On the Prowl
Why Mikva "Retired" T he final days of White House counsel Abner Mikva—certainly one of the most underreported stories of the Clinton administration—continue to be a prime item of speculation in...
...Mikva told the Washington Times at the time of his appointment that he hoped to stay through the end of the administration...
...Listed as a liability in the range of $1,000 to $15,000 is a debt to the Big Eight accounting firm Coopers & Lybrand...
...But the surprise is the fourth name being polled by the market researchers—Tim Russert, the NBC Washington bureau chief who has given the Brinkley show a run for its money in the ratings war since he began hosting "Meet the Press" in 1991...
...Bill Bradley, and former Gov...
...Clinton and Gore have said they feel the loss...
...Perot figured there was room for only one major independent candidate, and it may as well be him...
...The Prowler has been briefed on the documents' contents, and the list of people whose reputations will suffer greatly when these documents are released at the first Travelgate hearing, scheduled for late October, includes Hillary Rodham Clinton, First Friend Harry Thomason, and Bruce Lindsey, Mikva's deputy in the counsel's office...
...When not needed for the cameras or the crowds, Leader spends most of the working day locked inside a cardboard-carpeted Capitol basement office...
...I just started working here...
...George Will, who is seen by the network as more responsible than any of the panelists for the show's long-time predominance in the ratings because he was the first consistent conservative presence on network television, apparently isn't in the running...
...rr ragedy was averted earlier this fall 1 when Leader, the country's would-be First Pet and Bob and Elizabeth Dole's only dependent, was captured after he broke free from interns assigned to walk him and dashed across busy Constitution Avenue...
...Ron Brown's Fiske C ommerce Secretary Ron Brown finally has released his financial disclosure statement from 1994, which should have been out last May...
...When Russert arrived on the scene, he saw to it that the photo of himself in the bureau lobby was larger than that of evening news anchor Tom Brokaw...
...Hot Dog...
...What was going on at the White House about two weeks before Mikva decamped...
...Jim Jeffords and his staff are desperately trying to convince Republicans that he is a true-blue conservative, even though the Vermont Republican failed to vote for any of the Contract With America measures in the Senate or for the Medicare reform package...
...Even a Pat Buchanan staffer mourned the passing of Captain Trips...
...Pearson, a Miami lawyer who is on a first name basis with Attorney General Janet Reno, was appointed by a judicial panel July 6. It took him ten weeks to name a deputy, Edward Nucci, the U.S...
...Sunday Will Never Be the Same Who will succeed David Brinkley when the grand old man of the Sunday morning talk shows retires...
...Nucci said he expected to be working for as long as two years, which would conveniently mean no findings until after the '96 elections, when Brown may be out of office...
...Using as many as seven hot dogs purchased from a street vendor as lures, the interns finally retrieved the pooch...
...The Russert show has increased its weekly audience by 43 percent and consistently beats Brinkley in major markets like New York, Washington, and Los Angeles...
...After missing a last-second, 40-yard attempt that would have tied the score, Brien was overheard by the Prowler telling associates that he just hasn't been bootin' the ball good since Jerry kicked off...
...Teddy Jr...
...Brien failed on two field-goal tries in a shocking 27-24 loss to the Detroit Lions in a nationally televised Monday Night Football game on September 25...
...The questions causing him trouble, these sources say, have to do with alleged unauthorized andunreported contacts between O'Neill and the Communist governments of Nicaragua and Cuba throughout the 1980s...
...Apparently Brown's high-priced Washington lawyers, led by Reid H. Weingartner, needed a bit of assistance in trying to untangle Brown's financial relationship with his business partner Nolanda Hill...
...Lee Hamilton, the Indiana Democrat—which threatened to leak the identities of CIA agents throughout Central America unless the Reagan administration agreed to curb its contra program...
...12 The American Spectator November 1995 Perot's Plan C lose advisers to H. Ross Perot say his surprise announcement that he is forming a third party was designed to force Colin Powell to run as a Republican—and to preempt efforts by others to form a third party...
...Boxer and a Story Often Told After several interviews with persons claiming to have interesting tales to tell about a politician's early career moves, curious political operatives are wondering what many residents of Northern California have pondered for years: Who was the woman in the wall...
...At one point in 1985, O'Neill drafted a letter to President Reagan—signed by Rep...
...But perhaps the hardest hit was Doug Brien, at press time still the kicker for the San Francisco '49ers...
...In some quarters (even some quartersof the White House), the thinking is that when Hillary found out that the documents exposing her were being shipped into Republican hands on Capitol Hill, she either told Mikva he was history or chewed him out so badly that he quit...
...These were not returned until weeks later, and since then there has been no further contact with anyone on Capitol Hill—where at least one safe is brimming with juicy documents—and indeed no sign of activity coming from his office whatsoever...
...As an influential Democratic staff member on Capitol Hill in the 1980s, O'Neill was the principal author of the infamous Boland Amendments, legislative restrictions on the Reagan administration's attempts to provide aid to the contras in Nicaragua...
...William Weld now has only memories...
...by conservative colleagues—is trying to push his voting record rightward...
...Some Republican lawmakers are privately fretting that Pearson, a 64-year-old former appellate judge, is slow on the draw...
...Paul Tsongas, retiring Sen...
...The purpose of the test is to screen out moles, as well as people who may be vulnerable to blackmail or exploitation for any personal or character defects...
...They're not likely to receive any reward from its owner, however, who is said to tolerate the high-strung schnauzer only as a necessary prop to soften his image...
...William Clinger, the chairman of the House committee investigating the Travelgate scandal, was coming to a head...
...The message went unreturned...
...O'Neill has been a key adviser on foreign policy to House speakers Jim Wright and Tom Foley...
...In the weeks before Perot's announcement, former Sen...
...A firm doing market research for ABC is calling viewers and asking them for their preference on a replacement...
...Look for him to support radical reform of the student-loan system, Jesse Helms's legislation to eliminate the Office of the Surgeon General, and the full welfare-reform package...
...Brinkley's contract runs through the 1996 elections and a replacement could be named shortly thereafter if, as expected, Brinkley steps down...
...The tussle between the counsel's office and Rep...
...What's more, when the scale of the cronyism revealed in those documents is made public, it will clarify why the White House went to such lengths to cover up the affair...
...If he'd just paid the bill, we would have never found out about it," said one Republican staff investigator...
...As expected, viewers are being asked about current Brinkley show regulars Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts...
...Shortly after Pearson's appointment, courtesy calls went out from congressional offices involved in investigating various aspects of Brown's activities...
...Clinger had been trying for weeks to get copies of about 900 pages of working papers of the July 1993 White House management review of the White House travel office...
...San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Caen posed the same question during the late 1970s and early '80s, when he reported that an employee at the Mann County government center entered the board of supervisors' conference room to the sounds of passion seemingly coming from behind a wall...
...And the White House spin —that when Mikva came aboard one year ago he told Clinton he would stay no more than a year—is a sham...
...Ted Koppel, host of ABC's "Nightline," however, is on the short list...
...attorney in Orlando...
...The most intriguing interpretation has Mikva being pushed out...
...Intelligence sources tell the Prowler that O'Neill failed the test more than once and has yet to pass it...
...Brown's relationship with Hill, of course, is currently the subject of an investigation by independent counsel Daniel Pearson...
...As the story goes, the door of a recessed closet suddenly burst open and two board members, one male and the other female, fell out onto the floor...
...Sen...
...Lowell Weicker had been talking amongst themselves of starting a party...
...Never mind that Democratic Caucus talking points on Medicare encouraged members to make hay for the cameras and storm out of committee hearings in protest...
...President Clinton and CIA director John Deutsch are said to be aware of the polygraph failures...
...And at least one item listed under the liabilities section of the form is raising eyebrows on Capitol Hill...
...O'Neill is also having difficulty, the Prowler was told, with questions about numerous leaks of classified intelligence information to the press while he was a staff member, with CIA Codeword clearances, of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence...
...As a matter of course, all CIA staff personnel are required to take and pass a polygraph test on entry into duty, then every five years, and on return from overseas duty...
...Should Russert leave NBC, he won't be universally missed in the News Bureau, where his ego is legendary and the butt of much interoffice humor...
...S everal senior CIA officers are concerned about the appointment by President Clinton of Michael O'Neill to the newly created post of chief of staff of the CIA...
...Plenty of Leg The death of Bay Area musical god Jerry Garcia continues to "impact" the Beltway and beyond...
...Such events are old hat in Washington—but this tale's interesting because one of the women serving on the Marin board at the time was a young and vivacious Barbara Boxer...
...His excuse...
...Asked for the name of the person handling press inquiries, a woman answering the phone at Pearson's Washington office replied, "I don't know...
...Finally running out of excuses, Mikva forked over about half the requested documents in early September...
...How long O'Neill will continue to be allowed to serve in a top CIA post, which does not require Senate confirmation, is uncertain...
...Jeffords badly wants the Labor Committee chairmanship if Nancy Kassebaum of Kansas decides to retire...
...CI The American Spectator November 1995 13...
...Perot's new worry is that after running well but losing the Republican nomination, Pat Buchanan will be in a strong position to take his party's nomination away from him...
...He's been on a diet and was feeling testy...
...Who Is Michael O'Neill...
...The "retirement" announcement was made without the usual fanfare at a time when Clinton was out of town, an indication that the White House didn't want to draw attention to it...
...What is certain is that Mikva had been telling friends for about two weeks before the announcement that he was going...
...The White House had been able to keep the notes secret for two years...
...Because of new committee rules, however, seniority does not guarantee ascension to committee leadership...
...Why Mikva "Retired" T he final days of White House counsel Abner Mikva—certainly one of the most underreported stories of the Clinton administration—continue to be a prime item of speculation in Washington...
...Though Clinton appointed O'Neill last spring, O'Neill only recently got around to taking the test...
...When Hunger Strikes T he day after his much publicized hissy-fit during a committee meeting on Medicare reform—in which he called Ways and Means Republicans "the kind of people I fought against 50 years ago" and chairman Bill Archer a "puppeteer" and "dictator"—aging Florida Democrat Sam Gibbons called GOP committee colleagues to apologize...
...So Jeffords—nicknamed "Teddy Jr...
Vol. 28 • November 1995 • No. 11
