September 6, 1998

Gore Cornered In Reno’s Bargain With Mephistopheles

U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno made her Faustian bargain with President Clinton two years ago but will have to show more objectivity if she wants salvation from Congress.

As students of Literature 101 will remember, the magician Faust sold his soul to Mephistopheles in return for all knowledge. Twenty-four years later, when the devil came to claim payment, God intervened because Faust had repented and made good progress toward a noble aim.

It will be remembered that Reno was Clinton’s third choice for attorney general. Zoe Baird and Kimba Wood were rejected by the U.S. Senate -- an action undoubtedly now considered by them to be a stroke of good luck.

Reno ’s first act was to “take responsibility” for the Waco, Texas, immolations launched by the FBI before she was appointed. This demonstration of mettle so surprised and delighted the public she came within an inch of being anointed.

Perhaps encouraged by political adulation, Reno began appointing independent counsels to investigate charges of White House misdemeanors -- chiefly Whitewater embezzlements, travel office firings, and illegal possession of 900 FBI confidential files on Republicans.

In all, she has recommended 10 independent counsels and approved their selections by a panel of three Federal judges. So far, Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr has obtained 14 Whitewater convictions. Such independence from her boss, Clinton, marked Reno for dismissal. However, she confounded him by publicly asking the president to keep her as he prepared for a second-term campaign. Intimidated by her popularity, Clinton agreed on condition she stop harassing him. Quid pro quo -- something for something. Thus, Reno came to owe Mephistopheles.

A potentially damaging misdemeanor occurred during the 1996 election when Clinton, Vice-president Gore and the Democratic National Committee may have violated Federal Election Commission rules.

Reno couldn’t find a smidgen of “credible evidence” about campaign funding irregularities. Nonetheless, she readily requested the three-judge panel to expand Starr’s Whitewater mandate to include Vincent Foster’s suicide, and Monica Lewinsky’s relationship with Clinton. The attorney general steadfastly refused to appoint an independent counsel to investigate the high crimes that may have occurred as Clinton, Gore, and the DNC desperately solicited campaign funds two years ago.

It is now alleged that Harold Ickes, then a White House lawyer, and David Kendal, the Clinton’s private lawyer, urged Reno to sit on the fund-raising scandal. If true, she also could face conspiracy and obstruction of justice charges.

There are two, principal issues in the on-going scandals. They are solicitation of contributions from foreign sources, and converting unlimited “soft” money to restricted “hard” accounts for the Clinton-Gore candidacies.

Despite damaging admissions obtained by Senate and House hearings, Reno insisted there was “no credible evidence” of wrong doing.

Since then, a hundred witnesses have fled the country, taken the Fifth Amendment against self incrimination or suffered chronic amnesia.

The attorney has declared for two years that she is conducting a DNC investigation through the FBI and her own staff. FBI Director Louis Freeh and Special Investigator Charles LaBella each recommended a special counsel. She told Freeh to get lost and reneged on a promised promotion for LaBella.

Rep. Dan Burton, chairman of the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee, asked for the LaBella report but Reno refused to submit it. Burton lost his patience. He and the majority Republicans cited Reno for contempt of Congress.

With this, Reno relented -- somewhat. She sent over a lot of verbiage; but 50 pages were redacted, that is, blacked out. Burton now has been attacked personally by the White House damage control squad, but he vows to push on.

Nevertheless, Reno last week announced a 90-day review of Gore’s “no controlling legal authority” part in the campaign-funds hustle -- and a 30-day review of the DNC’s creative accounting. She reacted to the leak of a memo from the DNC to Gore indicating that 65 percent of the money he raised would be devoted to soft advertising and 35 percent to hard purposes -- a major FEC no-no.

Suddenly a serious question arose: Did Gore intentionally make a false statement to federal investigators? This would be a felony, big time.

Also last week, Reno informed the Federal judicial panel, that she was opening a 90-day review on the activities of Harold Ickes, campaign manager of Clinton’s 1996 reelection campaign. The Senate Governmental Affairs Committee alleges that Ickes perjured himself in statements to it last year regarding a swap-donation deal with the Teamsters Union.

The reviews of Gore and Ickes appear to be extensions of White House obstruction of justice tactics. These postpone the melt down until after the congressional elections November 3.

It is doubtful that God will rescue Reno from Mephistopheles this time. Redemption will have to come through her personal integrity.

On November 4, all bargains will be fulfilled -- one way or another -- and all souls will be up for grabs.

By Lindsey Williams, columnist for Sun Coast Media Group newspapers