On the Prowl
"On the Prowl" Huanging It Although Ron Brown protégé and Democratic fundraiser John Huang officially left his Commerce Department job for the DNC in December 1995, the Prowler has learned that he...
...Whatever the case, Jeter was undermined...
...Jeter wanted to persuade Nigerians there to have their government do more...
...The White House group made no guarantees, but hinted they might be able to "thin the field" a bit for the FOP prior to the Hill police vote...
...Since neither Bill Clinton nor Al Gore were to be invited to the mid-October event, it would have been a perfect opportunity for Dole to hammer away at the Clinton administration's abortion and lifestyle positions...
...From mid-September to election day, the New York Times ran twenty-one front-page stories and another twenty-seven substantial inside stories on the break-in and other dirty tricks (not to mention Woodward and Bernstein's Washington Post reporting...
...14 December 1996 • The American Spectator Foggy Bottom Chief Justice Retired Maine Sen...
...election...
...Abacha took office seven months after that...
...Time to Retire Secretary of State Warren Christopher visited sub-Saharan Africa in October—the first time he had ever been there —but he should have stayed at home...
...was listed as a Taiwan subsidiary...
...Christopher was undeterred, and on his return from Africa, he made the mandatory pit stop on the "NewsHour With Jim Lehrer...
...Bill Paxon was a star at the Republican convention, telling anyone who would listen that as chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) he was doling out more campaign funds to more House races than ever before...
...As then—Republican National Committee Chairman Bob Dole said, the Democrats had failed to make a "public-gripping" issue of Watergate...
...The reason...
...It wasn't until the conviction of the burglars in 1973 that the inside story began to break...
...Congress remained in opposition hands, and Democrats actually gained three senate seats...
...But don't tell that to embattled Texas freshman Steve Stockman, the target of more than $2 million in negative advertising by the AFL-CIO who received no support from the NRCC after an initial $15o,000 last spring...
...Any of these people and their families could have received part of that $15 million pool and passed it along to the DNC seemingly legally...
...The U.S., he said, had to act against Nigeria because Sani Abacha, its head of state, had "annulled" a democratic election...
...Along with the International Union of Police Associations and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the FOP had been angling to win the support of the 75o rank-and-file members of the Capitol Hill police force, which was seeking union representation...
...Those funds are already earmarked for House races in 1998...
...Commerce was important to these types of donations," the source says, "because we could track which companies and businessmen this money could be passed to for donation to the DNC...
...He even crowed that with his help every GOP freshman would be re-elected...
...Abacha did not annul an election...
...On his arrival in Mali, Christopher said he wanted to build support for an all-African peacekeeping force...
...No Killer Instinct Even when Bob Dole had a chance for some divine intervention, he took a pass...
...Mitchell has his sights on something else...
...In early September, the New York Archdiocese and John Cardinal O'Connor invited Dole to New York's premier political event of the year: the annual Al Smith dinner at the Plaza...
...He told the Cardinal that it wouldn't be fair to politicize an event such as the Al Smith dinner," an aide to O'Connor said...
...Nonetheless, the day after Christopher made his pronouncement, Howard Jeter, a State Department professional, arrived quietly in Liberia...
...We had lists and lists of Taiwanese permanent residents employed or consulting with U.S...
...According to this source, who independently confirmed reports that Taiwan's 9 Kuomintang party was ready to donate $15 million to Democratic coffers, Mark Middleton, the former White House aide who in the last two years traveled to Taiwan on more than eight fundraising missions, was particularly enthusiastic 1 about the $15 million, even o calling Huang in Washington to discuss how such a huge amount could be handled as discreetly as possible...
...In fact, he told Clinton he wanted to be Secretary of State...
...History as Farce Will Clinton's re-election bury the Whitewater investigation...
...But Dole declined...
...It wasn't unusual...
...Then, in mid-October, the Hill police voted to join the Teamsters anyway, even though, said an FOP representative who lobbied the Hill police before the vote, the White House had assured the FOP that the Teamsters were out of the running...
...Thefeckless Christopher had done it again...
...suggestions while Christopher was publicly denouncing it...
...Jacques Godfrain, the French minister for foreign assistance, said the visit was intended only to influence black Americans in the U.S...
