American Politics Journal

Failing Upward, Take Two
Ted Olson Gets a Second Chance to Wreck a Republican Presidency
By Tamara Baker

April 16, 2001 -- St. Paul, MN (APJP) -- Cripes, so much stuff is in
the news lately, it's hard to know what to mention first.

I could bring up the US media's studiously ignoring President
Clinton's landmark trip to India, wherein he raised tens of millions
of dollars for earthquake relief, and earned the unmitigated praise
and devotion of everyone in India -- even as the US press members
choose to holler "indictments are around the corner!" with the latest
developments in the trumped-up "Pardongate" non-scandal.

I could discuss how scores of commentators -- from Paul Lukasiak to
FAIR -- are exposing the mainstream media's rush to declare George W.
Bush "legitimate" by deliberately distorting some of, and omitting
other parts of, the Miami Herald's admittedly incomplete Florida
ballot recount.

I could mention how Geneva Overholser, a brave woman who, because of
her courage, is (like fellow honorable commentator Anthony Lewis),
not given anywhere near the column inches she rates, takes her
fellow mainstream media peers to task for coddling George W. Bush
any way they can.

I could tell everyone about Greg Palast's discussing how the GOP stole
the Florida election in the first episode of "The Calling", a new PBS
Series. Mr. Palast will appear and report on the purge of African-
American voters from the Florida election rolls, the purge that cost
Al Gore the White House. The program will broadcast the week beginning
Friday April 20: Call your local PBS station to make sure they'll be
carrying it.

I could even discuss how Usurper Boy's minders, none too sure that
even the kids of Republicans can be trusted not to go ballistic in his
presence, decided to frisk the toddlers that participated in the
traditional Easter Egg Roll on the White House lawn. (One never
knows when the fanatical members of the Toddler Liberation Army
will strike, you see: They could be packing Glocks in those Huggies!)

But no. Today's topic will be how the Shrubbery's minders, in
selecting Theodore "Arkansas Project" Olson as their Solicitor General
nominee, may be lovingly polishing the very gun that shoots them in
the underbelly.

You see, from 1981 to 1984, Ted Olson was a key legal advisor to
President Ronald Reagan. In that capacity, on October 25, 1982, he,
highly improperly, advised Reagan to invoke executive privilege rather
than come to the aid of his embattled EPA head, Anne Gorsuch (later
Burford). Because of Reagan's taking Ted Olson's advice, Gorsuch
was forced to resign as a result of the scandals Olson wound up
causing to be created around her.

In trying to cover his tracks and his butt, Olson went on to give
testimony that many observers were to charitably describe as
"misleading and disingenuous" and "deliberately evasive." As a
result, he himself became the subject of an independent counsel
investigation for perjury and obstruction of justice, escaping jail
time by the skin of his teeth. (My thanks go out to David Neiwert
for unearthing this information.)

After nearly unintentionally bringing down a Republican president,
Olson decided to try his hand at intentionally taking out a
Democratic one: hence, his infamous involvement with fellow
Federalist Society member Ken Starr and the Scaife-funded anti-
Clinton-oppo program known as the "Arkansas Project", which was
operated by Olson's American Spectator for many, many years.

Having failed at nailing Clinton, but having re-made his bones arguing
for Bush before the Scalia Court with the fix in so solid that even
Olson couldn't screw it up, Shrubbie's minders, rather idiotically if
you ask me, want to let Olson continue to fail upward and to give him
another shot at bringing down a Pubbie Prez. His Solicitor General
nomination is currently before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

I'd ordinarily be content to let the Pubbies stab themselves in their
own guts, but there is the danger that Olson could wind up replacing
John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court. Therefore, I urge my readers
to contact the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee and remind
them that Olson's clueless amorality damned near brought down Ronnie
Reagan back in 1982.

Don't bother mentioning Olson's partisan Arkansas Project nastiness;
that won't sway any minds. Mention instead how Olson's ham-handedness
forced Reagan to commit an illegal and stupid act, and to dump his
first EPA Administrator, Anne Gorsuch, because of it.

That should cause them to take notice.



Home • Latest • Archive • Search