Salon says I believe right. Gaderene’s Salon link says:
Even though Salon obviously hates Scaife, in the two portions that I underlined, Salon says that the Arkansas project involved paying investigators to look for corruption commited by the Clintons and their associates. Nowhere does it say that Scaife or the Arkansas Project did anything illegal.
BTW note the word “unearth” in the second underlined portion. “Unearth”, not “invent.” According to Salon, the purpose was to discover the truth.
another example of ‘december spin’. First you speculate that the Arkansas project is
then you read some of the links provided, quote from them and even the quotes you provide (and enhance by underlining) indicate that it’s a project funded by a certain select few folks, specifically to investigate Bill/Hilary Clinton, and you don’t see that as contradtory?
Perhaps then if we set up and fund a program to investigate underage drinking in Texas by young ladies with the surname “Bush” just to pull one out of the hat, funded by James Carvelle, this would seem to be a reliable, fair minded endeavor?
I don’t see a problem with the project having been funded by “a certain select few folks.” Is that immoral?
wring, your second point is not quite what Salon said. They said the project was, “to unearth damaging details about the president, Hillary Rodham Clinton and their associates.” Since some of the Clinton’s real estate partners went to jail and at least one of Hillary’s law partners did too, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to investigate their associates.
But, even if the project were focused on corruption involving just Bill and Hillary, why is that so bad, wring, or what’s the contradiction? Note that the Watergate investigation sought to unearth damaging details about RMN and his associates, just as it ought to have done.
Watergate was a governmental investigation, launched to check into a well publicized bunch of wrong doing.
the Arkansas stuff was launced by specific folks with an axe to grind, dedicated to finding stuff about specific people.
Though the differences should be apparent, let me elaborate for you:
say my neighbor is a criminal. The government gets wind of it, launches an investigation, with folks taking oaths and all.
Now, say my dad, who dislikes my neighbor, hires some private investigators to follow them around, look into every single aspect of their past for a period of a couple of decades with the express intent to find and expose wrong doing.
You don’t see a difference? You see the latter an ‘objective’ source?
Compare Woodward and Bernstein with the Arkansas Project
[li]W&B worked for a newspaper; Scaife owns a newspaper[/li][li]Both conducted investigations of specific people[/li][li]Both wanted to find and expose wrong-doing[/li][li]Arguably, both were not objective. (The Washington Post is a Democratic paper. They, and W&B, never committed that level of investigative reporting effort to Dem corrruption.)[/li]
I agree that private investigations are different from government investigations, but these newspaper people were doing their job. The Washington Post and W & B are heroes in my book for their Watergate efforts.
Oh, Lord love a duck, December! Its staring you right in the face!
The Arkansas Project uncovered diddly squat because there wasn’t a god-damned thing to uncover! Bill and Hillary made a bad investment, lost thier money, and that’s it! All the smoke and mirrors, fuss and feathers, was about nothing. Could it be any plainer?
They weren’t guilty!!!
Nixon got nailed for Watergate, which is, ironicly, damn near the least of his offenses. Its kind of like indicting Vlad the Impaler for wearing brown shoes with a blue suit!
And, trivially, wasn’t one of the Woodward/Bernstein guys a registered Republican?
A) The money transferred to our pair of shady republican activists was from a 501c(3) charitable foundation. Someone was getting a tax break by donating money with the expressed purpose of uncovering corruption in the dealings of a political opponent.
B) Scaife stopped funding the project because he was concerned about how the money was being disbursed. I think that even he was concerned that nonprofit funds were being spent to pay for the legal defense of a crooked Arkansas judge who was willing to provide evidence against Clinton to save his own ass. All of which evidence, of course, was subsequently discredited.
Thank you Meglin. I’ve been trying to understand why the Arkansas Project has been represented as so really terrible, and you’ve offered an explanation.
Question: What was “shady” about these Republican activists?
(Note that some would consider the phrase “shady Republican” to be a redundancy. ;))
Yes, this thought had occurred to me. Was that tax break illegal? Was anyone charged with tax evasion or tax fraud? Was anyone required to go back and pay tax on allegedly tax-deductible money used to fund this project?
OTOH if the tax deduction was legal, then what’s the problem?
I take this paragraph to mean that the Project had become embarassing to Scaife and that it was unsuccessful. From what I’ve read, I’d agree.
Still, having an investigation that doesn’t pan out doesn’t sound like a crime to me, or even particularly immoral.
Again, Maeglin I appreciate your information and opinion on this matter.
Every Monday I check out Democratic Underground (thats democracticunderground.com, folks) weekly Top 10 Conservative Idiots which is a hoot, a laugh riot, and good clean fun.
Anyway, my whole premise appears to be crapulous. The original story appeared way buried in NY Times, Hilary was in fact only supposed to speak for twenty seconds or so, and the cheers were seen by the reporter as far outweighing the boos. Twas Drudge who spun it widdershins, and I fell for it!
So…I’m full of beans.
I go now to perform the Ancient Tasmanian Ritual of Self-Abasement, accompanied by a chorus of bitter virgins intoning dirges of woe and humiliation.
You’re welcome, december. I do not mean to be short of tone. This is merely an issue which gets me rather excised.
And yes, Ken Starr himself investigated the alleged payoffs to David Hale with nonprofit funds. He appointed Michael E. Shaheen, Jr., of the OIC, to do the investigative work.
But here’s the problem.
Richard Mellon Scaife funded Ken Starr’s chair at Pepperdine University with $1 million.
Quite the reverse. Surely a real conspirator would have kept Starr on the job doing his nefarious deeds. However, in order to take that position, Starr would have resigned as Special Prosecutor.
Starr got vilified when he prosecuted and vilified when he tried to stop prosecuting. Scaife got vilified for supporting Starr as Prosecutor and for taking an action that would have removed Starr as Prosecutor.
december, I find your double-reverse-rationcinatio logic rather bewildering. Can you please relate it in a way that a liberal, who does now know how the world works, can understand?
After all, if Starr began prosecuting under shaky circumstances, why should he not be criticized? And if he left under circumstances of the same nature, why should he not be criticized?
