That's exactly the advice Janet Reno needed to hear and heed before making the call to send more than 130 federal marshals and INS agents into the peaceful home, armed with assault weapons and tear gas. At her press conference Saturday morning Janet Reno was shameless. If it weren't for her Parkinson's-induced thumb tapping on the podium, one could have been lulled uninterrupted into her peaceful delusion. Clinton, at a brief Rose Garden press conference later in the morning, mimicked Reno, while continuing to distance himself from any responsibility in the Elian Gonzalez ordeal. In his Clintonian way, he carefully avoided images of INS agents storming the home in the dark to grab the child.
Many questions remain unanswered.
Young Marisleysis says the family was on hold with the Justice Department and had no idea what was about to happen. When they heard the front door being knocked down, she explains, they thought a fight had broken out among protesters outside the house. That an assault weapon was pointed at them is inexcusable. The future for Elian seems grim. The image of Clinton's impeachment lawyer, who is representing Juan Miguel Gonzalez, praising Janet Reno's actions, reminds us that the buck does indeed stop with the President and his Attorney General.