When Richard Nixon was president, he only wanted to do the kinds of the things that Bill Clinton has done -- and gotten away with. Nixon spoke of having the Internal Revenue Service go after his political enemies. But the IRS not only did not do it, they audited Nixon himself while he was still in the White House.
During the Clinton administration, however, the IRS has been auditing not only conservative think tanks but also women who have made accusations against Bill Clinton. The administration has violated federal laws by releasing the confidential personnel files of Linda Tripp -- and Attorney General Janet Reno has announced that she does not plan to prosecute this violation.
Those who speculate about Bill Clinton's "legacy" need to understand that corruption of the federal government is a lasting -- and dangerous -- legacy of this administration. Freedom is the exception, not the rule, in this world. The prerequisites of freedom include not only constitutional guarantees, but also traditions and standards which punish those who violate the norms that enable those constitutional guarantees to work.
With so much of the media and the public more concerned with showing how non-judgmental they can be than with protecting the norms that make our freedom possible, this administration has put us on the road to becoming just another corrupt country run at the whim of those in power.
The Clinton administration's big lies about gasoline "price gouging" and sending federal agencies out to investigate Big Oil is just one in a long series of corrupt actions. If they get away with it, in courts and at election time, ever more corruption will follow in future administrations -- until this is no longer America.