Annan-omous Threat
USA
Today , the Washington Post , and the New York Times
lead with the U.N. Security Council's OK of the weapons inspection deal agreed
to last week by Kofi Annan and Saddam Hussein. The Los Angeles
Times goes with President Clinton's criticism of the congressional
movement towards a radical overhaul of the tax code.
The Security Council voted 15-0 to approve the Annan deal, which opens up
eight of Saddam's presidential sites to U.N. inspectors. The papers report that
debate focused mainly on what would happen if Saddam reneges. The U.S. and
Britain wanted the Council to authorize automatic military action as part of
the accord, while other member countries, led by France, Russia, and China, did
not. In the end, there was no mention of automatic military moves, but merely a
warning of "the severest consequences." USAT and the WP stress
the U.N.'s warning, while the NYT stresses the U.S. failure to get
inclusion of an automatic attack. Despite this difference, everybody reports
that the U.S. position is that it doesn't need further approval for a strike if
the deal is abrogated.
The Post reports that the U.N.'s resolution reiterates the intention
to consider ending the economic sanctions on Iraq once its weapons of mass
destruction have been eliminated. This news seems too important to leave to the
last paragraph, though.
The LAT lead reports on a speech President Clinton gave Monday
in which he denounced the current vogue for wiping out the U.S. tax code in
favor of a radically new system. Clinton called the approach "misguided,
reckless and irresponsible," warning that it could imperil the economy. "No one
concerned about fighting crime would even think about saying, 'Well, three
years from now we're going to throw out the criminal code and we'll figure out
what to put in its place,'" the paper quotes Clinton as saying. "But that is
exactly what some people in Congress are proposing to do."
This sounds like an important story--Zeitgeist and president on collision
course over taxes. Why then does the WP put it on p. 5, and the
NYT national edition bury it on p. 15?
A Wall Street Journal editorial on Internet taxation
takes the position that Bill Clinton is right to support a sales tax
moratorium, and Trent Lott wrong to oppose it, because the Internet is "the
business infrastructure of the future," and hence its growth shouldn't be
"stifled" by taxes. Along the way, the editorial asks a fun tax question: "If a
man in California buys a birthday present for his mother in Illinois from a
company located in Georgia, in which state did the transaction take place?"
Today's appearance of Vernon Jordan before the Starr grand jury gets
front-page coverage at the WP and a "Politics and Policy" piece at the
WSJ . USAT uses the occasion to do an informative
front-page primer on grand juries. The Tony Mauro/Kevin Johnson effort
reviews such basics as that the lawyers of those summoned have to wait outside
and that grand jurors can pose questions. There are also the nuggets that
England did away with grand juries fifty years ago and that in Hawaii they have
their own lawyer as a counterbalance to the prosecutor. And there's this grand
juror's question to Sidney Blumenthal during his appearance last week: "Do you
believe the public should be fully informed about the character of the
president?" Blumenthal's answer: "Yes, I do."
In a WP front-page interview, Bill Gates says, referring
to the Justice Department's lawsuit, "If we can't innovate in our products,
then you know we will be replaced." The paper is struck by how far Gates'
behavior is from "the usual cautious demeanor of business leaders visiting
Washington," and finds him "roaring with indignation and disdain for those who
question his business practices."
One of the key causes of press overkill of the sort we're now witnessing in
l'affaire Lewinsky is the papers' tendencies to do stories about
anything that has to do with Topic A, even if it would otherwise merit
virtually no news play. A good example is found in today's LAT "Column One" feature, which tells us that Walt Whitman,
"the poet of democracy, the poet of the body and soul," commands a loyal and
expansive following, and quotes a talking head from USC to drive home the
point. The real reason for the piece isn't revealed until the fifth paragraph:
Whitman's book Leaves of Grass "has a cameo in the investigation
involving President Clinton and former White House intern Monica Lewinsky."
What's next--a "Column One" about Leo Rosten and the history of "schmucko"?
