Kenneth Starr: A Man with an Agenda
Ok, I'll start with my vague understanding of the situation. A Whitehouse intern, 21 year old Monica Lewinsky told a friend, Linda Tripp, that she was having an affair with the President. The friend contacted special counsel Kenneth Starr. Kenneth Starr asked Tripp to wear a wire while talking to Monica. Supposedly, when word got out about the tapes, Clinton is rumored to have had a personal friend, Vernon Jordan, contact Monica and urge her to deny the affair.
Ok, a couple of quick points:
Monica Lewinsky
It would not surprise me if a 21 year old young woman with a desire for bragging rights fabricated an affair with a President with a history of similar allegations. If she had the affair, she's an adulterer. If she didn't, she's a liar. If she lied, the best thing she can do is come clean about it. People of any age will tell tales to their friends to build up their image or create intrigue or controversy. It would be no big deal and everyone would laugh it off. If, on the other hand, she had the affair… Her conscience will decide. For now it's my understanding that she'll take the Fifth in her deposition this Friday. Somehow, I think that will make things even worse because then it will be Clinton's word against the tapes, and who is Joe Blow going to believe? If she was just spoofing her friend, Monica should tell the truth now and get it over with.
Linda Tripp
Tripp is a spy. She is not Monica's friend. When was the last time a "friend" taped your conversations and turned them over to a prosecutor? I can only assume she was trying to fuel the investigation into the Paula Jones case by supplying Starr with evidence of extra-marital affairs involving Clinton. Whatever the reason, Monica should really think long and hard about continuing any kind of "friendship" with this traitor. (A sudden thought: isn't it coincidental that a "tripwire" is used to set off a bomb?)
Vernon Jordan
My guess is that, if Monica decides to implicate Clinton in an affair, and if she also testifies that she was urged to lie, that this man will take the fall. While Clinton was a little vague about his contacts with Ms. Lewinsky, he was adamant that he did not ask her to lie and that he did not ask Mr. Jordan to contact her. In that scenario, Jordan will take all the blame, regardless of what really happened.
Gennifer Flowers
Leave it to Ms. Flowers to jump back on the bandwagon for a little more public attention. Did she have an affair with Clinton? She says they did, he says they didn't. At some point it came out that he in fact did have an affair and that he and Hillary had worked things out. But what has any of this, the current scandal, got to do with her? She claims she believes Clinton would have asked her to lie. He didn't, but she says it's not beyond him to do so. Well, seems to me history would indicate that he's not the kind to ask someone to lie. Otherwise he might have tried to influence her back when it would have done him some good.
Kenneth Starr
What a prick -- and that's simply my personal opinion (wouldn't want this a**hole investigating me…). This guy should really have taken the professorship he was offered. He might be doing the nation some good instead of screwing you, me, and anyone else paying the President to be a President by demanding every minute of every day that the President be hauled out of the Oval Office by his collar and made to answer for every rumor and allegation of every kind of nuisance and impropriety his filthy, small mind can conjure up. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Starr running for higher office or getting an appointment to a cabinet position the next time a Republican gets into the President's seat (without sneaking into the Oval Office while the President's back is turned, that is).
Clinton
Is he guilty of adultery? Do I care? Is he guilty of tampering with an investigation? I hope not. All in all I like Clinton. I've never seen a President try so hard to do what he thought was right for the nation. And it's for that reason that I sincerely hate Kenneth Starr. Starr has definitely bought his place in history, but the price is paid by the people of the nation that can't get their money's worth out of a truly hard-working President because Starr is too busy stealing that President's attention and energy and redirecting it toward defending himself personally.
Republicans
Because of the allegation of tampering with an investigation, a felony, what would have simply been another embarrassment to Clinton has turned into possible grounds for impeachment. The Republicans are drooling all over themselves at this opportunity to rid themselves of the worst thing that's happened to them in their long and sordid history: an effective and hugely popular Democratic President. They won't be leaving this alone. It wouldn't surprise me terribly if the whole thing was thought up by the G.O.P. as a tool for ousting Clinton.
Saddam Hussein
A lot of lawmakers on Capitol Hill are urging Congress to give the President permission to declare war on Iraq. I hate Saddam Hussein, but come on folks, this is not the way to solve it for two very important reasons:
We're in a no-win situation if we go in, and it's my belief that he now has his weapons of mass destruction ready to go and hidden inside his palaces. My prediction is that, if we go to war with him rather than making a precision strike to take Hussein out, Saddam will blow up one of the palaces with a nuke to make it look like the U.S. is taking extreme measures. Two things will happen then: he'll be free to use whatever other weapons he has available to him against the U.S. troops, and terrorism against the U.S. will skyrocket.