-Caveat Lector- [Note date. --MS] <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8230-2001Jun15.html> Ethics of Key Bush Officials Targeted Democrats to Probe Financial Dealings By Mike Allen Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, June 16, 2001; Page A01 Democratic officials said yesterday that they plan to mount a sustained effort to attack the ethics of financial dealings by leading Bush administration officials, including using the party's new majority in the Senate to call hearings. Democrats said they had resisted such a strategy for the past five months because of polls indicating voters are turned off by political bickering, even though many party activists have been eager to turn the tables on the Bush administration following years of Republican investigations of the Clinton White House. But Democratic Party officials said they have been emboldened by recent disclosures about the finances of some members of the new administration, and many hope they can use the cases to portray the Bush White House as beholden to special interests. Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) launched the effort yesterday by requesting a congressional hearing into the propriety of a meeting by Karl C. Rove, Bush's senior adviser, with the chief executive of Intel Corp. at a time when Rove owned more than $100,000 in stock in the company. "This is exactly the type of situation that you would have investigated had it occurred in the Clinton administration," Waxman, the ranking Democrat on the Government Reform Committee, wrote in a letter to the chairman, Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.). Democrats say they also are focusing on the failure of Treasury Secretary Paul H. O'Neill to complete the sale of his $100 million in stock and options in Alcoa Inc., of which he was chairman before joining the administration. O'Neill promised to sell off his holdings during a television interview on March 25. Dan Bartlett, a deputy assistant to President Bush, said the administration hopes Democrats will not engage in "politically motivated fishing expeditions." "We understand that there have been past, partisan battles over investigations, but these were battles and investigations this president and this administration were not involved in -- this president was off in Texas being governor," Bartlett said. "We understand that the temptation to retaliate may be there, but we would urge members from both parties to try to keep what was in the past, in the past." As he swore in his White House aides in his first business day in office, President Bush said he expected every member of his administration to behave legally and ethically. Then he added, "This means avoiding even the appearance of problems." Now, Democrats say they hope to use those words against him. After news accounts about Rove's March 12 meeting with Intel chief executive Craig R. Barrett and two Intel lobbyists appeared this week, the Democratic National Committee scheduled conference calls with talk radio hosts and state party officials in an effort to draw attention to the matter. White House officials said Rove had been waiting for months for clearance from ethics lawyers to sell his individual stocks, and has since done so. The officials said Rove talked to the Intel executives about ways the company could support the president's policies, and referred them elsewhere when they began to discuss a merger in the semiconductor industry. On the O'Neill matter, Michele A. Davis, a Treasury spokeswoman, said the treasury secretary began divesting his Alcoa stock in April and will sell all of it by next Friday. "It's a very large amount of stock to sell, so they're doing it in pieces," Davis said. "You want to be careful about volume on any given day." For now, the top feature on the Democratic Party's Web site is the "O'Neill/Alcoa Stock Tracker," which purports to graph the soaring value of the treasury secretary's holdings, and shows his photo in the middle of a big bag of money. Several Democratic officials said they recognize the possibility of causing a public backlash. Doug Schoen, who polled for President Bill Clinton, said the party should be cautious and would be better off focusing on issues such as health care. "That meeting undeniably had the appearance of a conflict of interest," Schoen said. "At the same time, I don't think there's been any showing that there was an impropriety. For most voters, who owns what stock is a pretty abstract question, absent some showing of malfeasance." House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) expressed concern about going too far. "We've had enough, in my view, of the kind of ongoing, never-ending investigation that went on in the Clinton administration," he told radio reporters yesterday. Nevertheless, several Democratic officials said the party is working on ways to keep attention on administration ethics over the next weeks and months. For instance, officials said energy hearings being held by Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), the new chairman of the Governmental Affairs Committee, could include an examination of whether Rove's former stake of more than $100,000 in Enron Corp., a Houston energy conglomerate, could have affected the administration's energy policy. White House officials said Rove was not involved in developing the energy policy, although he helped determine how it would be marketed. A Democratic official maintained that the "sheer breadth and width of Karl Rove's stock holdings make this a target-rich opportunity for us." "Couple that with the fact that his hand is in everything Bush does," the official said. "If the Rove stuff dies down, O'Neill will kick up." Jim Jordan, executive director of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, said the cases "underscore the biggest weakness of this administration, which is that it is too closely tied to special interests." "This gives the lie to the administration's contention that this is a different kind of government, or more ethical and mature," Jordan said. "In all the Clinton investigations, there was no suggestion that people were acting to personally enrich themselves. This is a different kind of scandal." Democrats maintain that Rove put himself in an untenable position simply by scheduling the meeting with Intel, and said they plan to raise questions about his extensive holdings until June 7 of stocks that could have been affected by administration policies on defense, energy and health care. A financial disclosure form released by the White House on June 1 showed Rove owned holdings worth more than $100,000 each of Boeing Co., one of the nation's three largest defense contractors; General Electric Co., a supplier for nuclear and fossil fuel power generators, among myriad other products; and Pfizer Inc., a pharmaceutical manufacturer. A White House official said Rove offered to sell his individual stocks before the inauguration, but the Office of Government Ethics directed him not to buy or sell anything. The official said Rove made more than a dozen requests to ethics lawyers and finally was told that one of his options for his holdings was to sell his stocks. Lawyers advised Rove to apply to the Office of Government Ethics for a certificate of divestiture, which allows deferral of capital gains taxes on sales that are made to avoid conflicts. The official said Rove was given his certificate on June 6 and sold his stocks June 7. Another official said Rove's holdings would have been worth much more if he had been able to sell them when he first asked to. "This is a situation where bureaucracy got the best of the process," said Bartlett, the White House official. "But in the meantime, Karl was diligent in being careful to not put himself in a position of conflict of interest. ======================================================= Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT FROM THE DESK OF: *Michael Spitzer* <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> The Best Way To Destroy Enemies Is To Change Them To Friends ======================================================= <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! 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