Friday, July 10, 1998 --- New York (APJP) -- This morning, I read with some amusement reports that Sylvester Stallone presented President Clinton with the boxing gloves used in Stallone's breakthrough film Rocky at a Democratic fund-raiser held on Stallone's Miami estate last night. Clinton gratefully accepted the gloves and added a pugilistic flourish: "I think I have established that I can take a punch; now the time is come for me to deliver a few."

But the fact is that the gloves are off, and have been for some time -- not only in the White House's not-so-private donnybrook with "independent" prosecutor Kenneth Starr and his partisan and destructive investigation into any "scandal" he can glom onto, but in the partisan combat being ratcheted up in preparation for what may turn out to be the bloodiest off-cycle election in memory.

Clinton went on the attack earlier Thursday with his pointed critique of GOP attacks against Democrats "from can to can't, from dawn until dark, year-in and year-out, forever and a day" at another fundraising appearance.

The message is clear: Democrats plan an all-out assault on the inefficacy of the GOP-controlled Congress. Republican incumbents will be pilloried for both their sparse and trivial legislative effort this session as well as for a litany of mostly wasteful, almost exclusively partisan investigations which could have led to actual reforms but were squandered in a shallow attempt to make the White House appear culpable in every so-called "scandal" in Washington.

Democrats will likely make judicial activism an issue this fall, armed with Kenneth Starr's extraordinary low popularity -- not to mention a pattern of abuse in Starr's clearly partisan pursuit of Clinton. Starr will become the poster boy for the threat of jurist "legislation" that threaten individual rights, allowing Democrats an opening to "steal" yet another issue usually associated with the GOP.

Starr faces serious problems on another front. Yesterday, CNN's Wolf Blitzer reported that sources close to Monica Lewinsky's defense team confirmed that she was prepared to cooperate with Maryland State Prosecutor Stephen Montanarelli. Montanarelli has commenced a grand jury probe into Linda Tripp's recordings of conversations with Lewinsky -- tapings which are illegal under Maryland law.

Lewinsky's legal team has refused to confirm the story, but if true, the move presents Kenneth Starr with a situation which could range from problematic to catastrophic. His "star" witness Tripp finds herself the target of an investigation, which can't do anything but hurt his investigation. And there has been a flurry of discussion over whether Tripp can be charged with violating wiretap laws in the first place, for two reasons: in most cases one cannot be charged if one does not know it to be illegal, and Starr immunized Tripp against prosecution.

But there are problems on both those fronts. Let me pose the first problem as a question: if you wanted to know whether it was legal to tape phone conversations in Maryland without the other party knowing, who would you ask?

a) a lawyer in Maryland
b) a private investigator in Maryland with experience in wiretapping
c) a law enforcement officer in Maryland
d) a book agent in New York City

Goldberg has said that she had taped her conversations with Tripp and might have "mistakenly" advised Tripp it was legal to tape calls with Lewinsky.

One sources close to Montanarelli told CNN "they could be the 'smoking gun' the prosecutor needs." And even if Goldberg advised Tripp that it was okay on tape, the Maryland prosecutors are certain to have some pointed questions for Goldberg.

Which leads to the second problem: Montanarelli may not necessarily be looking to indict Tripp for wiretapping -- in fact, the investigation into Tripp's conduct may turn up enough evidence of untoward behavior to implicate Tripp and others in obstruction of justice, charges which could conceivably reach into Starr's office.

Presently, Montanarelli's mandate is to investigate the taping. It's a lead-pipe cinch that he may borrow a few moves from the Starr play book, methodically expanding the scope of his investigation in any number of directions -- including Starr's.

American Affairs Editor
American Politics Journal