Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot of Electoral Math
Listening to yesterday's press conference from Patrick Fitzgerald brought my unbridled contempt for Kenneth Starr to a new level. Fitzgerald's display of professionalism, discretion, and respect for the law made Starr look like the partisan hack that he is. There were many, many bad actors in Whitewater/Lewinsky investigation, but Starr takes the cake because he was supposed to be the grown-up who kept House Republicans from going on a partisan witch hunt. It's expected -- though deplorable -- that politicians, political operatives, and the hacks who fund and write for right-wing think tanks will use heated rhetoric to attack their opponents, but one would hope that the Special Prosecutor would take his job seriously. Starr did not.
Fitzgerald spent less than a million bucks pursuing his case, took great care to avoid leaks, treated the press with respect while still keeping their questions at a distance, and in general let the legal process run its course rather than turn into a media frenzy. Starr wanted a media frenzy. He spent $52 million of the taxpayer's money on a seven-year snipe-hunting trip through rural Arkansas. His office seemed to leak documents -- and of course videotapes -- as though it were going out of style. The Office of the Special Prosecutor practically invited the New York Times into the office to write smears of President Clinton and the First Lady. He indicted several of Clinton's personal and business acquaintances on unrelated charges, with the hope that they would snitch on Clinton in exchange for a lighter sentence, going so far that some of his indictments were ruled out of the scope of his investigation. If there were any justice in the world, Starr's conduct as a special prosecutor would have led to his disbarment, he would find himself persona non grata on the lecture circuit, and his best job opportunity in Washington would be on the custodial staff of the National Review. Instead he's the Dean of Pepperdine law school.
It's rare that I wish for justice to be served in the afterlife, but I'm willing to make an exception for Ken Starr.
