The Hypocrisy Of People In Glass Houses Throwing Stones

The Trump impeachment inquiry is only a pale shadow of the Republicans’ $70 million, four-year investigation of Bill Clinton.

DavidGrace
Nov 5 · 9 min read
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By David Grace (www.DavidGraceAuthor.com)

I want to cut through the hypocrisy and rampant intellectual dishonesty surrounding the Trump impeachment investigation.

Where I’m Coming From

First off, if everything that Mr. T is accused of doing with regard to the Ukraine is true, I think that while his conduct was terribly wrong, it was not an impeachable offense and if I had a vote, I would not vote to remove him from office.

Secondly, I published this column on September 25, 2019:

The Dems Are Suckers If They Try To Impeach Trump. Trying To Impeach Donald Trump Would Be A Big Mistake

Complaining Republicans Are Massive Hypocrites

That said, pretty much everything the Republicans are saying in Mr. T’s defense are embarrassingly transparent lies, hypocrisy, or both, and are so ridiculous that Trump’s Republican defenders should be, but aren’t, ashamed to even make those arguments.

If you wonder why people have absolutely no respect for politicians, the glaring hypocrisy and intellectual dishonesty of the Republicans’ attack on the House impeachment inquiry are Exhibits A and B.

The Democrats Are Following The Republican’s Own Playbook

In the 1990s the GOP created the gold standard for using a government investigation as a way gain a political advantage.

In 1998 GOP Speaker Newt Gingrich, one of the most vocal advocates for Bill Clinton’s impeachment, happily predicted that the Lewinsky scandal would gain the Republicans thirty additional House seats in the November 1998 elections. BTW, they actually gained only five, a fact that the Democrats should take note of today.

The Republicans’ Unrelenting Gov’t Investigation Of Clinton

In 1994 Kenneth Starr was appointed as a Special Counsel to investigate the pre-election potential role of Bill and Hillary Clinton in the collapse of the Arkansas Whitewater Development Company and the related failure of the Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan Association.

Over the next four years, Starr spent $70 million in 1990s money investigating Bill Clinton for a GOP laundry list of alleged wrongful conduct, much of which occurred before he was even elected:

  • The role of Bill and Hillary Clinton in the Whitewater Development company,
  • The collapse of the Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan Company,
  • The involvement of Hillary Clinton’s former employer, the Rose Law Firm, in the Whitewater development project
  • The death of White House Counsel Vince Foster,
  • That Clinton improperly fired members of the White House Travel Office
  • That Clinton improperly used confidential FBI files.

None of these investigations found sufficient evidence of criminal conduct to support a charge, but the Republicans and Ken Starr were not deterred by their inability to get something on Bill Clinton.

Like the Energizer Bunny, year after year, accusation after accusation, they just kept on going.

After three years of failed Clinton investigations regarding six different failed accusations, in 1997 Starr began a seventh investigation based on a sexual harassment suit filed against Clinton by Paula Jones, again relating to activities that occurred before Clinton’s election as President.

In a 1998 deposition taken by Jones’ attorneys, Clinton denied that he had a sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky. Starr eventually filed a report with the House Judiciary Committee claiming that Clinton had lied about having a sexual relationship with Ms. Lewinsky and had thus committed perjury.

He also alleged that Clinton had attempted to obstruct justice by trying to get Ms. Lewinsky to lie about their relationship.

After four YEARS of continuous investigations Starr finally made a colorable case, not for accepting bribes, misusing the powers of his office, treason, breach of the emoluments clause or any other crime related to Clinton’s performance of his official duties, but rather for lying about and trying to cover up a consensual, sexual relationship with a woman who was not his wife.

Neither of the offenses for which Clinton was impeached related to any claims of official misconduct in Clinton’s performance of his duties nor crimes against the United States.

In contrast, the charge against Trump is that he abused the powers of his office by withholding money appropriated by Congress in order to coerce a foreign government into finding dirt on one of Trump’s political opponents.

The Point Isn’t Whether Either Man Acted Properly

I’m not going to defend Bill Clinton’s conduct or character any more than today’s Republicans should dare to try to defend Donald Trump’s conduct or his character.

The Point Is The Hypocrisy Of Living In A Glass House & Throwing Stones

My complaint is the Republicans’ intellectual dishonesty and hypocrisy in pushing the Clinton investigation nonstop for four years and then today vilifying the Democrats for using the GOP’s own playbook in going after Trump on a far smaller scale, for a far shorter period of time, and for a far more serious wrongful conduct that is actually related Trump’s performance of his official duties.

The Republicans cannot honestly claim BOTH that Starr’s secret, years-long, multiple investigations of Clinton were a proper use of governmental investigative power and also claim that the House’s bipartisan, narrowly-focused, months-long investigation of Trump is a witch hunt that is being wrongfully conducted solely for dirty political motives.

The Republicans complaining that the Democrats are wrongfully going after Trump for political gain is like Casablanca’s Captain Renault telling Rick, “I’m shocked, shocked, to find that gambling is going on in here.”

Give me a break!

“The Process Isn’t Fair” Hypocrisy

The Republicans’ second complaint is that the impeachment inquiry is unfair because Mr. T’s lawyers were not allowed to cross examine the committee’s witnesses or to call witnesses of their own.

First off, Trump has told all of the potential witnesses not to testify, so the GOP’s idea of how this should work is apparently that the committee will only be allowed to question witnesses who will support Trump without being able to hear any witnesses who will say things that make Trump look bad.

