Land of the Freeh, Home of the Blaze
Issue 1 is the long-suppressed video evidence of federal pyrotechnic use at
Waco. Issue 2 is the ethics of the Clintons--including the financing of their
mortgage and their public "disagreement" over clemency for Puerto Rican
criminals. Issue 3 is Pat Buchanan's flirtation with the Reform Party.
The pundits all agree that the Waco investigation has been mishandled, but
they disagree over who mishandled it. Liberal pundits--like Mark Shields and Al
Hunt (both of CNN's Capitol Gang )--tend to blame FBI Director Louis
Freeh, charging that he was closest to the suppressed evidence.
Conservatives--such as Capitol Gang's Kate O'Beirne and Bob
Novak--blame Reno, noting that Freeh took office several months after Waco.
Interestingly, the politicians mirror this partisan divide. President
Clinton has publicly supported Reno but not Freeh, and on CNN's Late
Edition Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., does the same. But on CBS's Face
the Nation Clinton-hating Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., supports Freeh; and on
Late Edition Republicans Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah and former Attorney
General Dick Thornburgh also back Freeh, a Clinton appointee. (Thornburgh casts
Freeh as a "fall guy," and Hatch calls him the "single best [FBI director] I've
seen.")
But just how important is Waco? Answers range from "in fact, there
isn't any evidence [that the feds started the fire]" (Brit Hume,
Fox News Sunday ) to "we're talking about an event unparalleled in
American history" (Mark Shields, PBS's Newshour With Jim Lehrer ).
(Shields compares the impact of Waco on the American psyche to that of the
Kennedy assassination.) Despite this disagreement, everyone seconds Reno's call
for an independent investigation, and they marvel at Reno's aura of political
independence. Fox panelists Mara Liasson and Juan Williams speculate
that her "Abe Lincoln status" derives from her refusal to participate in the
Washington social scene. (To read
Slate's take on
Reno's independent image, click here. To learn more
about Waco pyrotechnics, click
here.)
The commentariat splits over the propriety of Democratic fund-raiser Terry
McAuliffe's million-dollar underwriting of the Clintons' mortgage. Mara
Liasson, Sam Donaldson (ABC's This Week ), and George F. Will ( This
Week ) think it doesn't matter--Clinton is a lame duck, and it's not really
a gift. But Juan Williams, Brit Hume, Cokie Roberts ( This Week ), and
Bill Kristol ( This Week ) think it does matter--giving a million
dollars in collateral to a politician, even for private use, amounts to
improper influence.
The opinion mafia guffaws over Hillary's belated opposition to her husband's
proposed clemency for 16 Puerto Rican terrorists. Almost no one believes
Hillary's assertion that she and Bill never discussed the pardon offer. Several
pundits speculate that the president might pardon Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard
to appease Jewish interests in New York.
Many pundits--including Paul Gigot ( Newshour ) and every Capitol
Gang panelist--predict that presidential hopeful Pat Buchanan will bolt
the GOP for the Reform Party. Buchanan and Ross Perot are both economic
populists, Gigot explains, and by nominating Buchanan Perot can wrest control
of the party from Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura, who opposes Buchanan's
nomination. Shields points out that Perot dislikes the Bush family for its
alleged "dirty tricks" in the '92 presidential campaign. Several pundits
caution that Buchanan won't jump ship unless Perot can virtually guarantee him
the nomination, and that Buchanan may lose his pro-life followers if he joins
the Reform Party, which eschews social issues. Conservative pundits note with
glee that many of the same GOP leaders who refused Buchanan the podium at the
'96 Republican Convention are now begging him to stay in the party.
Portrait of a Humanitarian: Still on vacation, John
McLaughlin runs another prerecorded show, this time on immigration. (He tries
to peg the topic to Labor Day.) Unlike last week's entertaining but airy show
on the millennium, this week's smart program is grounded in specific policy
issues, like temporary work visas, mail-order brides, and bilingual education.
But what's remarkable about the show is not the topic; it's panelist Dan Stein,
spokesman for the closed-borders group FAIR, who comes off as singularly
obnoxious (no mean feat on McLaughlin ).
"Immigration," he warns us, "brings about the Brazilianization of America."
When a panelist remarks that many immigrants are valedictorians, Stein sneers,
"You and I should visit some federal prisons together." When Eleanor Clift
talks about the Latin immigrants in her childhood neighborhood in Queens, Stein
interjects, "Why don't you move there if you like it so much?" Stein also
informs us that when Alan Greenspan trumpets immigrant labor as an inflation
weapon, "what he's [really] saying is, 'We're redistributing income to the
employers and the immigrants themselves--take[ing] it out of the pocket of
middle-class taxpayers--to pay for the benefit of the army of marching poor
that we're importing into the country.' " In truth, Stein's politics aren't
that unreasonable. But one has to think that even the Know-Nothings had more
class.
Last Word
: Defending America's pro-Yeltsin
Russia policy on Fox , Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., says, "We've been
dealing with Yeltsin because he's the guy [in power]. The other guys behind him
are no box of chocolates. You know, everyone thinks there's a Jeffersonian
Democrat waiting to pop up. ... [Democratic reform] is going to take a
generation. The question is, How do we cut the losses, and how do we keep a
process going where we continue to destroy nuclear weapons?"
