THIS FAR AND NO FURTHER
A Timeline of Events Surrounding the Radical Right's Attempt to Subvert American Democracy
Written and Compiled by Black Max
1994
June
- June 24:
Middle East unrest
UNSCOM says Iraq has begun to comply with UN resolutions by destroying chemical warfare agents consisting over of 480,000 litres of chemical warfare agents (including mustard agent and the nerve agents sarin and tabun); 28,000 chemical munitions (involving 8 types of munitions ranging from rockets to artillery shells, bombs and ballistic missile warheads); and nearly 1,800,000 liters, 1,040,000 kilograms and 648 barrels of some 45 different precursor chemicals for the production of chemical warfare agents. (UN/Electric Venom)
Fiske's final report finds no impropriety in Whitewater transactions; conservatives demand further investigations
- June 30: Whitewater investigator Robert Fiske issues what will become his final report.
Whitewater / Lewinsky and related "scandals"
He finds no criminal wrongdoing in the Clintons' involvement with Whitewater and Madison Guaranty, rules Vince Foster's death a suicide, and finds that documents removed from Foster's office by White House officials were handled properly. Republicans are furious with Fiske's findings, and move to have him replaced and to continue the investigation. The same day, Clinton signs into law a renewal of the Independent Counsel Act. Right-wing judge David Sentelle, a crony of Jesse Helms, will fire Fiske for what he labels "perceptions of conflict" arising from Fiske's appointment by Clinton attorney general Janet Reno. Sentelle, as part of a three-judge "independent" panel, will name right-wing ideologue Kenneth Starr, a lawyer currently representing tobacco companies against consumers in a number of related lawsuits, as the new independent counsel for Whitewater. Five former presidents of the impartial American Bar Association will write a letter that questions Sentelle's choice of Starr, with one, Stephen Bundy, wondering how Fiske can be fired for perceptions of conflict when Sentelle and Starr, both plagued with numerous and blatant real conflicts of interest, are themselves "consorting with the leader of the opposing political faction." - Fiske has earned the enmity of Washington Republicans since March, when he insists that any congressional hearings on Whitewater be delayed until he can complete his report, fearing that any grants of congressional immunity to White House officials in return for their testimony would compromise his report and make future prosecution impossible (similar grants had wrought devastation upon Iran-Contra independent counsel Lawrence Walsh's attempts at criminal prosecution, most memorably Oliver North). But Fiske's caution carries little weight in Congress; senator Alfonse D'Amato gathers a solid bloc of Republicans (joined by a number of cowed Democrats) and forces the scheduling of hearings in mid-March. The House Banking Committee schedules its own hearings for late July. Even Fiske's acquiescance to the Senate hearings didn't placate his right-wing critics; the Wall Street Journal along with influential New York Times columnist William Safire excoriate Fiske, accusing him of being part of the "cover-up." It is the Journal's editorial writers who raise the specter of Fiske's potential conflicts of interest, focusing on his failure to resign from his law firm and complaining that Fiske's firm does business with International Paper, who was peripherally involved in the Whitewater land deal. Fiske's negotiation of a plea deal with Arkansas embezzler and Clinton accuser David Hale, requiring Hale to accept two felony counts, also angers conservatives.