That’s not how any investigation works.

Second, the Trump inquiry is being conducted by a committee that contains seventeen GOP congressman who hear all the testimony and who can question all the witnesses on behalf of Mr. Trump.

Clinton had zero representatives on Starr’s investigative team and all Starr’s activities were kept secret from him.

Potential Defendants NEVER Get To Participate In The Investigation Of Their Own Conduct

Third, an investigation is not a trial. Its purpose is marshal the facts. A trial only occurs if and when the investigator believes that he/she can prove that the suspect did, in fact, commit a crime.

When the police investigate someone, the potential defendant doesn’t get access to the witnesses before he’s actually charged.

Nixon’s impeachment investigation was conducted first by Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox and later by Special Prosecutor Leon Jawarski. During those investigations Nixon was not allowed to talk to any of the witnesses, review their testimony, or to force the investigators to depose any witnesses favorable to Nixon.

At no time during those the four years of Starr’s investigation was Clinton allowed to participate in any way, see the evidence obtained, or to present testimony from witnesses beneficial to him.

Just like Nixon and Clinton and any other person being investigated, Trump has neither a legal nor a moral right to participate in the investigation of his own potential wrongful conduct, but unlike Clinton, Trump has seventeen Republican congressman there to participate on his behalf and report back everything that happened.

Republicans Are Hypocrites When They Claim The Democrats’ Inquiry Is An Improper Political Stunt

I’m not defending Bill Clinton’s conduct or character. I’m calling out as hypocrites the Republicans who complain that the Trump investigation is a terribly unfair political attack.

If the Democrats are taking testimony in order to politically wound Trump, then their game plan is based on a strategy invented by Newt Gingrich and the House Republicans in their pursuit of Bill Clinton.

Aphorisms, Homilies & Words To The Wise

In light of the House Republicans’ $70 million, four year marathon investigation to get something on Bill Clinton, the GOP today needs to remember these sayings:

  • What does around, comes around.
  • Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
  • Turnabout is fair play
  • Epistle to the Galatians, 6,7: “For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.”
  • People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.

What I’m Actually Upset About — Politicians’ Belief In A License To Lie

At the core of my outrage at the Republicans’ wounded cries is that they know that all their complaints about the investigation being unfair, rigged, a star chamber, blah, blah blah are lies.

These politicians aren’t babes in the woods. They aren’t ignorant about how Congressional committees work. They know that the committees investigating Trump have almost as many GOP members participating in the questioning and hearing the testimony as Democratic ones.

Short of perjury and falsified evidence, a lawyer who knows that his client murdered nineteen people will do anything he can to deceive, mislead, confuse or fool the jury into letting the killer go.

Short of committing a criminal act, that lawyer will tell the jury every lie and make up any phony argument he can to get the killer off because he thinks that the phrase, “I’m just doing my job” excuses anything.

Like that defense lawyer, the complaining Republicans aren’t concerned with the truth or honest arguments.

They think that lying to protect their side is perfectly fine because lying and misleading the public in order to get their guy elected and keep him in office is what they’re supposed to do, that it’s OK because that’s their job.

Politicians’ notion that they have a license, even a duty, to lie is what I’m really upset about. See my column:

Like James Bond’s License To Kill, Politicians Think They Have A License To Lie

The Impeachable Crime That Has Not Been Investigated

If I were going to investigate Mr. T I would start with getting access to the recording of the phone call between Mr. T and Turkish President Erdogan during which Mr. Trump agreed to pull U.S. forces out of the Kurdish areas near the Turkey-Syrian border.

We know that:

  • Donald Trump is relentless in pursuing his own self interest
  • He will do almost anything to keep his base happy
  • His own advisors told Trump not to pull the U.S. troops out of the Kurdish border zone but he did it anyway.
  • He would not have angered his base by throwing the Kurds under the bus without a good reason.
  • Turkish President Erdogan is not Trump’s bestest buddy.

So, we have to ask: Why did Trump do it? Or, better yet, What was in it for him?

What did Erdogan give or promise to give Trump in order for Trump to go against his closest advisors and anger his base by throwing the Kurds under the Turkish bus?

My guess is that he was promised future land and permits for hotels in Istanbul and Ankara and several billion dollars cash in a numbered account.

Of course, I have no proof. That’s just my opinion, suspicion, speculation, about why he did it.

I doubt that the transcript of the call with Erdogan will reveal any explicit bribe, maybe just something like, “I’m ready to proceed as we discussed” or “Everything is ready to go” or something like that.

The actual details of the bribe would have been arranged face-to-face in advance between an agent of Erdogan’s administration and Mr. Trump, needing only the final confirmation during that phone call that the deal was a go for Trump to pull out the U.S. troops.

If I were going to investigate Mr. T, I would start with a search for any potential meetings between him and somebody close to Erdogan in the sixty to ninety days before the Kurds were thrown to the wolves.

Then I would start tracing money from the Turkish government, friends of Erdogan, and third parties who might act as his bagman to some shell company or to a numbered account in some country where the U.S. cannot easily gain access to banking records like the British Virgin Islands.

The U.S. Treasury is actually pretty good at tracing those kinds of transactions. Anyway, that’s the investigation I would pursue.

You see, that absolutely would be an impeachable offense.

–David Grace (www.DavidGraceAuthor.com)

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DavidGrace

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Graduate of Stanford University & U.C. Berkeley Law School. Author of 17 novels and over 200 Medium columns on Economics, Politics, Law, Humor & Satire.

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