Monday, September 15, 2003

The wolf in the henhouse

I realize it may seem like an overstatement to say, as I have, that L. Jean Lewis' appointment has the potential to be a "devastating" scandal for the Bush administration.

My reasons for saying that go well beyond the outrage inspired by the news of Lewis' appointment as chief of staff of the Office of the Inspector General of the Department of Defense. It has everything to do with the serious questions raised by her elevation to that position, the chief of which I already noted:
Why was someone with Lewis' scant qualifications -- indeed, whose record of ethical behavior is, to put it kindly, extraordinarily questionable -- given a position calling not only for the highest level of competence, but also a spotless record of integrity?

First: It's important to remember just what Lewis' position is. As Newsweek reported:
Lewis has been given a $118,000-a-year job as chief of staff in the traditionally nonpartisan Defense Department’s inspector general office. With 1,240 employees and a budget of $160 million, this office is the largest of its kind in the government. It investigates fraud and audits Pentagon contracts, including the billions of dollars being awarded in Iraq to companies like Halliburton and Bechtel.

The Office of the Inspector General is not merely supposed to be nonpartisan: It is supposed to be a model of integrity and probity. Its own mission statement -- a document titled "Mission/Vision/Values" [PDF file], states the following:
Core Values:

-- Accountability
-- Integrity & Efficiency

Considering L. Jean Lewis' record in the Resolution Trust Corporation -- where she ran a T-shirt marketing scheme out of her office; secretly (and illegally) tape-recorded a fellow RTC employee; improperly disclosed confidential documents; and kept confidential documents in her home, all of which are likely violations of federal and state laws -- as well as her clearly perjurous testimony before Congress, there should be no question about whether Lewis should even be allowed near this staff.

Some of the more colorful instances of her lying before Congress were her claims that the tape recorder "turned itself on" and that her use of the word "BITCH" on the T-shirts she sold (with the subscript, "Bubba, I'm Taking Charge, Hillary") were "in no way intended to denigrate the First Lady". But the most serious instances of unmistakable perjury were her assertions that she had not made any pre-election attempts to pressure the FBI and U.S. Attorney about her shabby criminal referrals for the Clintons in the Whitewater matter, which were directly contradicted by testimony from the FBI (who had documented the contacts, of course) and several other law-enforcement officials.

It should be clear that any normative candidates for top staffing positions at any Inspector General's office should be persons with spotless records and unquestionable reputations for professionalism, ethical behavior and personal integrity. That someone like L. Jean Lewis even made it past the door raises serious questions about just what standards were used. This goes well beyond mere cronyism.

Second: At no point in her career as a low-level RTC investigator did Lewis exhibit any level of managerial capability. Nowhere in her resume is there even an inkling that she possesses any personnel-management skills. What in God's name could have qualified her to, out of the blue, rise through the ranks to suddenly oversee a staff of 1,240 people?

The only real quality that L. Jean Lewis exhibited at the RTC was her naked, almost psychotic eagerness to participate in partisan skulduggery. In this sense she was a classic Nixon-style dirty trickster -- not surprising, since many of the other figures in the Whitewater and impeachment scandals, such as Lucianne Goldberg, had bona fide ties to the old Nixon CREEP team. It was part and parcel of the anti-Clinton milieu.

Why would someone like Lewis be placed in such a sensitive position -- overseeing the audits of defense contractors in Iraq and elsewhere, particularly when some of these contractors, notably Halliburton, have significant ties to the Bush administration?

Some writers (including Greg Greene, who runs a generally smart blog), have suggested that perhaps Lewis was put in place to dig up dirt on Wesley Clark. Count me among the skeptics of this theory. Lewis in fact has been in place in the position since late last year, well before a Clark candidacy could have been anticipated. And the fact was that she didn't really dig up anything on the Clintons; what she proved skilled at was leaking trumped-up claims to the press and ginning up the juices for Clinton-hating conspiracy theorists. In other words, she is more skilled at manipulating the bureaucracy for political ends than she is at any kind of serious investigation or dirt-digging.

The more serious question raised by Lewis' appointment is this: Exactly what is going on in the DoD Inspector General's office? Are auditors being allowed to perform their duties free of partisan taint or political pressure? Is their work or effectiveness at uncovering fraud being suppressed or manipulated? Lewis' past standards of professionalism and partisanship would suggest that these kinds of problems are more than likely to recur in her new role.

That, in turn, puts the spotlight on the man who hired her.

Inspector General Joseph E. Schmitz

A quick glance at Schmitz's bio reveals nothing immediately amiss. Unlike Lewis, he is obviously eminently and fully qualified to hold the job. His resume shows a mostly admirable record of achievement.

However, there are two, closely related items in his bio that raise red flags: His close association with Edwin Meese, and his leadership role in the Federalist Society.

Meese too is a key Federalist figure. And this far-right organization, many of you may recall, played a significant role in both the impeachment of Bill Clinton and Whitewater matters, and continues to hold significant sway within the administration -- after all, the Bush White House officially discarded the longtime role of the American Bar Association in providing advice in selecting federal judges and replaced it with the Federalist Society. And Bush's solicitor general, of course, is the noted Federalist Society figure, Ted Olson.

