< PREVIOUS ] [ 1990 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
Here's a public-service suggestion for Bruce Benson, chairman of the Colorado Republican Party, and Hank Brown, the party's candidate for the U.S. Senate. Send $200,000 to the U.S. Treasury, with instructions that the money is to be used to reduce the Colorado taxpayers' share of the savings-and-loan bail-out.
Granted, $200,000 is but a microscopic black droplet in
that rising ocean of red ink. However, it is the amount of
money raised at a rally in Denver last week. The featured
speaker was former President Ronald Reagan, who urged the
thrifty, hard-working folks who can pay $1,000 for lunch to
go out there and win just one more for the
Gipper.
A few years ago, the S&L industry was a lucrative source of campaign money. There were also yacht trips for senators and representatives and cushy high-paid jobs for their relatives. The industry in return received, in essence, a license to steal.
Certainly there is ample blame to spread around both parties and at least two branches of the federal government. Treasury Secretary Don Regan ignored his own inspectors' warnings, and helped pack the Federal Bank Board with S&L cronies. In the House, Jim Wright and Tony Coelho got caught and resigned, while in the Senate, the Keating Five investigation will of course wait until after the election.
The result -- $500 billion and counting -- is easily the largest theft in the 2,700 years since money was invented. By comparison, the biggest old-fashioned gun-and-dynamite bank robbery (Jan. 22, 1976 in Beirut) got a mere $50 million at most; it would take 40 such robberies to match just Charles Keating's swag, and 10,000 to match the total American S&L heist.
We voters have been angry about getting stuck with the bill, so candidates this year have made a big pother about returning old S&L contributions -- they don't want to appear beholden to tainted money.
It is hard to imagine that Ronald Reagan has the wit to hot-wire a car, let alone mastermind the biggest heist in history.
But when all this wholesale thieving was going on,
Reagan was the one who had sworn before God and man to
take care that the laws be faithfully executed,
and
nobody was twisting his arm when he signed and then praised
bills like the Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions
Act.
To refuse to take money from Ken Good, Bill Walters or Charles Keating, but to allow yourself to use campaign money raised by Ronald Reagan is the same as saying that those greasy bills from Knee-Cap Lenny are disgusting, but that Don Vito Corleone's crisp cash is as pure as the driven snow.
The $200,000 from Reagan's visit is as filthy as money can get, and it is supposed to help finance every Republican campaign in Colorado. If Brown and Benson have any sense of honor or propriety, they'll send it to the Treasury and then wash their hands.
< PREVIOUS ] [ 1990 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >