
In an interview with CBS News, former President Clinton said he regrets instituting Don't Ask Don't Tell -- but said the policy didn't work the way he was told it would.
Asked if he regretted it, Clinton -- who helped get the policy through Congress in 1993 -- said, "Oh yeah, but keep in mind, I didn't choose this policy."
"Don't ask, don't tell was only adopted when both Houses of Congress had voted by a huge veto-proof margin to legislate the absolute ban on gays in the military if I didn't do something else," he said. "They would never let me order, by executive order, allowing gays in the military."
PERMALINK | COMMENTS | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (0)Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele on Wednesday urged the Department of Justice to investigate last year's efforts by the White House to convince Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA) to abandon his Senate campaign against Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA).
In a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, Steele wrote that the public had "heard several different versions of whether or not Congressman Joe Sestak was offered a job or appointment if he were to forgo his campaign for the United States Senate," CNN reported.
PERMALINK | COMMENTS | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (0)Yet another organization with ties to prominent Democrats has received money from accused Ponzi scamster Hassan Nemazee. This time, it was the William J. Clinton Foundation that received a hefty donation from Nemazee, the New York financier and Democratic Party fundraiser.
Nemazee, who was charged with stealing $292 million from several banks, gave between $50,000 and $100,000 to the former president's charity in 2009, according to a donor list released yesterday.
PERMALINK | COMMENTS | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (1)A heavy-hitting group of conservative lawyers led by Ken Starr and Ed Meese is jumping to the defense of a Democratic trial lawyer and major John Edwards backer.
No, Starr, Meese et al. haven't suddenly undergone a political conversion. Instead, they see a chance to undermine campaign-finance laws they never supported in the first place.
PERMALINK | COMMENTS | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (4)Notorious anti-immigrant sheriff Joe Arpaio is working with a husband-and-wife GOP lawyer team that was one of Bill Clinton's biggest tormentors during the 90s, to go after a local Arizona official. But critics are calling the effort a politically motivated fishing expedition. And the defense lawyer on the case knows something about politicized justice: he was one of the US attorneys improperly fired by Alberto Gonzales.
Here's the back-story. It's got a few twists and turns. But stay with us -- it's worth it:
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Powerhouse fundraiser Hassan Nemazee had a lot of friends in Democratic circles. And one of the most important appears to have been the party's money-man par excellence, Terry McAuliffe.
But since the news broke yesterday that Nemazee had been charged with running a $292 million Ponzi scheme, the normally loquacious McAuliffe hasn't been his usual voluble self.
PERMALINK | COMMENTS | RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (1)We've told you about Hassan Nemazee's leading role in raising money for the Democrats' climb back to power over the last few electoral cycles. But a longer look back shows that the New York financier -- who was charged yesterday with running a $292 million Ponzi scheme -- began building his influence by wrangling cash for the Clinton-Gore team during the 90s. And that his largesse also extended to the GOP.
Based on news reports accessed via Nexis, here's a quick time-line on Nemazee's political and fund-raising work during those years:
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