From: doel@bae.bellcore.com (Michael Doel)
Subject: Re: Weinberger's Pardon
Organization: Bell Communications Research
	<1hqqbuINN5qa@spim.mti.sgi.com>
	<1992Dec30.122028.2193@engage.pko.dec.com> <bhayden.725732024@teal>
	<1992Dec30.194220.29181@aio.jsc.nasa.gov>
Date: 30 Dec 92 16:20:38


Lest everyone think all Republicans are covering for Bush & co. on this,
here's a different viewpoint from a conservative republican.

Philosophy statement 1: No one (including the President and his executive
team) is above the law.  This is not to say that the President can't go
against the wishes of Congress, but if an explicit law is passed, even the
President must follow it.

Philosophy statement 2: No one (including the President and the special
prosecutor) should be unaccountable for their actions.  When some acts
without impunity, there is too great a threat of corruption.


Having said this, my take on this situation is that Reagan probably knew
what was going on and that it violated law.  Bush probably knew too, though
his being vice president at the time exonerates him somewhat from blame
(i.e. the President is the one who calls the shots).  I'm fairly convinced
that at this point, a fair majority of the American public believes this
about Reagan and Bush.

The key question is, what should be done about it?  By now, I think the best
answer is "nothing".  The worst part of any punnishment that could be levied
against either of the men would be the damage to their reputation in the
public's eye.  Since I think that's already occurred, I'm willing to end the
whole mess.  Most of the public seems to be saying "who cares" by now; it's
time to move on.

How does this affect your impression of the Reagan presidency as a whole you
ask?  Very little.  I still consider Reagan a great president who did almost
everything right.  I agree with most (not all) of the conservative
principles which guided his policy and think they are best for the United
States.  I wish he wouldn't have gotten involved in this mess, but that
still doesn't erase the rest of the good he did.  Bush has been a pretty
mediocre president on the domestic front even without the scandal (though he
did a great job on foreign policy IMO). 

As to the special prosecutor, I think we need to revisit the way it's
currently set up.  As I said before, I think it's key for the prosecutor to
be answerable to someone.  In this case, he should probably have been
answerable to Congress (for his budget e.g.).  Despite the fact that
Lawrence Walsh is a Republican, I do see a vindictive nature in his actions.
The filing of charges against Weinberger 1 day before the statute of
limitations expired and the disclosure of that indictment just before the
election were a little too coincidental for my tastes.  I really believe
that he very much wanted to see Bush out of office (which would not make him
unique amongst Republicans) and let that cloud his judgement.  Some changes
I would make are the following: 

	1. When a special prosecutor is established, he should be answerable
	   to either Congress, the President, or the Supreme Court.  By
	   answerable, I mean that the particular branch would set an
	   annual budget (which Congress would be forced to abide by) and
	   have the freedom to remove the special prosecutor if it was
	   deemed that abuses had occurred.

	2. Nobody should serve as "the" special prosecutor for the length
	   of a long investigation.  For an ongoing investigation, a new
	   person should be appointed once every two years or so.


Finally, someone had posted that they approved of anyone lying to Congress
since Congress so routinely does the same.  I cannot agree.  I think lying
to Congress is perjury & wrong.  Even though Congress is often corrupt in
and of itself (save that for another post), we can't condone false
testimony, even by members of one's own party.
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Mike Doel				<doel@bae.bellcore.com>
444 Hoes Lane RRC 1B-209
Piscataway, NJ 08854

"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat
 and wrong." - H.L. Mencken
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Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,talk.politics.misc,alt.activism.d,misc.legal,alt.politics.bush,alt.president.clinton