This video tells us as much about Bill Clinton, who is the only person seen on the screen, as about the persecutorial team headed by Ken Starr. The incessant questioning solely on the sexual aspect makes a mockery of the constitutional threshold for impeachment, "Bribery, Treason, and other High Crimes and Misdemeanors".Mr. Clinton comes across as a very smart lawyer, able to slice the language for nuances of meanings, of "is", "alone", ...(The prosecutors themselves indulge in such semantics, asking as to what specific acts were included or excluded in a definition, what the word "causes" is understood as, ...). The impatience shown by the public in general, and the Republicans in particular for such legalistic hair-splitting is not justified. He is after all, defending himself from the attack of a team of lawyers, who have virtually unlimited time and money at their disposal. He is not obliged to offer them more than asked, and at times when he chooses not to answer a question, considering it too personal and embarrassing, well, tough luck, Mr. Eisenberg! You have the choice (I think) to give him total immunity, and then compel him to answer! Of course, an ordinary citizen would have taken the fifth for many of the questions, but that option is not viable for a political office holder in general, more so for one who is occupying the highest office of the land.
The quality of the video and audio left a lot to be desired. It truly looked like a home-video, and at times, less polished than that. I would have liked to see the faces of the prosecuting team, when they were asking the highly (I am amazed how quickly this word entered casual discourse!) "salacious" questions. It is said that in general, Ken Star's team were on better behaviour, cognizant of the video taping process. I would hazard a guess that they would have been on even better behaviour, had the camera turned towards them, when they were asking the questions.
Mr. Bittman comes across like an attack dog worthy of James Carville's approbation. His very first question is "Mr. President, were you physically intimate with Monica Lewinsky?". As a response, the President read a statement, basically admitting to "involve inappropriate, intimate contact". This must have bowled over TheTeam, which promptly takes a break, to discuss strategy. Their state of confusion shows up in the first question after the break. Consider the following exchange:
Q: Mr. President, you statement indicates that your contacts with Ms. Lewinsky did not involve any inappropriate intimate contact. Mr. Bittman...
CLINTON: No, sir, indicates that it did, inappropriate intimate contact.
Q: OK, it did involve inappropriate intimate contact.
So it goes. Remember these are high-priced, high-intensity lawyers, zealots in their pursuit of Clinton for the past forty million dollars!
Considering the import of the case and the occasion, TheTeam seems to be very ill-prepared with many things. There is many a time where there is only one copy of a document. Why couldn't they have come there with enough for everybody there?
The tape should be viewed as a legal document, which it is. There are many occurrences of repeated questioning on the same topic, repeated, receiving repeated, almost identical answers. That's the nature of the beast. It would have been nice, if the tape were given to an editing house, to be condensed to a 2-hour version, taking out such duplications, things said purely "for the record" to satisfy legal obligations, ceremonial introductions, (and things such as would you state your full name, did you take an oath to tell the truth, ...), references to xxxxxxx
It is said that a prosecutor can get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich if he so wishes. Getting a conviction later, is entirely a different story. Even if she is unsuccessful in that, the process severely strains the finances of any but the very rich, so in a sense he wins even when he loses! Mr. Bittman unintentionally reveals the fanatical zeal of TheTeam, when he asks the question,
QUESTION: Well, we are interested -- I know from the questions that we received from the grand jurors they are interested in knowing what was going on in your mind when you were reading Grand Jury Exhibit 2 and what you understood that definition to include.
One wonders if the question is really that of a grand jury member, or his own.
The tape is must see for history, constitutional, legal buffs. And properly edited (to about one-fourth its size), it would be good viewing for the common folks too. I am sure such condensed versions would be available in future. As it is, it beats the length of the boring movie, "Titanic", albeit managing it to be far more interesting. END