Louis, Louis

            Attorney General Janet
Reno's refusal to appoint an independent counsel to investigate Clinton, Gore,
or Hazel O'Leary--over the objections of FBI Director Louis Freeh--was Topic 1
on the weekend shows. Having unanimously predicted last week that Reno wouldn't
appoint an independent counsel, the commentarians briefly reiterated their
positions. On the attack, Paul Gigot ( NewsHour With Jim Lehrer ) and Pat
Buchanan ( The McLaughlin Group ) claimed that Reno presides over a
"politicized" Justice Department that had "changed" her mind on appointing a
counsel (Fred Barnes, The McLaughlin Group ). Defending Reno's decision
was Margaret Carlson ( Capital Gang ), who said independent counsels are
"not independent" because they're appointed by a partisan panel.

            The
pundits then moved on to this week's fresh meat: Freeh. Videotapes of Clinton
press secretary Mike McCurry's icy comments about the rebellious Freeh were
repeatedly unspooled. The president's unveiled message to Freeh: "Don't let the
door hit you on the way out" (Gwen Ifill, Washington Week in Review ).
"Louie Freeh all of a sudden became free Louie," said David Shribman
( Washington Week in Review ), who predicted that the director would leave
the FBI in two months. So outrageous was Freeh's "dis" of the president and the
attorney general that Clinton "ought to fire him," said Jack Germond ( Meet
the Press ).

            While the pundits simultaneously applauded Freeh's
integrity as a prosecutor, judge, and now FBI director, they insinuated that he
had tilted against Reno to shore up his reputation with Republicans on Capitol
Hill, who still resent him for his handling of Filegate, Ruby Ridge, and the
FBI crime-lab snafu (Shribman; Eleanor Clift, The McLaughlin Group ; Mara
Liasson, Washington Week in Review ; Mark Shields, NewsHour ).

            Jane Mayer
( Washington Week in Review ) exonerated Freeh from the charges of gross
politicking, saying that his real campaign is to protect the FBI from
criticism. Brit Hume ( Fox News Sunday ) posited a wily Freeh who had
deliberately written his memo in support of an independent counsel, knowing
that it would be leaked and/or subpoenaed.

            
The pundits repeatedly denigrated Reno.
Evidence of their low regard for her: Nobody hissed when Hume said she is not
"the sharpest knife in the drawer" or "the brightest bulb on the circuit."
Damning her with faint praise, Steve Roberts ( Late Edition ) called Reno
the "least political figure in this town." Tony Blankley ( Late Edition )
compared her to Capt. Queeg in The Caine Mutiny , obsessed with micro
legal matters while neglecting macro legal matters. Riffing off a recent New
Yorker article, which reported that Clinton administration officials refer
to her as the "Martian," Shribman said now she's the administration's "favorite
Martian."

            Gigot,
top cheerleader for an independent counsel, confessed that he couldn't explain
the Republicans' mellow response to Reno's decision. His befuddlement was
enough to 1) make you think you had finally met an honest pundit or 2) make you
reach for the channel changer. The weekend's final consensus was that Reno and
Freeh and the White House would all clash again, but that an independent
counsel would be appointed to investigate Secretary of the Interior Bruce
Babbitt, and the investigation would come back to haunt Clinton and Gore,
because independent-counsel investigations "spread like cancer" (Hume). Also,
Reno will survive. As Mayer quoted a source as saying: "She's the perfect
firewall ... because nobody can say that she's in the tank for Bill
Clinton."

            Issue 2, Latrell Sprewell's assault on and death threat
against his coach, moved across the shows like a fast break. But because
everybody was playing offense--all condemned the assault--nobody scored.
Inexplicably, none of the pundits proposed the Solomonic principle of
prosecuting Sprewell on criminal assault charges instead of suspending him for
a year. If a jury sends him to jail, consider that his long-term suspension. If
they find him innocent, let him play again--if any team will have him.

            Rep. Dick
Gephardt's future-of-the-Democrats speech at Harvard was Issue 3. The
Democratic pundits sparred over Gephardt's intention: Al Hunt ( Capital
Gang ) said Gephardt was energizing the liberals for the 1998 contests.
Carlson called the speech a "letter to Al Gore," and Susan Page ( Late
Edition ) backed Carlson, calling it a "broadside" against Clinton. The
speech was "bad politics," ruled George Stephanopoulos ( This Week ), who
has worked for both Clinton and Gephardt, because it didn't give the president
any credit.

            President Clinton received low marks for his race round
table in Akron, Ohio (Issue 4), especially for abruptly switching talk-show
styles from Oprah to "Sam Donaldson" (Sam Donaldson, This Week ) in order
to bully author Abigail Thernstrom. "If the president wants a debate about
affirmative action, he can't just throw in a question at the end of the
session. He's got to structure it," said Liasson. Page noted that real dialogue
about race in America is precipitated by presidential leadership: Harry Truman
and Lyndon Johnson framed the race debate by integrating the armed services and
passing the Civil Rights Act, not by asking questions.

            
               Pissy Fit at This
Week : ABC's This Week contributed not one word to the
independent-counsel decision, the only show to hold its fire on the issue. Were
Sam, Cokie, and George demonstrating their superior news judgment or staging a
pissy fit? Halfway through the program--and apropos of nothing--host Donaldson
explained that Reno had been invited to appear on the show but had "set
conditions" that the show was "not able to meet." (Reno didn't seem to receive
any special treatment on Face the Nation , where she appeared Sunday.)
Reno didn't even rate a mention in This Week 's closing round table.
"Pundit Central" demands an independent-counsel investigation of this pundit
malfeasance.

            

               --Jack
Shafer