaign-finance probe, should invite the testimony of Miss
Reno and Messrs. Radek, Freeh and Esposito in order to
determine what conversations took place and why three and a
half years transpired before Mr. Freeh's December 1996 memo
was made available to the committee. Maybe it will jog their
memories.
k=================================================================
Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT
FROM THE DESK OF: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
*Mike Spitzer* <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
~~~~~~~~ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
The Best Way To Destroy Enemies Is To Change Them To Friends
Shalom, A Salaam Aleikum, and to all, A Good Day.
=================================================================
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