.id AA03189; Tue, 18 Jul 95 18:41:08 CDT
Date: Tue, 18 Jul 1995 18:41:07 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 5 Num. 59



              Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 5  Num. 59
             ======================================
                    ("Quid coniuratio est?")


-----------------------------------------------------------------

And Where It Stops, Nobody Knows (yet)
By Wesley Pruden
[*Washington Times*, National Weekly Edition, July 17-23, 1995]

The spinning is under way, so this must be Whitewater time again. 
The White House gave its Whitewater file, all but marked 
"Sanitized for Your Protection," to selected reporters and 
(surprise! surprise!) there were no surprises in it.

This is supposed to be the complete file that was taken out of 
Vincent Foster's office sometime on the evening of the day he was 
found in Fort Marcy Park, his hands neatly at his sides after a 
gunshot wound in his mouth that hardly mussed his hair, wrinkled 
his shirt or spoiled the crease in his trousers.

Then the file was taken upstairs to the family quarters where 
Bill and Hillary, thoughtful tenants that they are, made a closet 
available until it could be taken to the office of their lawyers. 
The lawyers made room for it, too, though they had to move a lot 
of stuff out of the way. You know how lawyers' offices are, with 
so many files full of ethics and stacks of scruples and tons of 
tenets and sixpacks of principles lying about. There's hardly any 
room to sit down.

Whitewater, and particularly the incredible Foster coincidences, 
is unseemly for a lot of the reporters. Even to ask good 
questions is bad form. According to the Los Angeles Times, the 
file the White House so generously made public on contains "very 
incomplete records of the land deal but does not support 
speculation that the project was a fraud, or that Foster was 
excessively concerned about the matter."

The file, reports USA Today, "contains nothing damning to 
President Clinton or first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton." The 
Washington Post assured its readers that O.K., there may be a few 
"irresolvable discrepancies in the recollections of various 
officials" (called "lies" in plain English) but, gee, guys, there 
certainly was "no concerted effort to hide anything."

Perhaps not, since this White House has never learned how to make 
concerted efforts, but the hysterics are out to discount 
everything everyone knows about Whitewater so that nobody gets 
hurt when Al D'Amato and his friends take the first hard, honest, 
official look at Whitewater.

Newsweek magazine, in fact, suggests that the hearings could even 
be called off because it has conducted its own investigation and 
everyone can relax, it didn't find anything really bad.

"What emerges," the magazine reports, "is a detailed account of 
how aides -- driven in part by a desire to protect the Clintons 
from any embarrassment -- reacted after [Vincent] Foster's death. 
White House officials concede that the staff was sloppy, but deny 
attempts to cover up or obstruct justice."

Very little of the stuff reported is new, so the grand offer to 
open the Whitewater file smells like plea bargaining in the court 
of public opinion, cheerfully conceding a misdemeanor (sloppy 
staff work) while denying the felony (obstructing justice). Left 
not asked is the obvious question, why would anyone about to go 
on trial, particularly in the court of public opinion, open a 
file to reporters if it hadn't been sanitized?

The salient issue, as Newsweek delicately phrases it, is whether 
the White House "exercised enough care in preserving evidence 
after Foster's death -- and specifically, whether anything was 
removed from his office that suggests Foster killed himself over 
Whitewater... there is no document, memo, note, or scrap of paper 
suggesting that Foster, the Clintons or anyone else was 
orchestrating a cover-up."

The campaign to discredit anyone and everyone who asks questions 
about Whitewater, and particularly about the Foster death {1}, 
will intensify as the days dwindle down to July 18, when the 
Senate hearings commence. This campaign is not so much to silence 
the questions, but to intimidate the Republicans in the Senate, 
and Al D'Amato in particular.

Frightening Republicans sufficiently to shut them up is often 
child's work, and so may it be this time. But the questions are 
clearly frightening to the administration, too. Vince Foster may 
well have shot himself; you can find lots of people in Washington 
who believe he did. [But] it's easier to find someone who 
believes Elvis did it than to find someone who believes Mr. 
Foster did the deed at Fort Marcy Park.

Nobody thinks the Clintons made a bundle on their Whitewater 
investment, but a lot of people -- beginning with a lot of people 
in Little Rock -- confidently believe they robbed their little 
bank, and in just about the way that David Hale, the Little Rock 
investment banker who first laid out the scam, says they did.

Bill and Hillary and their accomplices have succeeded so far in 
skating by, avoiding the real questions by answering the 
questions nobody asked. This week, for the first time, the right 
questions may get asked for the first time. It's enough to scare 
some people to death. {2}.

---------------------------<< Notes >>---------------------------
{1} Regarding the pre-Whitewater hearings media blitz, pooh- 
poohing the enormous amount of evidence against the Clintons and 
their associates: it is reminiscent of the media blitz which came 
down hard on Oliver Stone's film *JFK*, weeks before it had even 
been released. In both cases we have an obvious attempt at damage 
control.

{2} You may not be able to obtain a copy of the *Washington 
Times* at your local library or retailer. To subscribe to their 
national weekly edition, phone 1-800-363-9118.

-----------------------------------------------------------------
     I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation."
-----------------------------------------------------------------
  For information on how to receive the new Conspiracy Nation 
  Newsletter, send an e-mail message to bigxc@prairienet.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------
If you would like "Conspiracy Nation" sent to your e-mail 
address, send a message in the form "subscribe conspire My Name" 
to listproc@prairienet.org -- To cancel, send a message in the 
form "unsubscribe conspire" to listproc@prairienet.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Want to know more about Whitewater, Oklahoma City bombing, etc? 
(1) telnet prairienet.org (2) logon as "visitor" (3) go citcom
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Aperi os tuum muto, et causis omnium filiorum qui pertranseunt.
Aperi os tuum, decerne quod justum est, et judica inopem et 
  pauperem.                    -- Liber Proverbiorum  XXXI: 8-9 

 Brian Francis Redman    bigxc@prairienet.org    "The Big C"
--------------------------------------------------------------
    Coming to you from Illinois -- "The Land of Skolnick"        
--------------------------------------------------------------