Moreover, the Federalist Society continues to hold considerable influence on the course of the nation's war against Iraq, as Salon's Michelle Goldberg explained in her article "Above the Law":
Many of George Bush's legal advisors, including Attorney General John Ashcroft and Solicitor General Ted Olson, are members of the Federalist Society, which argued in a white paper that the War Powers Act is "unnecessary, unconstitutional, and shameful." Another member is White House counsel Tim Flanigan, who is largely responsible for articulating the legal arguments buttressing Bush's Iraq policy. According to the Village Voice, the Federalist Society gave Flanigan $700,000 to write a biography of former Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren E. Burger.

The group didn't return calls asking for comment, but its past pronouncements offer a telling clue to understanding the legal thinking underlying Bush's Iraq plans. A Federalist Society white paper about the War Powers Act calls the congressional power to declare war "a constitutional anachronism," and makes the rather stunning argument that Congress only has a role to play if the country is at peace and wishes to wage "an offensive (or what we would today call an aggressive) war."

Since that kind of war is outlawed by the world community, the white paper argues, the issue is moot. That same paper argues that the Act's premise of rectifying the mistakes of Vietnam is fallacious, since "by the end of 1972 the United States and South Vietnam essentially had the war won," and had America not fought in Vietnam, "we might well have lost the Cold War."

"This group of White House Federalist Society lawyers that is telling Bush he already has the authority to attack Iraq is the same group of White House Federalist Society lawyers that told him he could go right ahead and set up his [military tribunal] kangaroo court system," says Francis Boyle, an international law specialist at the University of Illinois College of Law at Champaign. "This is kangaroo constitutional law that we're seeing in operation here. What we're seeing here is a gang of ideologically driven lawyers who are getting the president and the country into serious legal trouble."

Schmitz's ideological past also raises other red flags. Before being appointed to the post by Bush, he was practicing law as a partner with Patton Briggs. One of his more noteworthy cases involved representing the racist anti-immigrant group U.S. English in its efforts to pass an English-only law in Utah (it passed handily).

There has been nothing in Schmitz's actions (or inactions) in office so far that necessarily raises red flags. However, some of them at least raise questions:

-- Whatever became of the IG's investigation into former Army Secretary Thomas White's travel? If it went nowhere, why?

-- What role did Schmitz have in the facilitating the DoD geniuses who came up with the ill-fated (even conservatives called it "Orwellian") Information Awareness Office?

-- Finally, did the Inspector General ever seriously pursue the seemingly legitimate claims of the (rabidly anti-Turkish) American Hellenic Institute in September 2002 -- that the participation of Richard Perle and Douglas Feith in any kind of DoD dealings with the government of Turkey represented a gross conflict of interest? (This question is particularly germane right now, since we are currently negotiating with Turkey over the use of its troops in Iraq.)

Even seemingly normal bureaucratic reshuffling such as Schmitz's recently completed reorganization of his offices should come under scrutiny. Is this another case of camouflaged "deregulation" in which audit procedures and standards are altered in a way that makes abuse and fraud by DoD contractors more likely to be overlooked?

These questions might never have arisen had Schmitz not hired L. Jean Lewis. But that stunning decision raises serious questions about his judgment and the standards of professionalism and nonpartisanship practiced by his office.

Nothing short of a congressional investigation, frankly, will settle the issue in a way that reassures the public that this office is being run as it should. As Joe Conason suggests, Democrats in Congress should be raising holy hell about it.

(On the other hand, Joe's partner in crime, Gene Lyons, doubts that any investigation would ever emerge from Congress: "Fat chance," he tells me via e-mail. "The GOP Congress wouldn't investigate the Bush admin if they caught Rove in one of those sting ops trying to lure a seventh grader to hot pillow motel." Gene's probably right, but there's always the off-chance that Democrats at least are growing spines, and can raise a stink about it.)

With that in mind, let me urge everyone reading these posts to take the time today to contact the Democratic members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who have oversight on these issues. Please write to them and urge them to demand an investigation into Lewis' grossly improper hiring. (I always urge people to write their own original letters, because spam letters suck; but please feel free to use any of the information contained in any of my posts.) Be especially certain to write them if you are from their home states.

Carl Levin, Michigan

Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts

Robert C. Byrd, West Virginia

Joseph I. Lieberman, Connecticut

Jack Reed, Rhode Island

Daniel K. Akaka, Hawaii

Bill Nelson, Florida

E. Benjamin Nelson, Nebraska

Mark Dayton, Minnesota

Evan Bayh, Indiana

Hillary Rodham Clinton, New York (wonder if she's interested?)

Mark Pryor, Arkansas

Though I don't believe in urging my readers to waste their time, there are also two senators on the Republican side of the aisle who may well respond if they hear from you:

John McCain, Arizona

Susan M. Collins, Maine

In the final analysis, I'd have to say I did overstate things by suggesting that the Lewis hiring in fact will become a scandal. But by God, it should.

No comments: