Death of American Virtue - Ken Gormley [270]
It was not until Sunday morning that Ginsburg finally strolled into their office as if he were on vacation. The California lawyer was wearing a pair of slacks, a charcoal gray V-neck sweater, and a bright pink dress shirt underneath. The OIC lawyers instantly discerned that Ginsburg was a bird of a different feather. “His real specialty is broken necks from [swimming pool and] diving board accidents,” Bennett would later comment. It was clear from the get-go that this lawyer was far removed from the elite world of Washington defense attorneys, and he didn’t “understand the lexicon of criminal law.”
Seated at the small OIC conference table, Bennett and his fellow prosecutors produced a document verifying that the three-judge panel had expanded Ken Starr’s jurisdiction. They also flashed a copy of Lewinsky’s false affidavit.
Ginsburg, appearing like a frisky prizefighter psyching himself up for a big fight, made clear that he viewed Clinton as a “misogynist” and perhaps as a “child molester.” Yet he did not believe that the Starr prosecutors had any business sticking their noses into the affair. Ginsburg told them, “If the president had a sexual relationship with a young lady, however morally wrong that might be and whatever you think of him, so what?” He glared at the prosecutors across the table. “What has this got to do with national security? Unless you’re investigating Monica for espionage or something. Or the president for espionage.” This didn’t involve selling secrets to the Chinese or Russians. Ginsburg nearly shouted, “What are you looking for with little Monica? I mean, what is it that you want?”
Baffled, the OIC prosecutors explained that Lewinsky was on the hook for perjury arising out of the Jones case and that the president might be involved in “a conspiracy to obstruct justice.” They wanted the truth, not a lot of blustering from a swimming-pool lawyer about whether Monica was in cahoots with the Chinese.
When the subject turned to possible immunity, the mood in the room grew even uglier. Jackie Bennett was annoyed that Mike Emmick had offered Lewinsky immunity in the Ritz-Carlton. The OIC lawyers had now decided that there would be no more free passes; the “fire sale” was over. Bennett leaned over to Ginsburg and growled, “You rejected the offer of immunity. And so, now if she wants to get it, she’s got to earn it.” Bennett was actually thinking, “Thank God you were stupid enough to [reject the deal]. Now you’re going to have to work for it.”
Bennett felt strongly that federal prosecutors should never take “a pig in a poke.” They should never cut a deal to grant a cooperating witness immunity, until that person spelled out what he or she was prepared to say in a written “proffer.” OIC had already been burned once, in the botched Webster Hubbell deal. Bennett was not going to allow his office to do that again. He wanted a written proffer from Lewinsky, whether this loopy lawyer from California understood federal criminal procedure or not. If OIC did not insist on this precautionary measure, Lewinsky could sign the immunity deal and then say, “I fantasized all of this. I made it up and I consciously lied to Linda Tripp.” If that happened, the government would be stuck with a “tainted evidence.”
The avuncular Mr. Ginsburg didn’t seem moved. He was beginning to appear oddly demonic to the OIC team, with his pointed, salt-and-pepper beard. “I feel this is like a Gestapo Nazi technique,” Ginsburg now said, blasting his adversaries. “It just doesn’t make any sense to me unless you can demonstrate to me that there is an issue of national security involved.