A perverse game of peekaboo
Why the White House needs to cough up details on the alleged Sestak job offer
A perverse game of peekaboo
Dick Polman, Inquirer National Political Columnist
This is getting farcical. Joe Sestak, Pennsylvania's Democratic senatorial candidate, continues to say that the Obama White House sought last summer to lure him away from the Senate race (thus clearing the field for Arlen Specter) by offering him a juicy federal job - yet Sestak continues to stonewall on the details. Since February, he has played this perverse game of peekaboo on Comcast, Fox News, MSNBC, NBC News, CBS News, CNN, and in the pages of The Washington Post. I may have missed a few. The CNN appearance, which aired late yesterday, bordered on the tragicomic.
John King asked Sestak, "What specifically did they offer you, sir?"
Sestak replied, "I'll let others talk about their role."
King then said, "You cast yourself - and I don't question it - as a man of great integrity...If somebody (in the White House) was playing politics as usual, or possibly breaking federal law, sir, and trying to induce you to leave a political campaign with a federal appointment, that could possibly be breaking the law. We're trying to get just the basics of who said what and offered what."
Sestak replied, "Yes, sir. And I'll let others speak for themselves."
King asked, "What is the harm of you saying 'this is the person who called me and this is what they offered me,' so that we can to that person and get the other end of the conversation?"
Sestak replied, "I'll tell you what the harm actually appears to be. You and I should be talking right now about how people were slammed in this economy, John."
King said, "I'm simply asking you, who offered you a job to...get out of the race?"
Sestak replied, "Yes, sir. And I said all I'm going to say on the matter."
The White House, as we know, isn't talking either. Last Thursday, press secretary Robert Gibbs kicked away 13 queries about the alleged job offer, with the footwork of a Philly Flyers goalie. And yesterday on CNN, top aide David Axelrod said simply that the lawyers had "looked into" the allegations and concluded that the summer '09 conversations with Sestak "were perfectly appropriate" - even though "I can't relate to you what the conversations were."
If everything was "perfectly appropriate," then why doesn't the White House dispel the cloud of mystery, and put this (presumably) minor story to rest, by simply telling us what happened?
Sestak was right yesterday when he suggested that viewers probably preferred to hear him talk about the economy. I truly doubt that most voters in Pennsylvania - or political junkies in general - are outraged that the White House apparently tried to entice Sestak to leave the Senate race as a favor to incumbent Specter. Every White House, of every political persuasion, has tried to influence elections, by encouraging or discouraging candidacies. As Ron Kaufman, political director for the senior President Bush, reportedly remarked yesterday, "Tell me a White House that didn't do this, back to George Washington."
Granted, there is a federal statute (18 USC 595) that prohibits such behavior; according to the language, no federal executive employee is permitted to use "his official authority for the proposal of interfering with, or affecting, the nomination or election of any candidate" for federal elective office. But if we were to take that statute literally, a president commits a crime whenever he tries to affect an election by stumping in person for his favorite candidate, or whenever he tries to recruit somebody to run. The statute language is so broad as to be meaningless.
Another federal statute (18 USC 211) appears to bar the awarding of "any appointive office" in exchange for a political favor, but the language is murky, and ethics experts say it's always tough to prove a definitive quid pro quo; indeed, Sestak has told The Washington Post that the White House had reached out to him via "some indirect means."
Most voters typically dismiss this kind of lawyerese as inside baseball. But what could really hurt the White House (and, potentially, Sestak) is the perception of a coverup. As we know from recent political history, a coverup is generally deemed to be worse than the original behavior. And any coverup looks particularly bad in this case, because this White House has talked so much about being more transparent than its predecessors - and because this particular Senate candidate talks so much (as he did on CNN yesterday) about the importance of "personal accountability."
Nature always abhors a vacuum, and the press corps by definition is determined to fill it. Reporters will keep asking the questions as long as the principals remain determined not to answer. Some Democrats now appear to recognize this truism. National party chairman Tim Kaine said on Sunday, "If the question gets asked, it's something the (administration) should deal with," and New York congressman Anthony Weiner told MSNBC yesterday: "What the White House should do is, to some degree, say, 'Here are the facts'....Someone has to help us out here, and I think the White House and Congressman Sestak need to make sure we're not talking about this next week."
Will we be?
