July 20, 1998 --- New York (APJP) -- The pundits went into a pap frenzy over testimony of Secret Service agents before a grand jury following a bruising legal battle between Kenneth Starr and the Treasury and Justice Departments resulted in a ruling that the agents must testify -- a ruling which will likely be appealed, but not in time to stop more testimony this week.

The usual gang of talking heads went into their programs acting as if it were a major victory for Starr -- then skirting the subject as lawyers for the agents in question asserted that they seriously doubt Starr will find any evidence of wrongdoing. And there was still no talk of the damage Starr's various legal battles is doing to the three-branch ssytem of constitutional government or individual liberties.

The other big topic du jour -- homosexuality and a series of full-page newspaper ads placed by social and religious conservatives claiming that turning to God will somehow "cure" homosexuality.

But there was more than an undercurrent of another issue -- Tim Russert's essentially passing along a rumor that Secret Service agents had "facilitated' for the President as a news story on Wednesday morning. And we're pleased to see we're not the only outlet refusing to let Russert off the hook for this incident.

This Week

Our local affiliate moved This Week to an extra-early slot to make way for coverage of a sporting event; we were only able to catch the first half.

The first guest, John Kotelly, is an attorney representing Secret Service agents testifying before a grand jury as part of Ken Starr's perpetual investigation of everything Clinton. Kotelly said "It just seems inconceivable to me that the president would be having conversations with persons he wanted to talk in private with in the presence of his Secret Service agents… In cases where he is in private situations, secure situations like in the White House, the president has privacy, and the Secret Service respects that privacy," he said.

Kotelly is concerned that because of Starr's ability to compel testimony from the president's security detail, current and future presidents might "feel a need to push the Secret Service away.''

So what does Ken Starr expect to get from this testimony? Based on Kotelly's comment, Starr can anticipate a windfall of nothing.

About the only thing Starr has proven is that, in his unchecked power, he has shown himself able to endanger presidential safety and national security by prying as deeply into his personal life as he can by any means possible. Starr's recklessness and the supervising three-judge panel's "laissez-faire" supervision are a threat not only to security but individual rights and the constitutional three-branch system.

Sam and Cokie's second guest was outspoken conservative judge Robert Bork, whose record of judicial activism prevented him from passing congressional muster as a Supreme Court nominee. Sam and Cokie asked him all of the expected questions about events leading to Secret Service testimony before a DC grand jury -- but failed to challenge any of his flagrant assertions.

Bork proclaimed protective privilege a "preposterous claim" -- and was not even challenged on the fact that it has been an accepted facet of federal government since Garfield was assassinated and the claim was never challenged when Nixon was being investigated for Watergate and Reagan (and Bush, for that matter) for Iran-Contra wrongdoings.

Asked whether he was in sync with Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and his proposal for a narrower privilege, Bork said no: "There is this talk about pushing away the Secret Service if a president learns not to trust them. The fact is the president is in danger only when he’s out in a crowd."

Really, Bork? Tell that to anyone who was working in the White House the day that a wacko "dittohead" sprayed the White House with automatic weapon fire, pitting the White House with numerous bullet holes and hitting a (thankfully empty) press room. Do you think the public are idiots, Bork, or do you hold the office of the presidency in such contempt that you actually feel comfortable saying something that stupid?

Bork parrotted the "bash Clinton" party line, proclaiming that "[Starr] is, if anything, moving with great deliberation. But the strategy of the White House is to stall this thing and attack Starr to make him appear responsible for it."

Who does he think he's kidding? If Starr had stepped aside from his seven-figure private practice, the matter of Whitewater would have been wrapped up ages ago.

When chat turned to poll numbers and the largely indifferent attitude of the public to perjury, Bork said "I like to think that the public hasn't thought this through." Which only reminded us that they have -- the so-called perjury, if it is indeed that, was largely extorted, and perhaps this will come out in Maryland's investigation into Linda Tripp's taping. Heck, they may just pull a "Starr" and expand the investigation into Lucianne Goldberg's conduct and Tripp's ties to Starr's office and Paula "Nosejob" Jones's lawyers.

Bork got nasty about appointing a special prosecutor to look into the so-called Chinagate controversy: "The talk that this assertion of privilege was strictly by the Secretary of the Treasury is nonsense. Bill Clinton knew about this. He also knew back when he claimed he didn’t even know whether he claimed executive privilege or not -- somebody else did it, he didn’t know about it --this stuff is orchestrated from the White House. It’s orchestrated from the Oval Office."

Cokie: "Do I know that?"

Bork: "Is there any doubt?"

Nice, Bob. Guilty until proven innocent -- from a bitter, broken man whose fitness to serve on the highest court in the land WE don't have any doubt about (clue: about as fit as he is to compete on American Gladiators).

We got a brief snicker from ABC News correspondent Linda Douglass when the talk turned to proposals of a civil litigation exemption for Secret Service personnel: "…for example, Larry Klayman could sue the Secret Service."

Cokie: "And he probably will!"

The best thing Cokie has said so far this year! We laughed so hard we almost forgot to change the channel to…

Fox News Sunday

Tony Snow, our favorite member of the vast right wing conspiracy, looked tanned and upbeat, having returned from vacation. And he still has the best hair on pundit TV!

The first guest -- Senate majority leader Trent Lott (R-MS). Topic one: what to do with all that money the government is projected to have over the next decade! We were going to have to wait on gay issues… Lott: "We should return the money" to the taxpayers, "find ways to guarantee social security" with the rest "returned to the people in tax cuts."

No talk about buying down the debt, though -- yes, in the short term it wouldn't "return" that tiny smidgen of money to Joe Average taxpayer, but in the long run it would put the country on track for far more long-term economic stability after the near disaster visited on America by the "don't tax but spend-spend-spend" strategy foisted upon America by Reagan's economic team of Laffer-heads.

When Brit Hume -- far less cranky in his last couple of FNS appearances than he usually has been -- asked Lott if Americans should have the right to sue HMOs, Lott replied "Do they want results or lawsuits?" Lott tried to paint this as a Democrat attempt at "more government… more lawsuits to benefit their buddies [litigation lawyers]."

More government? Not letting patients sue their HMO is "more government," if you ask us. There's no reason why HMOs should continue to get away with murder in the name of shareholder profit.

Lott talked about reforming "in a way that doesn't drive up costs" -- which we'd support if it didn't involve legislation that is actually being penned by lobbyists for HMOs and insurance companies.

Lott was also asked about the White House memo released earlier in the week showing National Security Advisor Sandy Berger having played a bigger role in moving authority over technology transfer from the Defense to the Commerce Department: "I didn't realize he was as involved with that [as he was]… a process that endangers American technology."

How does it endanger American technology, and where's your evidence? And for all the so-called "compromising" of national security, why are you so reluctant to mention evidence that moving the transfer process to Commerce actually yielded an intelligence bonanza -- including access to Chinese missile designs, military communications networks, and ballistic missile capabilities -- which may not have been possible otherwise?

We have no doubt that these topics will never come up in congressional hearings -- no doubt for "national security reasons."

Lott also took a brief moment to smear the Secret Service: "That's why I don't understand about the Secret Service agents, without getting into the legal niceties and arguments that they have. They appear to be hiding something -- what is it? If there's no problem, just come forward, tell the truth and that'll be it. We'll move on."

Hey, Trent, do you regularly bad-mouth the Secret Service, or do you save it for when it suits your agenda? They appear to be doing their job. If they saw anything untoward -- including things that might be construed as a crime after the fact -- they would have reported it, as they are legally bound to! They're telling the truth, and yes, we'll move on -- to more opportunities for you to stick your foot in your mouth.

There was no direct discussion of Lott's gaffe on a right-wing television talk show comparing homosexuality to disease and criminal behavior when talk turned to Lott's opposition to James Hormel being confirmed as the US ambassador to Luxembourg.

Instead, Lott crafted a new excuse: "My problem is we have the people's business [which] we must do… [Hormel has not confirmed] just because of time."

There are moments such as this that I wish the Sunday political talk shows had a laugh track! Lott has presided over the laziest Senate in memory, with a majority party whose idea of "less government" means don't legislate, and instead conduct a campaign of investigations which will consolidate support only from his party's hardest core of conservatives.

Lott brought up the same tired claims that Hormel was some sort of "advocate" for the gay "lifestyle" and showed "insensitivity" to religion.

Right. Like anyone is going to advocate a lifestyle where one is ridiculed, disowned by family, discriminated against, and physically attacked or even killed. And the so-called "insensitivity" to religion stems from Hormel's appearance on a local San Francisco broadcast of a gay-rights parade chuckling at the antics of a group of marchers dressed as an "order" of hedonistic "nuns" -- a fabricated stretch if there ever was one.

