It is a sorry state of affairs that it took Sen. Alfonse D'Amato, no card-carrying member of the ethics police, to smell the trouble before the press: Why was Roger Altman, acting head of the government agency investigating the Whitewater mess, giving three top White House officials a "heads up" on the inquiry? Next we learned that there were other, similar sessions. At the very least, some common-sense legal advice should have nixed these meetings. When it was all over, White House Chief of Staff Mack McLarty sent a belated internal memo reminding senior officials of the law; maybe he passed it along to Bernard Nussbaum, the president's ethics cop with a lousy track record, who was in on these discussions. Republicans wanted Altman's scalp. They always knew Nussbaum's departure was a good idea, but after all, they didn't want to solve too many problems for the White House.
What's missing from this picture? Where are those vocal Democrats who habitually summoned enough outrage to convene hearings about the possible misconduct of a former assistant housing secretary in 1989 or the dire misuse of gift funds by the ambassador to Switzerland in 1988? Aren't these questionable Whitewater meetings serious enough to raise some eyebrows, even though Republicans no longer run the executive branch?
Of course they are. But only a few Democrats are brave enough to admit it -- and congressional oversight has become an oxymoron. Democratic leaders instead have chosen to put the kibosh on righteous indignation; they are deeper into damage control. That explains why House banking chairman Henry Gonzalez -- who demonized presidential son Neil Bush as a player in an S&L scandal -- wants no part of investigating this first couple's ties to Madison Guaranty.
Silent watchdogs. Conspicuously quiet, too, are the resident Washington white hats, the nonprofit government watchdogs. Some are too busy lobbying for campaign reform to risk making enemies in the White House. There is, admits Charles Lewis of the Center for Public Integrity, a "quiet, unstated thinking that some may not like what the White House is doing, but they're better than the [GOP] alternative." The result is what Lewis calls "a complete, deafening silence" from the usual rabble-rousers. But the press, thriving somewhere down the food chain, takes its cues from the people who honk. And so a double standard emerges, clear as white water: If the Republicans had acted like this, the bad press would have come sooner.
There is no shortage of examples. New presidents are expected at the outset to establish blind trusts for their finances to avoid even the appearance of conflict of interest; Bill Clinton's wasn't created until July 1993, six months after he took office and three days after Vincent Foster's death. The long delay was not high- profile news. Neither was the revelation of Hillary Rodham Clinton's $100,000 stake in an investment group that, at the end of 1992, had nearly 14 percent of its money in health care stocks. The group had "short" positions in certain health care companies, betting that their prices would decline; it bet right, particularly since Mrs. Clinton's own health care task force was pushing price controls that could hurt those businesses.
No one says the first lady was out to make a killing. Rather, the issue is that the potential conflict should have been handled sooner. The White House said there was no problem because Mrs. Clinton was not a government employee. But when called upon to defend her closed health reform meetings, it turned around to argue she was a government employee. Again, no huge headlines. But recall the front-page stink when it was learned that Secretary of State James Baker owned substantial stock in Chemical Bank, which lends money to Third World nations. The investment was in a blind trust, but all the heat forced Baker to immediately -- and appropriately -- sell the stock.
Republican Rep. Frank Wolf of Virginia has taken to corresponding with McLarty to air another ethical gripe: Why does a group of the president's outside advisers have seemingly permanent "temporary" White House passes? Wolf argues that the political strategists have the best of both worlds, keeping private sector salaries with top public-sector access -- and no formal disclosure rules. "What outside group wouldn't mind `paying' an employee to go `volunteer' at the White House?" he asks in a letter. Strategists Paul Begala and Mandy Grunwald say they do no lobbying, their clients are political and the list is no secret. "We have met a higher ethical standard" than previous GOP strategists, says Grunwald. The problem, though, is that the public is left relying on their good intentions.
It's not that this White House has been silent on setting standards. There is, for instance, a five-year rule preventing certain top officials from lobbying their former agencies -- a ban that arguably works to keep qualified candidates from entering government service. And during his first session with senior White House staff, the president called for an administration "dominated by high standards and clear vision, and we ought to have a good time doing it." Trouble is, they don't even look like they're having a good time.
