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SEIFFE:  The Barrett Report

Monday, December 19, 2005

By Ralf Seiffe

The last, living special prosecutor becomes extinct in the next two weeks but conservatives hope to see evidence that he once existed, soon.  Special Prosecutor David Barrett got his letter of marque to investigate the once-rising Clinton Cabinet member Henry Cisneros’ alleged pay-offs to his mistress and the tax laws that he might have violated.  Like many other special prosecutors, he soon found a much bigger case to investigate.  Conservatives want to see the report because rumors have it that there is evidence of massive mis-conduct by the Internal Revenue Service and that Clinton Administration officials used the agency to their own political ends.  Some pundits believe the information to be damaging enough to end hope for a second Clinton Administration.   

These must be some fire there given the smoke screen Democrat senators are laying down.  Our own Dick Durbin joined Democrat Senators Brian Dorgan and John Kerry in putting language in an Iraq War funding bill that would have prevented the release of the report’s most damaging material.  The gambit failed but subsequently, Democrats have succeeded with other moves that make conservatives worry that the report will wind up next to the box Indiana Jones sent to Washington at the end of his first adventure. 

Senator Charles Grassley of the Iowa Green Eyeshade Republicans is fighting to get this report released as every other special prosecutor’s reports have been published.  I wish him luck but he’s up against the best of the Clintonistas who have demonstrated time and again their ability to win Washington hardball.  Democrats know that keeping Senator Grassley at bay means that they will escape whatever blame obtains from the public’s reading the report.  

To remedy that problem, radio personality Bruno Behrend has suggested that there must be someone in the drama who could simply leak the information to the press, or at least to someone in the blogosphere.   

Leaking is a well-developed technique the left uses to keep the obsolete media in their thrall so why shouldn’t conservatives learn how to do it, too?  The answer is, of course, that conservatives believe in the rule of law and respect the process that’s keeping this supposed bombshell from exploding in public. 

So, the question becomes, is there any justification for purloining the report and publishing it?  Perhaps a similar situation that rose during our parents’ stewardship of the government could help.  Back then, The New York Times came into possession of a stolen document called United States-Vietnam Relations, 1945-1967: A Study Prepared by The Department of Defense.  This 7,000 page report was classified but leaked by a Defense department worker and the newspaper decided to publish excerpts. The feds stepped in and tried to restrain their publication.   

This became the famous “Pentagon Papers Case” but then the places were reversed; conservatives, generally, wanted to keep a government report concealed while liberals, generally, wanted some stolen documents to be published.  Can a leaker, now considering dispatching a copy of the Barrett Report to The Weekly Standard find any guidance in the arguments made in 1971 at the Supreme Court?  

The premise for releasing either the Pentagon Papers or the Barrett report is that the public paid for it and has the right to see it.  Moreover, if the facts in the report even half justify the frenzy in talk radio, the Congress has a duty to investigate.  As the work of a public body---even one involved in a potential prosecution---it has great news value.  The Democrats, by stonewalling the release of the Barrett Report, are engaged in a sort of 21^st Century version of prior restraint that Nixon’s government tried.  

Liberals once agreed.  Under the theory that turn-about is fair play, it’s valuable to resurrect a brief filed by 27 members of Congress 34 years ago.  Most of those congressmen are now forgotten by all but the most abject political junkies but a trio of names are memorable and indicate the nature of the petitioners.  They include Bella Abzug, Ron Dellums and the still serving Charles Rangel.   The brief argued that the government should not stand in the way of printing the Pentagon Papers despite the embarrassing nature of the documents.  Along with The New York Times and The Washington Post,  the congressmen made a case to which the Supreme Court concurred.  

Given that the Court prohibited the government from restraining publication of the Pentagon Papers, these leading liberals must have convinced the Court that “Information that comes to light other than by strictly legal process is nevertheless entitled to the full protection of the First Amendment.”  Presumably, the same argument can be made for a government employee who might publish the Barrett Report.  Our potential leaker should take comfort that the government could not restrain publishing the information if it comes to light.    

If the information is as advertised, the government would have a hard time taking action against the leaker because the release is clearly in the public interest.  The Congressmen’s amicus brief supports that notion saying “The attempt…to suppress the publication of these documents violates the both the legislative and the public right to know.”  Too right.  

Since then, we have enacted whistleblower laws that protect those government employees who see law-breaking and report it.  If the IRS was being used, this is just the sort of situation those laws were designed to cover and disclosure is the object of the laws.  As a bonus, the leaker might actually be entitled to a reward!  

The similarity between the Pentagon Papers and The Barrett Report is this:  documents produced by the government show real problems in the operation of government.  In the earlier case, the left used the information in the papers to start the process that lead to their orchestration of defeat in Viet Nam .  In the latter case, the report allegedly shows  information the right could use to orchestrate the end of the current tax system.  One wonders if the worthless report of the President’s tax commission might have been different had they been aware that the Clinton Administration had behaved just like Nixon’s.  

Oh, one other thing.  One of those 27 congressmen was Abner Mikva.  This legendary Illinois Democrat should re-energize his principles and tell Illinois Senator Dick Durbin to read his 34 year old brief to the Supreme Court and get out of the way of the Report’s release.   As precedent, Mikva should mention that Alaska Senator Mike Gravel had the courage to put 4,100 pages of the report in the Congressional Record. Given the venality of the current Democrat party, courage like that is a pipe dream. 

© 2005 Ralf Seiffe

Ralf Seiffe advises business start-ups and product launches from Chicago, Illinois and is a political analyst and columnist for the Illinois Leader and Illinois Review.