Washington Times-EDITORIAL � May 26, 2000
No privacy for Linda Tripp?
Pentagon officials violated Linda Tripp's privacy rights,
and Defense Secretary William Cohen is so put out over it that he
intends to give the culprits a firm tap on the wrist. Apparently
he didn't want to overdo it with a slap. No one's going to break
the law on Secretary Cohen's watch, no sir.
The punishment follows an investigation by the Pentagon's
inspector general which concluded that Pentagon spokesman Kenneth
Bacon and an aide broke the law when they released confidential
personnel files to a New Yorker reporter (and former colleague of
Mr. Bacon's) who was out to undermine her credibility. They did
so notwithstanding warnings from the official overseeing the
personnel files that they could be used for official use only,
not for political or other unofficial purposes.
For breaking the law, Mr. Cohen has sent the two officials a
letter of reprimand saying they should have known better. But
he's not going to put the reprimand in their files. Anything
goes, apparently, when Linda Tripp is involved.
Mr. Bacon's wrongdoing is just one part of Mrs. Tripp's
political persecution, part of which came to an unceremonious and
embarrassing end this week. Maryland prosecutors, who filed
criminal charges against her for taping phone conversations she
had with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky, have finally
dropped them, ending a nightmare that began only after Mrs. Tripp
sought to tell the truth amid a sea of lies.
Those tapes, of course, confirmed the sexual relationship
Miss Lewinsky had with President Clinton, a relationship he
denied under oath and in front of the American public. At the
time, Miss Lewinsky was pressuring Mrs. Tripp to lie, too.
Attorneys for Paula Jones, who had accused Mr. Clinton of sexual
harassment, were trying to show a pattern of wrongdoing. Showing
the president had a habit of pressuring female subordinates like
Miss Lewinsky for sex would help substantiate Miss Jones'
accusations against him.
Within days after Mrs. Tripp gave the tapes to Mr. Starr in
January 1998, Maryland Democrats mounted pressure on state
prosecutors to charge her with taping a conversation without the
consent of both parties � something that Maryland rarely pursued
in the courts.
Not even a grant of immunity from Mr. Starr �immunity that
should, for all practical purposes, have shielded Mrs. Tripp from
state prosecution � could temper the pressure to persecute her.
Writing on the op-ed page of The Washington Times last December,
Mark Levin (president of the Landmark Legal Foundation) and
Arthur Fergenson (a former assistant U.S. attorney and now a
Maryland lawyer) quoted the applicable U.S. Supreme Court
decision regarding self-incrimination and immunity. "We hold that
the constitutional privilege against self-incrimination protects
a state witness against incrimination under federal as well as
state law and a federal witness against incrimination under state
as well as federal law."
Thus, Maryland was compelled to honor the immunity Mr. Starr
granted Mrs. Tripp � unless the state could prove its case
without relying upon any of the immunized testimony Mrs. Tripp
offered. In Mrs. Tripp's case, this was a practical impossibility
because prosecutors would have to demonstrate that the testimony
of their star witness, Miss Lewinsky, was completely independent
of Mrs. Tripp's testimony.
Earlier this month, Howard County Judge Diane O. Leasure
finally ordered much of Miss Lewinsky's testimony suppressed,
noting that the former intern was prone to lying and that she was
"bathed in impermissible taint" because of her access to
immunized testimony.
Thus, a politicized criminal prosecution that should never
have begun, collapsed, as predicted. Justice is not yet done
though, not while Mr. Bacon and others are free to violate Mrs.
Tripp's rights with impunity.
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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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