There is hardly a subject which evokes more emotion on the part of our viewers than the death of Vince Foster. Here we are, more than two years after that tragic event, and many of the issues surrounding his death have yet to be settled.
Many in our audience believe that Foster was murdered. Still others believe that Bill Clinton was somehow involved in the murder. I want to say at the outset that I have drawn no such conclusion. I don't know if Vince Foster killed himself or was killed by someone else. I don't know if he died at Ft. Marcy Park or died somewhere else. It is frankly irresponsible of anyone to draw absolute conclusions about what happened to Vince Foster.
With all the unanswered questions about his death, what I don't understand is the willingness on the part of the media and politicians in both parties to simply accept the original ruling that his death was a suicide. Why the rush to judgment on both sides? Some who hate Bill Clinton want to believe the worst about him and so they are prepared to believe that Foster was done in because he knew something Clinton didn't want disclosed and they will believe that no matter what an unbiased look at the case concludes. Others want to defend Bill Clinton to the point that they will dismiss whatever evidence may be presented that there are strange happenings connected with his demise. All I want is someone in authority to look at all the unanswered questions in the case with a view toward getting it settled.
Just last week, a group of forensic handwriting experts, including one of the world's leading experts at Oxford University, concluded that the suicide note which appeared in the Foster briefcase after witnesses had claimed that the briefcase had no such note when it was first viewed, was a forgery. This has enormous implications. If this is true, who forged the note? Why did they forge it? Why did the note appear a couple of days after the briefcase was originally examined and determined not to have such a note in it? Who put it there?
There are so many issues in this case which don't add up. Yet almost no one in either the journalistic or political community wants to pursue the matter. I frankly find that hard to understand. One Republican Congressman, when I pressed him on the subject, told me "Look. The implications of the whole Foster mess are too much for us to deal with. Our whole system of government could be affected if the outcome were as bad as some of you suggest it might be. It is better to just leave well enough alone."
A journalist I pressed on the subject told me "You don't understand. It is a no-win proposition for us to investigate Foster. Our editors don't want it and the White House is playing hardball on this like nothing we've ever seen before."
You don't have to tell that to Richard Mellon Scaife. Scaife is the publisher of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and one of the few media people in this country who has doggedly pursued the Foster case. His payback has been a series of dreadful articles in national publications, including The Wall Street Journal, which have distorted Scaife and his charitable organizations beyond recognition. I have known the man for more than 20 years. Seldom have I seen such vicious reporting.
Moreover, Christopher Ruddy, the reporter Scaife hired from the New York Post, who has kept on the Foster case and has done about the only real investigative work in this country on the subject, was ridiculed in perhaps the worst hatchet job ever in the history of the CBS program 60 Minutes. The question is why? If Vince Foster really did commit suicide at Ft. Marcy Park and no one else at the White House or involved with the Clintons had anything to do with it, then why go after Scaife and Ruddy? After all, most people in the country have never heard of either one of these gentlemen.
In all famous cases, you always have some people who don't believe the official version of what happened. To this day there are people who insist that Bruno Hauptmann was innocent of kidnapping the Lindbergh child. There are others who claim that the Rosenbergs were innocent of giving the Soviets our atomic secrets. So what? No one does hatchet jobs on these people. They are simply ignored.
Yet media friendly to the Clintons insist on making Dick Scaife and Christopher Ruddy an issue. I will tell you, as someone who was an investigative reporter myself, that is what convinces me that there is something wrong here. The fact that establishment media would find it necessary to distort both Sciafe and Ruddy to such an extent suggests that there is a fear somewhere they might be on to something and perhaps this treatment will cause them to back off. I can find no other rational explanation for what has happened.
There have been reports for months now that Special Prosecutor Ken Starr has written off the Foster case because he feels that were he connected with it in whatever way, it would ruin his chances of eventually getting to the Supreme Court. I don't know if those reports are true or not. But Starr may not have an easy out in this regard. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has asked New Mexico Congressman Steve Schiff, a former prosecutor, to take a look at the case. Schiff reportedly has insisted that Starr look into and provide explanations for some of the unanswered questions.
Let's hope so. Frankly I have been uneasy for a long time about some in the media on the right in the talk show business claiming that they knew that Foster was murdered. I've told them that. By the same token, the indifference of journalists and Members of Congress has also troubled me as new unanswered questions have arisen. I had hoped that the whole matter could be put to rest so we could get on with other important questions.
But now that I have examined the totally irresponsible treatment of Scaife and Ruddy, I am absolutely convinced that there is something here that is being covered up. In my personal experience, those who have something to hide always go after the people who are pursuing the truth. I've been there.
No matter how uncomfortable this is for Congress, and no matter what the implications for our system, the leadership has the responsibility to pursue this with all due vigor. Even if the association with the case will hurt Ken Starr, he also has such an obligation. As to the journalists, they ought to recognize the signs about what is being done to Ruddy. Surely there is one of them somewhere who will say "That could happen to me as well and I'm not going to let this happen to a colleague."
Not until now have I been totally convinced that there is a cover up going on here of extraordinary proportions. I simply refuse to believe, especially in view of the new evidence on the suicide note, that there isn't at least someone of courage left in this city who is in a position to do something about the Foster case. I pray to God we will hear from that person.