Zealotry for the law! Part I

In my previous post about Super Rod Blago, I took a swipe at U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. In fact, following up on a comment from His Honour Lord Macrum of Maine, I relished the possibility of Patrick Fitzgerald losing the case. To his credit, Macrum did not let that pass without asking me why I felt this antipathy toward Fitzgerald, and he also asked what I thought about Kenneth Starr's pursuit of President Clinton back in the heady days of the 1990s. (Heh... er, sorry about that.)

I will start at the end, which is the beginning, and then work my way back, which is actually forward. In time, I mean. Whatever. This post is about Ken Starr. The next one will be about Patrick Fitzgerald.

Ken Starr, for those that were too young, too drunk or too wise to have been paying attention, was the United States Solicitor General during the administration of the first President Bush. He was later appointed by a three-judge panel to investigate the Whitewater controversy, which implicated Bill and Hilary Clinton in a failed real estate venture and, by extension, into the questionable circumstances surrounding the failure of Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan, which was owned by the Clintons' real estate business partner. All of this was somewhat interesting at the time, but it soon became clear that as far as the Whitewater land development and Madison Guaranty issues were concerned, the Clintons seemed always to be just removed enough not to pursued in a criminal sense. But they were certainly guilty of having associations with crooked business partners. Fifteen individuals were eventually convicted of federal crimes, mostly embezzlement, tax fraud, loan fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud, related to the Whitewater affair.

The problem was that the investigation, like almost all white collar investigations, dragged on for ages. Kenneth Starr unearthed some evidence of sketchy or questionable conduct by the Clintons, and by times the Clintons seemed less than forthcoming about the matter. But instead of dropping the issue and moving on, Mr. Starr kept digging, always finding out a bit more, but never enough to charge or present an impeachment report related to Whitewater.

Concurrent to this, of course, President Clinton was pursued in the courts by a woman, Paula Jones, to whom he had been very rude. I am not excusing Clinton's behaviour, which allegedly involved a sudden and unexpected invitation to a certain intimacy, but this is the political and social climate we have lived in since the 1980s, where rude behaviour is often considered illegal. Like almost all civil suits, this too dragged on for ages, and by the time it came to fore in the courts, putting it frequently in the news, President Clinton had been subpoenaed and had testified in a deposition and had once again raised suspicions about his truthfulness. And it was here that things went out of control: Kenneth Starr asked the Attorney General, Janet Reno, for authority to investigate the allegations against Clinton relating to what he may or may not have done with Paula Jones and with a now-famous White House intern, Monica Lewinsky.

We all know how the story went from there. Zealotry for the law! Yes, yes, said Ken Starr, I know this all about private conduct, but the president may have lied about the matter under oath. Well, duh. Of course he lied about it. And while I do not condone or excuse lying under oath, my position is that no man, not even a philandering scumbag adulterer like Bill Clinton, should have to testify in a deposition or in court about the women he has had. This was ridiculous. I know, I know, I am opening up myself to criticism for saying this, because I believe that the absence of public criticism of abhorent moral behaviour has fuelled the general decline of Western culture in the last forty years. Bill Clinton should have been publicly embarrassed by these revelations, but I cannot see any justification for the matter being dragged into court. Ken Starr didn't see it this way, though. Mr. Starr is a man of great intellect, high personal moral standards, and great generosity. But he was blinded by his zealotry for the law, and put the United States through an entirely unnecessary political episode. One might argue that if it had not been Starr, it would have been someone else. I can counter that with you may be right, or you may be wrong. It could just as easily have been someone who would have pulled the curtain on the matter instead of ordering testing of evidence on a blue dress. Zealotry for the law does not always translate into justice.

Two final interesting points about Clinton and Starr, one of which may raise the wrath of some of my readers:

1) Ken Starr has since expressed regret about asking Janet Reno for authority to investigate the Lewinsky matter.

2) The laws which permitted Bill Clinton's prosecution for sexual harassment were put in place for good reasons, but the blame for the degree to which they have become weapons in the hands of vengeful people rests entirely with the political left. The obsession with political correctness that brought us to the day when a person's life can be ruined, socially and legally, based on another person's unproved allegations, is most definitely not a conservative creation.

If time permits, I shall post my complaints about Patrick Fitzgerald tomorrow or Friday.