- Meanwhile, right-wing talk show hosts, led by Rush Limbaugh, are joining in the public flogging of Fiske, centering on the manufactured controversy of Vince Foster's suicide. Limbaugh repeatedly tells his audience that the Fort Marcy Park suicide scene was manufactured, though he has no evidence except a single report in an obscure, unreliable industry newsletter. Reporter Christopher Ruddy publishes stories in the Scaife-owned Pittsburgh Tribune-Review alleging, without evidence, that Foster was most likely murdered and the circumstances of his death covered up. Senator Bob Dole gives the wild allegations credence by publicly calling Foster's death an "alleged suicide." Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich says the FBI and Park Police reports of Foster's suicide are false. Representative Jim Leach, in close contact with Floyd Brown and David Bossie of Citizens United, insists that Foster's death is connected, somehow, to the Whitewater investigation. Fiske's finding that Foster indeed committed suicide, and committed the deed because of untreated depression and his over-reaction to hateful editorials by the Wall Street Journal, inflames his critics beyond reason. Fiske's findings that the Clintons committed no wrongdoing throughout the abortive, money-losing Whitewater deal, and his refusal to indict anyone, further infuriates his critics, many of whom believe what televangelist Jerry Falwell says of the prosecutor: "Fiske was appointed by Janet Reno at the suggestion of [former White House counsel] Bernard Nussbaum. It's like putting Hillary Clinton in there." (CNN, H.R. Clinton, Washington Post/CBS/Orlando Sentinel-Tribune/James Carville, Joe Conason and Gene Lyons)
- June 30: In an ironic coincidence, Bill Clinton signs into law the reauthorized Independent Counsel Act,
Whitewater / Lewinsky and related "scandals"
which will allow the appointment of a special prosecutor without going through the Attorney General. Clinton lacks the input of former White House counsel Bernard Nussbaum, a strong opponent of the reauthorization, as Nussbaum has resigned because of a swirl of allegations surrounding his supposed misconduct during the Foster investigation (allegations which will be proven false). As Clinton signs the order reauthorizing the Act, he mutters, "I may be making a terrible mistake." - The ICA authorizes a three-judge panel to name a special prosecutor; these judges are selected by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. The current Chief Justice, William Rehnquist, is a far-right partisan with a history of breaking the law for conservative ends. Authors Joe Conason and Gene Lyons write, "It was a serious mistake indeed for any Democratic president to cede control over this lethal mechanism to Rehnquist, a committed Republican and conservative ideologue." Rehnquist has not forgotten the bitter, partisan fight in 1971 that marred his own ascension to the court. He is a former member of the John Birch Society, and during the 1950s had fought for continued segregation of the nation's schools. He had engaged in attempts to prevent black and hispanic voters to cast their votes as a young Republican operative in Arizona. As an assistant attorney general under Nixon, he approved the covert army surveillance of antiwar protestors, a violation of the Constitution. He ensured that the Special Division, as the three-judge panel was called, remained stocked with at least two Republicans and one outvoted Democrat. In 1992, Rehnquist named right-wing religious extremist David Sentelle to the panel; Sentelle, whose record as a judge is spotty and his experience limited, qualified for the post in Rehnquist's judgment because of his affiliation with the Senate's equally extreme Jesse Helms, an unrepentant segregationist from North Carolina. Sentelle's Republican cohort on the panel, the aged Joseph Sneed, won his spot on the panel through absolute fidelity to the Nixon administration during the Watergate debacle, and is a reliable second vote.
- Democrat John Butzner, a holdover from the Johnson administration, has no chance of having his voice heard. Sentelle won Rehnquist's admiration by penning such screeds as his 1991 diatribe against "leftist heretics" who wanted to turn the country into "a collective, egalitarian, materialistic, race-conscious, hyper-secular, and socially permissive state." Naturally, Rehnquist chooses Sentelle to preside over the panel.
- Fiske's days as an independent counsel are numbered. Columnist William Safire, leading the charge from the op-ed pages of the nominally liberal New York Times, writes bluntly of Fiske, "Find a way to get rid of him." Republican activist Floyd Brown and ten members of Congress write to Sentelle asking him to find a way to depose Fiske. (Joe Conason and Gene Lyons)
Summer 1994
FBI buries evidence of Saudi involvement with Islamic terror groups
- Summer: A high-ranking Saudi diplomat, Mohammed al-Khilewi, defects to the US.
Middle East unrest
He brings with him 14,000 pages of documents, including material describing the corruption of the Saudi royal family, proof of Saudi support for international terrorism, and details of the $7 billion given to Saddam Hussein by Saudi Arabia for his nuclear program. FBI agents interview al-Khilewi but refuse to accept the documentation. Apparently the agents were ordered not to accept any documentation of Saudi criminal activity, even on US soil. (Greg Palast, CCR) - Summer/Fall: Three separate attempts are made to crash planes into buildings in the US.
Islamist and domestic terrorism
A disgruntled Federal Express worker tries to crash a DC-10 into a company building in Memphis, but is overpowered by the crew. An Air France jet is hijacked by terrorists who intend to crash the plane into the Eiffel Tower; French intelligence thwarts the attack. And on September 12, an apparently deranged man sends his Cessna towards the White House; he is remarkably successful at getting through the entire security infrastructure, and is only prevented from ramming his plane into the President's bedroom when he crashes instead into a tree just 75 yards from the bedroom window. The pilot, Frank Corder, dies in the crash. Right-wing radio and certain Republican politicians use the incident as an opportunity to make fun of Clinton, instead of worrying about how such an amateurish assassination attempt could come so close to succeeding. (CCR, CNN/Killtown)
Wreckage of Frank Corder's Cessna, resting against the White House
