Ground Hog Day with Al Gore

In the never-ending nightmare that has become my life, I have to write about the same criminal acts of the President and Vice President, over and over and over again. It will not end until they are out of office, since they control the prosecutors and-most usefully, as it turns out-they own the attorney general.

The late-breaking news this week on the Vice President's felonies (which he confessed to in February 1997) is that lots of attorneys at the Department of Justice can read! Consequently, many more people than we ever knew about had concluded fully two years ago (along with everyone else on the planet who can read except Janet Reno) that an independent prosecutor should have been appointed to look into Gore's manifest campaign fundraising violations.

In particular, Charles G. LaBella, the Justice Department's former chief campaign finance investigator, who was hand-picked for the job by Janet Reno, as well as several other political appointees, recommended appointment of an independent counsel to investigate the Vice President's felonious fundraising calls from the White House. Among others, this included high-ranking political appointees, such as Robert S. Litt,, who was previously believed to have opposed such appointments.

The Consigliere

Their reasoning was apparently this: Federal law makes it a criminal offense for "any person to solicit... any [federal campaign] contribution in any room or building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any [person who is paid by the government]."

In addition, it is illegal for the Vice President to be whoring for campaign money in Buddhist temples. Since Al Gore did both those things, LaBella sent a harshly worded memo to Janet Reno stating that the law required her to appoint an independent counsel.

The main Gore felony under investigation concerned his fund-raising calls from the White House. Though the media subtly supports Gore's allegation that the law is old and obscure, it is neither-having been amended by Congress most recently just in 1994, for example.

Moreover, every White House Counsel always sends a memo to "all White House stafF' alerting them to the criminal penalties for making fundraising calls on White House property. This is from one of the memos Gore received on the topic, from Bernard W. Nussbaum dated July 12, 1993:

"A number of criminal statutes prohibit the use of federal programs, property or employment for political purposes. Violation of these criminal statutes is punishable by imprisonment and/or the payment of a substantial fine....

"[T]he following types of activities are clearly prohibited:

-Soliciting . . . campaign contributions on federal property or in federal buildings. This means that ... no fundraising phone calls or mail may emanate from the White House or any other federal buildings . . . ."

- But the guy who wants to be President spent several quiet afternoons in his White House office hitting up about 50 potential donors for campaign cash on his White House phone, and his defense is-ignorance of the law. That was one of Gore's claims, anyway. That he is an ignoramus is, in fact, the only defense not directly contradicted by the law and the facts.

At first, of course, Gore famously claimed there was "no controlling legal authority"--and by the way, did you know I was the inspiration for Love Story. Then he claimed to federal investigators no less (White House felony # 4,562@-that he was not asking for money to help reelect Bill Clinton after all (hard money), but merely to promote general party-building activities (soft money).

That was the preposterous theory ultimately promoted by the Clinton-Gore consigliere, Janet Reno --Gore was only soliciting soft money, so it wasn't against the law.

The concept of "soft money" is never explained in the media, so one is left with the impression soft money is some evil trick of conveying large amounts of cash to politicians in pillow cases or something. All "soft money" means is this: money the federal government hasn't regulated. Since the federal government will regulate anything it can get its fangs into, that essentially means money that the federal government is not permitted to regulate, in accordance with the Supreme Court ruling in Buckley v. Valeo. (Which is why it is illiterate bluster for politicians to claim to want to regulate it.)

Support the Girl Scouts

Any donation to a federal campaign is hard money. Only money that is spent on state campaigns-or no campaigns at all, such as for general "party-building" activities-is "soft money." And it is soft money simply because such money is spent on activities unregulatable by the United States Congress. Taking a broad view, the money you leave on your doorstep for the paper boy is "soft money."

So, if Gore were not calling for donations to "help reelect Bill Clinton" but rather were saying to donors something like, "The Rhode Island Democrat Party could really use your support this year," he would have been calling for soft money. If he had said, "The Girl Scouts of America could really use your support this year," he would also have been calling for soft money.