Hale and . . . Farewell?
Nelson, Rex
Hale and . . . Farewell? by Rex Nelson Little Rock Asmall coterie of lawyers, reporters, and retirees looking for entertainment gathers each morning at the federal courthouse in downtown Little...
...is the Lance Ito of Arkansas-he allows trials to drag on for weeks and even months, and this one has been a drag too...
...The questions about Starr soon spread beyond the borders of Arkansas...
...Tucker and the McDougals are accused of defrauding the government and two financial institutions during the 1980s in transactions totaling about $3 million...
...Indeed, there has been much more national media focus in recent weeks on Starr's perceived conflicts of interest than there has been on the trial itself...
...Rex Nelson is political editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette...
...Hale was the trial's key witness, and it is vital to the prosecution's prospects that jurors found him credible during his nine days on the stand...
...A statewide poll of voters who participate regularly in state elections, conducted in early April by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, showed that only 19 percent believe Tucker when he says he is innocent of the charges against him...
...Most Arkansans don't trust their governor, but right now the opinion of only 12 Arkansans matters...
...As for former Arkansans Bill and Hillary Clinton, they couldn't be happier that few people outside Arkansas are paying attention to the goings-on in Judge Howard's courtroom...
...Forty-four percent think the governor is lying, and 37 percent are not sure what to think...
...That allegation led the defense to call Clinton as a witness, which led in turn to the testimony the president videotaped in the White House on April 28...
...Prosecutors took the jury on a convoluted journey through a series of complex and obscure financial transactions at the heart of the case...
...He quickly characterized himself as the victim of overzealous Republican prosecutors who, unable to hang Clinton legally, had decided to go after the next biggest Democratic target in Arkansas...
...It's just a few blocks to the state capitol, where Bill Clinton had his office for 12 years...
...The scandal tour may have hit its final destination...
...Hale says Clinton put pressure on him in 1986 to make the loan...
...During his first few days on the stand, Hale showed his Jaycee colors, speaking with confidence, maintaining eye contact with the jurors, and deftly handling the questions that were asked...
...At this point, it's far from certain the prosecution can obtain any convictions...
...If they weren't alert, the prosecution is probably doomed...
...Tucker's ratings probably would be even lower among those who don't vote...
...Courtroom regulars have been spotted napping on warm spring afternoons, leading to speculation about just how alert the jurors can possibly be...
...district judge George Howard, Jr...
...As his testimony continued into a second week, however, cracks began to develop...
...The most common sentiment heard in coffee shops and on courthouse squares across the state this spring is that Tucker is guilty of some of the charges, but that the jury won't ever convict him...
...Nothing has emerged to derail the president's reelection campaign, and few people are paying attention to the trial of the president's former Whitewater business partners and his successor as governor...
...Most of the case is based on information given to the prosecution by a former municipal court judge and Little Rock businessman named David Hale...
...Though Arkansans seem uninterested in Starr and have long since gotten used to the peculiar antics of Jim and Susan McDougal (it would take pages to detail them all), they are genuinely interested in what happens to Tucker...
...After being indicted in August by a federal grand jury, Tucker began trying to influence the potential jury pool...
...By the time he was excused, Hale had admitted lying not only to the Small Business Administration (big deal), but to the FBI (a real big deal...
...He is a former national president of the Jaycees, which marks him as a past master of schmooze, with a big smile, shiny shoes, funny jokes, and a sincere demeanor...
...His popularity has plummeted, as evidenced by the fact that his plan for rewriting the state constitution received only 20 percent of the vote in a special election in December, and a bond issue he favored got only 13 percent of the vote in a January special election...
...The defense rested last week after just two witnesses-James McDougal in person and the president on videotape...
...It would come as no surprise if the jurors liked Hale, who has a talent for making people like him...
...Unlike Clinton, Tucker seems to have little political capital remaining...
...He claims that then-governor Clinton benefited from a $300,000 loan Hale's firm made to a marketing firm owned by Susan McDougal...
...Republicans who were expecting a new bombshell to come out of downtown Little Rock during the Whitewater trial of Democratic governor Jim Guy Tucker, James McDougal, and Susan McDougal have been sorely disappointed...
...the Rose law firm, where Hillary Rodham Clinton had her office for 16 years...
...the Excelsior Hotel, where Paula Corbin Jones claims Bill Clinton sexually harassed her in May 1991...
...and other stops on the Clinton scandal tour...
...It's been a long haul...
...In both a legal and political context, much of what is happening in Little Rock is about spin, and Tucker is the chief spinner down here...
...by Rex Nelson Little Rock Asmall coterie of lawyers, reporters, and retirees looking for entertainment gathers each morning at the federal courthouse in downtown Little Rock...
...He also has yet another Starr indictment to contend with after this trial is over...
...Tucker's party line-that Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth Starr and his people are modern-day carpetbaggers intent on destroying the reputations of as many southern boys as possible- was picked up by other members of the state's Democratic establishment and several newspaper columnists...
...Hale has made the only direct allegations against the president in the Whitewater case...
Vol. 1 • May 1996 • No. 35