Alvenada : so Tal is your muse? Disturbing....— still_independent- swedesboromike : and I have no idea why I typed "Clinton's"— still_independent
- still_independent - yes, really. bin Laden killed <3000 Americans. More than that died at Cheney's direction for no reason in Iraq. Not to mention half a million Iraqis, whose lives are typically valued somewhat less than cats and dogs by the wingnuts. All for nothing. And there is no evidence that bin Laden ever tortured anyone - though I am sure there are those he would happily put to the waterboard - Mr. Cheney, perhaps? Cheney is an international terrorist and war criminal, as is bin Laden. They both deserve to pay the same price for their evildoing.— yoda
- The following is from Yoda. I think it says a lot about the American left who view VP Chenyey as the villian of greater proportion than Osama Bin Ladin. Truly sad there are people in our country who believe in this way. The passage is devoid of any objective evaluation of historical facts and and is seething with the venom that only a leftist extremists could harbor...................................... "bin Laden killed <3000 Americans. More than that died at Cheney's direction for no reason in Iraq. Not to mention half a million Iraqis, whose lives are typically valued somewhat less than cats and dogs by the wingnuts. All for nothing. And there is no evidence that bin Laden ever tortured anyone - though I am sure there are those he would happily put to the waterboard - Mr. Cheney, perhaps?".................................. I shall wait for some form of condemnation from the so called " independents and moderates " on here.
Comment removed.- Yo, Mikey - don't hold your breath.— yoda
- "last guy that spent 1/3 of his 8 years on holiday." More nonsense from larry.— pj katauskas
- United States debt has surpassed $13 Trillion or 90% of GDP. See it add up along with other interesting numbers. Over $117,000 per tax payer & over $42,000 per citizen. Just terrible. http://www.usdebtclock.org/— NEPhilly
- Comment removed.
- yoda : not sure where to start. swedesboromike, you can breathe now. Yoda, on the factual side, feel free to try and substantiate the 1/2 million number. I doubt you can find a credible government or NGO estimate approaching that. Listen, I was (and am) adamantly against the invasion of Iraq. But trying to draw a moral equivalency between intentionally targetting and killing civilians and creating a power vacuum in which Iraqis were killing Iraqis is ridiculous. And forcing innocent civilians to choose between burning to death or leaping to it is at least as tortuous as waterboarding a handful of individuals (to which I was also opposed, btw). Finally, your opinion that the average Iraqi's life is "valued somewhat less than cats and dogs " is based upon what? I regret every loss of life that we caused directly or indirectly, as an unintended conssequence as our invasion (which were the majority). But to be honest? I value the lives of my family over those of my neighbors. I value the lives of my neighbors more than those of my fellow Americans. And I value the lives of Americans more than Iraqis. Perhaps that puts me at odds with my faith, but so be it. But that doesn't mean that I have a low value on Iraqis lives, just a slightly lower one than those of my countrymen. If I honestly believed as Mr. Cheney did (which I did not) that Hussein was actually that great a threat to our country, then I may have chosen the same course of action.— still_independent
- I think that the 2012 Democratic primary race between President Biden and former Secretary of State Clinton will be fascinating.— BillyFortune
larrydalliopolis, prove your allegation that Bush spent 32 months on vacation. I don't believe you can. No president (including the chicago thug) is ever really on vacation.— georgel- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/18/bush-spent-487-days-at-ca_n_158902.html 487 days at Camp David, 490 days on ranch = 977 days on vacation in 8*365 = 2920 days = 33.5% of the time on vacation.— yoda
- ***May 25 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. government’s Aaa bond rating will come under pressure in the future unless additional measures are taken to reduce projected record budget deficits, according to Moody’s Investors Service Inc. The U.S. retains its top rating for now because of a “high degree of economic and institutional strength,” the New York- based ratings company said in a statement today that was little changed from a credit opinion released in February. The outlook is stable, the statement said. The government’s finances have been “substantially worsened by the credit crisis, recession, and government spending to address these shocks,” Moody’s analysts lead by Steven A. Hess wrote. “The ratios of general government debt to GDP and to revenue are deteriorating sharply, and after the crisis they are likely to be higher than the ratios of other Aaa-rated countries.” Debt to revenue has more than doubled over the past three years and is now over 400 percent, which could lead to “potential stress” on finances, the report said.*** http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=az1YD_O3PXz4— NEPhilly
- larry and yoda - Ever hear of telecommuting. Just because your not in the office doesn't mean your on vacation. You can work from just about anywhere except a basketball court or a golf course. Also yoda please tell us the real "TRUTH" about 9/11. It was really "CHENEY" that did it. So he could "CRAM DOWN" the Iraq war vote in congress just to give "HALIBURTON" the oil fields.— Mike Welbourn
Cited by the Columbia Journalism Review as one of the nation's top political reporters, and lauded by the ABC News political website as "one of the finest political journalists of his generation," Dick Polman is a national political columnist at the Philadelphia Inquirer. He is on the full-time faculty at the University of Pennsylvania, as "writer in residence." Dick has been a frequent guest on C-Span, MSNBC, CNN, NPR and the BBC. He covered the 1992, 1996, 2000, and 2004 presidential campaigns.
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