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The Patriot Act Abuse Myth
Yesterday, one of the Senate's leading Republican critics of the Patriot Act explained that his opposition wasn't to the security measure itself - but rather to the prospect that it could be abused under future presidents who aren't as respectful of civil liberties as President Bush has been. That critic, Sen. Larry Craig, mentioned presidential candidate Hillary Clinton by name, asking ominously during an interview with Rush Limbaugh: "Who will be her attorney general, and what might he or she do to your liberties and mine?" One wonders, however, where Sen. Craig was, along with the rest of the civil liberties crowd, during the eight years prior to the Patriot Act - when civil liberties went out the window with Hillary and her husband actually in charge. Sen. Craig, for instance, has yet to demand the release of Independent Counsel David Barrett's report - which reportedly documents how the Clintons used the IRS to target their political opponents.
Story Continues Below But even without Mr. Barrett's findings, we know that Clinton accusers Billy Dale, Gennifer Flowers, Elizabeth Ward Gracen and Juanita Broaddrick were all targeted by IRS audits. After turning down an offer to settle her sexual harassment suit against Mr. Clinton, Paula Jones was not only audited - but had her confidential tax returns leaked to the media. In a Sept. 17, 1997 report, the New York Daily News had no compunction about exploring the details of Jones private IRS return in print. Apparently oblivious to the massive civil rights violation that he was in the midst of committing, late News columnist Lars Erik Nelson even complained that Jones was profiteering from her lawsuit - based on the fact that she had "reported [her legal] defense fund to the IRS on a Schedule C: 'Profit or Loss From Business (Sole Proprietorship)'." Outrage from the civil liberties crowd? Zippo. Neither did the Clintons need the Patriot Act to have 1,100 FBI files shipped over to the White House Counsel's office, where - according to Linda Tripp [whose file was among those requisitioned] - the FBI dossiers where stacked floor-to-ceiling in the office of one-time Hillary crony, Associate White House Counsel Bill Kennedy. When the Clintons explained that it was all just a "bureaucratic snafu," today's Patriot Act opponents bought their laughably transparent excuse hook, line and sinker. The civil liberties brigade was also AWOL when Hillary's advance man admitted that he regularly recruited "goon squads" to stifle protesters at events where she spoke during her 2000 Senate campaign. "Less genteel souls sometimes referred to them as goon squads," wrote Patrick Halley in his 2003 memoir, "On the Road with Hillary." "But I objected to that term. I was proud of the fact that not one of them had ever been arrested." Halley unabashedly recalled that whenever an anti-Hillary protest looked likely, he'd "sprinkle" his goons throughout the crowd "so there was always someone able to respond quickly." He said his enforcers "could certainly be intimidating if the occasion called for it," lamenting: "Sadly, but inevitably, things sometimes got a little frisky." Nowhere in Halley's book does he describe how the Patriot Act allowed Mrs. Clinton's campaign to get away with roughing up protesters - probably because at the time Halley was working crowd control for the then-first lady, it wasn't on the books yet. The lesson here is simple: If the American people insist on electing candidates with a clear inclination to abuse power, it's a fair bet power will be abused once they get in office - regardless of whatever safeguards built into the legal system.
Editor's note:
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
2006 Elections
Inside Cover Stories
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