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Like any other civic-minded American, I enjoy reading salacious material about Newton Leroy Gingrich, speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, and William Jefferson Clinton, president of the United States.
I must confess, though, that I haven't followed any of the current scandals closely. In Clinton's case, I wish our Cultural & Media Elite would just focus on one thing -- Whitewater, Paula Jones, FBI files, foreign campaign contributions, the price of a night at the White House, whatever -- so that I could read up on that single issue, instead of feeling so overwhelmed.
Further, I wish they'd focus on presidential misdeeds. Whatever he or Hillary might have done in Arkansas is for Arkansas's courts and voters to worry about.
As for Gingrich, I'm a bit underwhelmed. As I understand it, he's accused of channeling money from a tax-exempt foundation to a partisan political organization, then of misleading the House Ethics Committee about that money flow, and then of planning a spin-control operation despite his promise that he wouldn't -- this last item being recorded from a cellular-telephone call he made.
Start with the tax-exempt foundations. They're not supposed to try to influence legislation or elections.
And so, when I run across a press release from, say, the
Cato Institute, perhaps some passionate argument for
privatizing law enforcement so that rich people will be
able to choose their own investigators if they're near a
crime scene, always there is a statement printed at the
bottom of the page, to the effect of This is not
intended to influence any legislation or election
...
Sure. It's just supposed to influence me so I'll write something that is intended to influence, but the distinction is rather fine.
And those educational
fliers that the various
tax-exempt traditional-values coalitions distribute in
church parking lots on the Sunday before election aren't
supposed to influence the vote, either.
Right. it's just useful information, so that when I learn that Candidate A once shook hands with a lesbian at a rally, while Candidate B demands that the 10 Commandments be posted in every motor-vehicle department office so that people will have plenty of time to contemplate the Decalogue, I'll cast an informed ballot, which just happens to be for Candidate B.
So the Gingrich scandal
could produce one useful
reform -- end the hypocrisy of pretending that these
tax-exempt educational
foundations aren't trying to
steer the ship of state. Why not just change the rules so
they can operate directly, and eliminate these
pretenses?
Then there's Gingrich's admission that he might have misled the ethics committee.
I can understand why Congress might prefer to have leaders who respect the institution, and demonstrate that respect by being truthful. But that's the business of Congress.
But I can't understand why it is a crime to lie to
Congress, when it is not a crime for Congress to lie to us.
This is the same rotten deal we get from the police -- they
can lie and mislead all they want when they're questioning
us, but we can get charged with obstructing justice
if we do the same thing when we're answering them.
So there's another reform that could come from the current Gingrich mess -- either make it a crime for public officers and officials to lie to the public, or else remove the penalties for lying to the government.
Now, to the cell-phone call. Most people I know just assume that anything you say over any phone, let alone one that broadcasts, might end up in the wrong hands and be used against you.
One possible reform from this might be legislation to improve our rights to privacy. The best reform would be to ban cellular telephones entirely, or at least let certain regions (such as the one I live in) prohibit their use.
The availability of cellular service attracts people who thing they're so important that the world would stop turning if they were ever out of touch, and the fewer such folks I have to live near, the better.
But we're missing the obvious reforms that should come from both the Clinton and Gingrich woes.
Both Clintons are lawyers, and yet they've run up millions in legal fees in defending themselves against various allegations. Doesn't that indicate that they're something wrong with our court system, that even people who know its processes and procedures must bankrupt themselves after the process server arrives?
And Gingrich admitted he might have been unfamiliar with certain arcane aspects of the tax laws. He helps write those laws, and he votes on them. If he can't quite understand what's in there, what hope do the rest of us have?
Now's the time for him to ram through some tax reform and simplification, so that some good comes from all this sound and fury.
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