...We were shown correspondence and spoke to people involved who led us to believe all of our concerns had been resolved before the endorsement vote," said the source...
...He had a sensitive task...
...As an exercise in diplomacy, his visit was a disaster...
...companies, U.S.-based Taiwanese subsidiaries, and the like...
...Alfonse D'Arnato...
...Asked what changes he would make at the department, Mitchell told Clinton that he would want current U.N...
...Hell, the Buddhist temple in L.A...
...In late August, White House staffers met with members of the FOP executive committee, who suggested that Capitol Police membership might lock up an FOP endorsement for Clinton...
...One problem was that very few of the businessmen Middleton tapped for donations had American subsidiaries or even close ties to American business...
...ON THE PROWL Huanging It Although Ron Brown protégé and Democratic fundraiser John Huang officially left his Commerce Department job for the DNC in December 1995, the Prowler has learned that he continued to keep an office at Commerce well into this Fall — i.e., until the Indonesia scandal broke...
...After we heard we were out, we went to several people in the Labor Department for an explanation because no one in the White House would return our calls...
...Basically, the White House created a mirage, suckered us in, and then screwed us big time...
...Several weeks later, after the Teamsters did their part by ostensibly withdrawing from the selection process, the FOP board endorsed Clinton to great fanfare...
...deputy secretary of state Strobe Talbott transferred The American Spectator • December 1996 15...
...We'd see him wandering the halls, saying hello to people...
...Nigeria supplies most of the troops and pays virtually the entire cost of the Liberian peacekeeping operation...
...During all that prep time, Clinton and Mitchell spoke of many things, including Mitchell's role in a second Clinton administration...
...George Mitchell sat with first lady Hillary Clinton at the second presidential debate after helping to prepare her husband for both meetings with Dole...
...ambassador Madeleine Albright as his deputy, and elsewhere—preferably to the National Security Council...
...The system of checks and balances was ready to do its job...
...He told Clinton that he enjoyed working with the IRA and the British government as the president's special envoy on the Northern Ireland peace talks, and wouldn't mind a State Department posting...
...In fact, a number of conservative freshmen facing tough reelection campaigns have gotten little if any support from Paxon's committee...
...He also said he wanted to persuade other African nations to bring pressure on Nigeria and get it to stop its human rights abuses...
...Before you say yes take a look at the role Watergate played in the 1972 election...
...Whether Christopher knew about this, or whether he had simply forgotten it, was unclear...
...Meanwhile, no African nation showed any interest in pressuring Nigeria, and only Mali (where the citizens were forced to line the roads for Christopher's motorcade) supported the all-African force...
...Still, God does work in mysterious ways: Dole's refusal reportedly infuriated Sen...
...He would receive faxes, phone messages, all sorts of mail and memos here from other departments," a Commerce source tells the Prowler...
...He did not say what kind of pressure, although presumably he meant sanctions...
...When the Cardinal pointed out this was a dinner named after a politician, Dole merely chuckled and said he would send Jack Kemp if Gore were extended an invitation as well...
...While Clinton said he would love to appoint Mitchell to the Supreme Court, Mitchell knows he'd never be named chief justice —the only high court position he'd accept— and Clinton is said to be reserving it for Ruth Bader Ginsburg, so that he can be the first to appoint a woman to that post...
...But even in the Nixon landslide, the electorate took certain precautions...
...But on election day, November 7 , Nixon won with 6o percent of the vote and 52o electoral votes...
...Paxon Both Your Houses New York Rep...
...After Ron died, we'd still see him, but less frequently...
...Dumb Cops The Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) have learned the hard way what it's like to be shafted by Bill Clinton...
...his predecessor did...
...Freshmen in California, Oregon, Illinois, Ohio, North Carolina, and Maine who were three to five points behind their Democratic opponents a week before the election got none of the more than $5 million the NRCC has in reserve...
...The Watergate burglars were arrested on June 17...
...Indeed, the most significant result of Christopher's visit was a dispute with France...
...The rest was history, which does from time to time repeat itself...
...Nigeria did not want to accept any U.S...
...But some on the Hill say Paxon has gone out of his way to hurt freshmen who failed to back his efforts to gain a foothold on a more prominent leadership position in the upcoming Congress...
Vol. 29 • December 1996 • No. 12
