Friday, May 06, 2005
Lanny Davis sandbags Paul Volcker
A year ago, it would have been impossible for any conservative to imagine cheering while Lanny Davis -- Bill Clinton's Special White House Counsel -- sandbags Paul Volcker, inflation-fighting hero of old.
What a difference a year makes.
Lanny Davis represents Robert Parton, one of the dissident members of the Volcker panel, which investigated the UN oil-for-food scandal. Parton was apparently bound by a confidentiality agreement, and got caught between an American rock and the United Nations hard place when a Congressional committee hit him with a subpoena to produce documents and testify. Anti-UN Congressmen, of course, want to find out whether the Volcker panel's report -- which Annan has characterized as "exonerating" -- was a whitewash, and Parton wants to help them.
Davis, apparently, has found a way for Parton to produce his wad of incriminating documents to Congress.
Davis apparently accomplished this with a deft bit of lawyer's tradecraft:
Does anybody think the "source" for the Post's story is anybody other than Lanny Davis?
Amy Guttman better hope that these documents don't get published before Penn's commencement!
UPDATE: The Wall Street Journal persuasively argues that conservatives who want to get to the bottom of the oil-for-food scandal are playing right into the hands of the United Nations establishment:
So perhaps conservatives should not be cheering on Lanny Davis. That will resolve some serious cognitive dissonance.
What a difference a year makes.
Lanny Davis represents Robert Parton, one of the dissident members of the Volcker panel, which investigated the UN oil-for-food scandal. Parton was apparently bound by a confidentiality agreement, and got caught between an American rock and the United Nations hard place when a Congressional committee hit him with a subpoena to produce documents and testify. Anti-UN Congressmen, of course, want to find out whether the Volcker panel's report -- which Annan has characterized as "exonerating" -- was a whitewash, and Parton wants to help them.
Davis, apparently, has found a way for Parton to produce his wad of incriminating documents to Congress.
Documents potentially devastating to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan were handed over yesterday to a congressional committee in an explosive new development in the U.N. oil-for- food scandal.
House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) announced that Robert Parton, who resigned in protest from the investigation headed by Paul Volcker, had complied with the panel's subpoena.
Davis apparently accomplished this with a deft bit of lawyer's tradecraft:
There was high drama surrounding the subpoena of Parton because he was subject to a confidentiality agreement with the Volcker panel. Immunity laws typically keep U.N. officials out of reach of congressional subpoenas.
After secretly receiving the subpoena last Friday, Parton's lawyer, Lanny Davis, asked Volcker and U.N. lawyers if they would instruct Parton to defy a congressional subpoena — but did not actually tell them he had been subpoenaed.
When the Volcker committee and the United Nations did not reply, Parton had "no choice" but to comply with the committee's subpoena, a source said.
Does anybody think the "source" for the Post's story is anybody other than Lanny Davis?
Amy Guttman better hope that these documents don't get published before Penn's commencement!
UPDATE: The Wall Street Journal persuasively argues that conservatives who want to get to the bottom of the oil-for-food scandal are playing right into the hands of the United Nations establishment:
But for Republicans to now focus their attention on the bona fides of the Volcker probe because of the claims of a disgruntled investigator is to shoot the wrong target. Sure it will get some good headlines for the Members, and it may even further damage Mr. Annan's credibility. But it will also damage the Volcker probe, perhaps irreparably, and just when his Committee is getting into the meat of the scandal, which is why and how Oil for Food got started and why it was allowed to prop up Saddam Hussein for so many years.
Put simply, the Volcker Committee will be crippled if it cannot guarantee its witnesses--many of them not beyond reproach--that their confidential testimony won't end up being aired on C-SPAN as part of a Congressional hearing...
We aren't conspiracy theorists, but from the point of view of the U.N.'s most rabid defenders it's hard to imagine a better turn of events than this Congressional detour. Preoccupy the Volcker Committee with this side issue until its funding runs out in August. Chill its investigators, and its witnesses, into inactivity or silence. Damage Mr. Volcker's personal reputation, so that any final report can be attacked as suspect. The only people thrilled with all this must be the people who profited from Oil for Food.
So perhaps conservatives should not be cheering on Lanny Davis. That will resolve some serious cognitive dissonance.
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