Lott was completely unsuccessful in trying to weasel his way out of an already-bad situation -- he only made himself look worse on the issues of gays and Hormel.

Their second guest, HHS Secretary Donna Shalala, made her second weekend of talk appearances in a row, and continued to impress us by injecting both enthusiasm and robust advocacy into topics which often get exiled to the "wonk" ghetto. She was critical of what she considers inadequate HMO reform legislation -- "Rights must be enforceable… there's no use in giving rights without remedies… Government plans have these rights, why shouldn't everyone have these rights?"

She also shot withering fire at tobacco companies and their congressional allies who have sabotaged tobacco legislation: "These tobacco companies ought not to get away with targeting our children."

There was a feisty little exchange when talk turned to medicare reform. Shalala defended the Clinton administration position on massive changes, saying "we are not going to dump changes" on the Medicare system.

Brit: "Then why did you shut down the education program?"

Shalala: "We did not shut down the education program!" Shalala does not abide sloppy punditry or cheap-shot criticism lightly -- a major reason the Administration should give her an even higher profile on health issues!

The final guest segment, "Starr Too Far?", pitted Congressman Robert Wexler (D-FL) against Bob Barr (R-Twilight Zone).

The Madness of King Barr manifest itself early on as he steered discussion of protective privilege to a ludicrous attempt to tie the President to being influenced by campaign money from China.

Barr did not go on his usual rant about the "articles of impeachment" he wants so badly to be a part of -- probably because Wexler is far faster on his feet.

And when Wexler was asked about allegations of perjury against the president he acknowledged that the issue is indeed serious, but "it doesn't relate to national security, it doesn't relate to 'high crimes and misdemeanors' " -- a fundamental fact that most Americans get, and that will make Barr and his dozen or so impeachment henchmen in the House look like fools trying to push through.

Barr went of on a binge of speculation about all the "criminal" acts he alleges Clinton might have done (read: hopes against hope that Clinton did), to which Wexler replied "Those are BIG ifs!… I hope Mr. Starr has an opportunity to present his $40 million dollar report." Tony pointed out that the total includes money spent under Fiske -- too bad he didn't point out that the $40 mil total is way out of date and when you add in personal legal bills of all involved in this mess the total is likely to top $80 million -- WITHOUT the Fiske numbers!

Toward the end of the segment, Wexler commented that the nature of the charges against the President primarily deal with private conduct in the matter of a civil lawsuit that got kicked out of court and that the President's attackers are getting nowhere because "the American people are more sophisticated than that."

Barr [incredulous and loud]: "That's sophistication??"

Yes, Bob, it is. We'd like to explain it in more detail, but unfortunately we're due back on Planet Earth to watch…

The McLaughlin Group

Issue one: "A Constitutional Absurdity!" John and the gang debated an appeals court ruling compelling Secret Service agents to testify before Ken Starr's grand jury. During the pre-pap video piece, McLaughlin flashed a photo of Judge Lawrence Silverman (who bears a disquieting resemblance to film villain Goldfinger) and an excerpt from his comments, including his "constitutional absurdity" comment and flawed assertion that Janet Reno is acting as a sort of White House defender.

The question: how crushing a defeat? Naturally, Pat Buchanan called it "crushing" and predicted it "moves us closer to endgame"; Eleanor Clift said it was only a crushing defeat if you believe that Clinton walked out of his paula Jones deposition and said "Whew! Did I ever lie!" to his lawyers in front of Secret Service agents. Jay Carney said that while it was a setback for Clinton, Silverman's "lack of judicial restraint" was "offensive."

To say the least. We feel his partial, partisan behavior may well be grounds for impeachment, given the gravity and profile of the issue which he has chosen to politicize.

Larry Kudlow, a bit of a "wild card" conservative who writes for National Review, said that while Clinton's silence is "sinking groups and people around him," Silverman was wrong about Reno -- the Treasury Department brought suit and DOJ was bound to act on their behalf.

Clift got in the nearly last word, saying that no IC would have dreamed of subpoenaing the Secret Service in the Watergate or Iran-Contra affairs.

Does it imperil the president, asked John? Eleanor and Jay said yes, Pat, Larry and John said no.

Topic two: "The Gay Ads." You've seen them in big-city broadsheets --the full-page ads taken out by a consortium of so-called "social conservatives," most notably the Family Research Council and right-wing Christian organizations, making the claim that prayer can "cure" a person of homosexuality. These ads not only run against all medical and scientific evidence on the nature of homosexuality; they fan the flames of hate and fear in ad copy couched in the language of "values" and "God."

John's intro backgrounder included photos and quotes from the various ads that have been showing up for the last couple weeks, then asked if this was an attempt to elevate homosexuality to a fulcrum-level issue in November and in 2000.

Jay felt that the GOP was "push[ing] this issue at their peril" and might cast Republicans as intolerant.

John then did something that he is usually careful not to do -- getting facts plain wrong. In asking Larry about the issue, he mentioned "Disney's sponsorship of Ellen and 'Gay Days' at Disney World…" WRONG!! Disney neither sponsors nor endorses the unofficial "gay days" at Disney theme parks.

Shame on you, John.

Larry said it was a "nonstarter" that could "hurt the GOP," but agreed with Pat (and went against the body of scientific research) by saying that homosexuality was "unnatural."

McLaughlin then turned to the issue of James Hormel -- and actually ran a snippet of the allegedly "offensive" footage from a local San Francisco broadcast of a gay parade featuring Hormel as a commentator. The footage was clearly edited to outrage social ultra-conservatives, showing Hormel laughing at a gay group known as the "Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence," whose display rather absurdly lampoons nuns. There followed a quote from New York Post right wing troglo-commentator Ray Kerrison, who wrote "Hormel is a bigot, a religious bigot."

Pat said Hormel "is behaving like one." Eleanor got it right when she pointed out that "all he did was smile in amusement."

We say this is much ado about nothing. Face it, we're talking about Luxembourg, not exactly a major strategic relationship. We agree with the wag who pointed out that about the most difficult diplomatic issue Hormel will deal with is the wine list.

Carney had the most interesting forecast for the issue: helps them in '98, hurts in 2000. Could be -- the off-cycle elections usually draw only hardcore voters, but we predict the benefit of the issue for the GOP will only be felt in the south and some of the midwest where anti-gay sentiment runs strongest among Republicans.

Predictions!

Meet The Press

Tim Russert has hit bottom -- flashback to Wednesday, when Russert reported on Today that there were "suggestions coming out of people close to Ken Starr that perhaps the Secret Service facilitated for President Clinton. Remember that code word. It was used about the state troopers in Little Rock. And if in fact Ken Starr is trying to find information that can in fact conflict with President Clinton's sworn testimony that he did no have sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky he is going for it."

Russert and NBC quickly backpedalled when the rumor proved false. But the damage is done, and Russert did little to redeem himself on Meet the Press this week.

The first half of the show followed a format Russert has been experimenting with, a sort of reverse version of the Spivak-era MTP -- one moderator, a group of guests, focusing on one topic, in this case the testimony of Secret Service agents before a Washington grand jury.

One guest, lawyer Michael Leibig, was asked straight off by Russert about a quote from Ken Starr's brief re Secret Service testimony: "It says 'The office of independent counsel is in possession of information that Secret Service personnel may have observed evidence of possible crimes while stationed in and around the White House complex.' " Russert's delivery was eerily like that of his Today gaffe, and the topical similarity merely served to remind us of the slip-up. Not good.

Leibig, who represents three uniformed Secret Service agents, said that "Normal police officers, say a homicide detective, is a trained witness to perceive and notice things, but the training of the uniformed division officers is specifically not to pay attention, once they've cleared the security issues." In other words, they are trained not to pay attention to a president's activities and conversations.

Combine that with Kotelly's comments on This Week and it's beginning to look like Starr is on the highway to nowhere.

Jonathan Turley was also on hand, giving a reprise of his rant of the last few weeks that "The most serious charge [against Clinton] is repeatedly lying under oath." He continued to underline what he sees as the seriousness of of possible perjury: "The perjury claims really seem to be the most precarious for the president. There seems to be developing evidence that contradict the president's testimony."

Turley is out of touch with reality; most Americans are not going to buy into a case based on what looks to be extorted perjury.

