🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <6v9hb1$hfb$1@news-1.news.gte.net>, vtailor@gte.net () wrote:

  :Which is why I sat bolt-upright an hour ago when it dawned on me,
  :once again, that this budget surplus of ours is amazingly convenient.

The Clinton/Lewinsky scandal has been in the headlines for seven months.
Though it may be difficult to believe, there are some government employees
who go on doing their jobs rather than poring over the Starr report and
associated documents. I don't see the fact that the government reported
its figures while the scandal raged -- it was inevitable.

While this scandal has raged, I've gon on with my job, as I suspect most
people reading this have. So have most government employees. The chief
exceptions are at either end of Pennsylvania Avenue -- while Congress and
the White House are obsessed with the fruits of Starr's labor, the
government is currently running without a budget.

  :The U. S. embassy bombings in Africa, WHICH CLINTON
  :COULD HAVE PREVENTED, are the most glaring example of this, 

Congress could have prevented it, too, by allocating the funds to beef up
embassy security. The world is an unpredictable place, and it's a bit of a
stretch to blame government officials for failing to predict the future.
Reagan didn't see the barracks bombing in Beiruit coming, and Bush didn't
see the invasion of Kuwait in the tea leaves.

A lot of things happen in the world, and some of them will happen at times
that seem "convenient" for someone. When the scandals drag on for years,
dozens of unrelated events will grab headlines.

The world does not stop when the President is under investigation.
Watergate didn't stop the Arab states from attacking Israel, and it didn't
stop Nixon (or Kissinger) from handling the crisis, despite the cries like
the ones we hear now (although the phrase "wag the dog" hadn't been coined
yet). I seriously doubt that there is any causal connection between Judge
Starr's investigation and SwissAir 111, Hurricane Georges, or the deaths
of Gene Autry and Roddy McDowell. Things happen. No scandal changes that.
-- 
  "The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind."
                                                   -- Humphrey Bogart 
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Andy Walton * atticus@mindspring.com * http://atticus.home.mindspring.com/