DnA 9-17: Sixth Column - THE TRAIL OF DEAD BODIES IN CLINTON'S WAKE
Appeared in the Orange County Register
Eldon Griffiths
LONDON - With Heidi Fleiss, the reborn underwear saleslady, due to be tried Aug. 22 for running a Beverly Hills brothel, and O.J. Simpson's trial scheduled to go before a jury, if an impartial one can be found, Sept. 20, the U.S. Congress was well advised to squeeze its hearings on the conduct of the president of the United States into the dying days before it goes into recess Aug. 12.
I caught only a few hours of Lloyd Cutler (live) as he sought to portray Bill Clinton as a latter-day King Lear, "more sinned against than sinning." I then left Orange County for Britain where Whitewatergate ranks way behind such items as Bosnia, Rwanda, Mideast terrorism, and Russia's threat to invade the Chechen republic, reportedly about the same time as Clinton invades Haiti.
Yet even from this distance, two impressions of the "FOBs versus the SOBs," as an American friend describes the proceedings in the U.S. capital, deserve to be recorded. One is of the unimpressiveness of the White House gang (discounting Cutler, who was hired, like Perry Mason, as a telegenic defense counsel with no responsibility for the operational management of the U.S. government). Can you imagine a serious chief executive of any top U.S. corporation hiring that lot to run his business.
As for the congressmen, I squirmed at Chairman Henry Waxman's self-righteousness in limiting questions "in the public interest" to 30 seconds with no supplementaries), while wondering why the Democrats put up Barney Frank as their point man for the hearings. Wasn't it Frank who, four years ago, was reprimanded by the House Ethics Committee for employing as one of his staffers a male prostitute who used the congressman's house, as well as his office, to run a call-boy ring?
The choice of Frank to spearhead the president's defense is an eloquent comment on the administration's approach to an issue that has become a touchstone of Clinton's ethical standing.
More serious, however, is the congressional leadership's suppression of any detailed examination of the real meat of Whitewatergate. One of the advantages of the U.S. Constitution, I have always thought, is that its separation of powers allows the U.S. legislature to do a better job than the House of Commons in inquiring into the activities of the executive. Yet in what is, or ought to be, a model of Congress's ability to call the White House to accounting, the Democrats (in both houses) have used their majorities to block inquiry, limit scrutiny, and make a mockery of the doctrine of congressional oversight.
I doubt if this kind of gag would be accepted by the opposition in the British Parliament, nor indeed by any select committee of the Commons that I have ever sat on.
It is any wonder so many Americans are starting to look to extra-constitutional bodies, like Rush Limbaugh-style radio hitmen, as the most effective leaders of the opposition in Washington.
Using the device of a special counsel to draw a curtain beyond which the U.S. Congress may not probe is not a new stratagem in Washington. but its use to defend Bill Clinton is a step backward in the political evolution of a nation where higher standards of public awareness, not to speak of the ever-more intrusive nature of the investigative reporting, make transparency and accountability daily more, not less, essential if "constitutional democracy," American style, is to retain the loyalty of those it is supposed to serve.
If Congress is subject to gagging, why should those who elect it respect it? By putting the politically uncomfortable aspects of Whitewatergate off limits because full frontal exposure might embarrass the ruling party at this fall's elections, Congress has dealt a heavy blow to its already tarnished reputation.
All of which leads me to report, because Congress will not, a document that makes far more serious charges against the administration than anything so far heard in Whitewatergate. This document, addressed to the majority leads of the Senate and the House, was handed to me (and, no doubt, to other columnists) by a former congressman whose research has led him to conclude that 24 Americans with close connections to the Clintons have suffered violent and unnatural deaths over the past two years.
Extracts from this document appear below (see box). Perhaps its most disturbing claim is that four of Clinton's former Arkansas bodyguards were killed in the Waco shootout. This column lacks the resources to investigate this dossier's authenticity. All I can do is reveal its source, an outfit called Californians for America, whose address is 1105 Commonwealth Ave., Fullteron, and to make a judgement of the individual who authored it, William E. Dannemeyer, a former Republican congressman (1979-92).
Dannemeyer is not everybody's cup of tea. With many of his opinions, I, for one, disagree. Yet Bill Dannemeyer, whom I first came to know as a fellow legislator, struck me then and strikes me now as a man who says what he believes and believes what he says. I, therefore, cannot dissent from his request to the majority leaders of the House and Senate for further "immediate hearings."
"All Americans," says Dannemeyer, "want to believe that those deaths are just a matter of coincidence, but the probability of this being the case is so small that it ... raises the very serious question of whether the president, directly or indirectly [may be] involved."
To judge by the Democrats' actions in gagging the Whitewatergate hearings, there is little reason to expect that they will permit the Congress to look into -- and hopefully disprove -- the grisly claims contained in this Californians for America affair. But if our legislators will not do this, they should not be surprised if others do the job for them -- thereby, sad to relate, making Congress once again seem helpless or, worse, irrelevant.
NAMES OF THOSE WHO HAVE DIED, DATES OF DEATH,
AND ALLEGED LINKS TO PRESIDENT CLINTON
July 30, 1992 C. Victor Raiser II plane crash
(national finance co-chairman
of Clinton for President)
R. Montgomery Raiser
(Clinton Campaign)
Sept. 24, 1992 Paul Tully unknown causes, hotel
(Democratic National Committee) in Little Rock
Dec. 9, 1992 Paula Gober
(Clinton speech interpreter) car accident
Dec. 21, 1992 Jim Wilhite skiing accident
(associate of Mack McLarty's
former company)
Feb. 28, 1993 Steve Willis gunfire at Waco
Robert Williams
Todd McKeahan
Conway LeBleu
(Clinton Bodyguards)
May 19, 1993 Brian D. Hassey helicopter crash
Timothy Sabel
William Barkley
Scott Reynolds
(Clinton escorts/bodyguards)
June 22, 1993 Paul Wilcher undetermined cause,
(lawyer investigating gun in D.C. apartment
running out of Mena, Ark.)
July 20-1, 1993 Vince Foster suicide
(White House Counsel)
Aug. 15, 1993 Jon Parnell Walker fell off 22-story
(investigated link between building
Whitewater and Madison S&L)
Sept 10, 1993 Stanley Heard plane crash
Steven Dickson
(Clinton health-care advisory
committee)
Sept 1993 Luther Larry Parks murdered
(former head of Clinton security
team in Little Rock)
Nov. 30, 1993 Ed Willey self-inflicted
(Clinton fundraiser) gunshot wound
March 1, 1994 Herschell Friday plane explosion
(member of presidential campaign
finance committee)
March 3, 1994 Ronald Rogers undetermined
(was about to give "sensitive"
information to London Newspaper)
May 11, 1994 Kathy Ferguson gunshot to head
(ex-wife of Danny Ferguson
"Troopergate" State Troopers)
June 9, 1994 Bill Shelton gunshot to head
(boyfriend of Kathy Ferguson)