We got a laugh out of this exchange:

Leibig: "If Gorbachev is meeting with the president, that's extremely interesting and we'd all be interested. But the uniformed division officers, they're specifically trained…"

Turley: "Well, I…"

Leibig: "…to not be attentive to what's going on."

Turley: "I would hope if Gorbachev came out of the Oval Office with tossed hair and smeared makeup they would notice it. I mean, it seems to me that they have to look at the demeanor of the people around the president."

Russert: "I don't think we want to go there!"

Former White House Counsel Special Assistant Jeff Connaughton was asked the White House take on Starr's moves, but added his own assessment: "Starr has won a legal victory here, but it's one of dubious value. Because as The Washington Post editorialized this morning -- I mean, if he's on a fishing expedition, then this really may amount to reckless behavior on his part. And we don't know anything other than that he's been casting a very wide dragnet for months now trying to establish corroborative circumstantial evidence about whether or not the president may have told a false statement in a civil deposition in a suit that was dismissed months ago!"

Former White House chief of staff Leon Panetta, when asked about "his take," gave an uncharacteristically vague assessment of the situation: "From 3,000 miles away, it's a little bit like watching legal Kabuki -- there's a lot of intrigue, a lot of drama, a lot of actors running across the stage -- but nobody quite knows what the hell is going on."

We think it's clear, Leon -- Starr has gone completely out of control. Right-wing judge David Sentelle and the other two codger judges "supervising" Starr won't do a thing about it. Reno and Clinton can't without triggering a "pseudo-day night massacre" scenario. So now Starr gets to run roughshod over the Constitution.

Stuart "Odie Colognie" Taylor, not-so-stealth spokesman for Starr. leaked a possible reason for Starr's wanting to question Secret Service agent Larry Cockell: Starr may want to question Cockell about whether Clinton spoke to Monica Lewinsky on December 22 when the president was in Bosnia.

Taylor sounded completely ridiculous a little late in the show when the subject turned to alleged perjury in a civil suit over a sexual relation: "You know, I think one problem we all have in this is it reminds me of Potter Stuart's old quote: 'I know it when I see it," when the issue is what's obscenity in a movie. We're trying to figure out whether the movie is obscene and none of us have seen it. One perjury -- did you have sex with X? Answer, no. In my personal view, that's probably not impeachable. Others will disagree. But what if there were 20 perjuries, what if there 50, what if there were 50 perjuries plus a little obstruction?"

Stuart, no doubt fantasizing about what it might be like to say "see, I told you so" were his ridiculous scenario to play out, was quite full of himself. He was also full of something else -- but we will spare you the specifics.

The final segment of the show featured two columnist William Safire and historian Doris Kearns Goodwin. The question: what advice would the presidents you worked for give Clinton?

Clever, Russert. Nixon is perceived as a crook, Johnson characterized as a failure. Hypothesize about Clinton asking these two men for advice so you can continue to paint him as a criminal AND a failure.

Well, Tim, your reportage of rumors as "news" on Wednesday and hubristic handling of the aftermath is in our view a journalistic crime. And your damaged credibility combined with your not-so-subtle lack of impartiality are two clear reasons to consider you a failure.

Reliable Sources

Once again Reliable Sources was worth a look this week. Bernard Kalb turned the spotlight on Tim Russert's factually-challenged secret service "facilitation" story first misreported on this Wednesday's Today. One of his guests was Marvin Kalb who, while stating that he feels Russert is one of the finest political reporters on television ("He has politics running through his body, not blood"), fired off a few choice volleys at Russert.

"The word 'facilitation' implies pimping," said Kalb, "…I think it is outrageous."

Kalb's counterpart from the "other" side of the political spectrum was The New York Post's Deborah Orin, who seemed to want to discuss everything but Russert's bollixed story. When she asserted that the White House had started a war in the press, Marvin Kalb replied "this is a war… and Russert provided the White House with first-rate ammunition." Not to mention Salon and American Politics Journal!

There was also some discussion of a recent Newsweek poll showing the current waning public trust in the press, and the decline in coverage of world news over the last two decades. There was little discussion or analysis of underlying reasons -- including the press obsession with sex over substance with regard to the former issue, and the end of the Cold War plus conservatives having made inroads in shifting attention to domestic issues as seen through Reaganite glasses with respect to the shrinking coverage of global news and issues.

Nonetheless, it is surprising and refreshing to see one television program cutting through the pap and asking serious questions about press and media accountability.

-- The Editors