Vengeful Clerks - US Gov't vs. Roger Clemens, Pt II

OffHisMeds cannot help but laugh at the prescience of his recent Roger Clemens post, coming as it does a couple of weeks before this article from the AP: "House panel: Clemens can't see its files for trial". In my April 1 post, I posited that Congress and Major League Baseball were in cahoots to deny Roger Clemens a fair trial.

In this article, the congressional committee that oversaw the Mitchell Commission report on Performance Enhancing Drugs in Major League Baseball attempts to deprive Roger Clemens from having access to the notes and testimony that they used to conclude that he had lied to Congress and a Grand Jury when he asserted that he had never knowingly taken steroids or Human Growth Hormone.

What is remarkable about this is the attempt by our Legislators to claim privacy privileges normally reserved for criminal defendants, who are granted various extraordinary rights so as to establish the level playing field our legal scholars thought necessary to prevent the incidental conviction of an innocent man or the use of our criminal legal system as a tool of oppression by the State. This concept is enfranchised in such other policies as Double Jeopardy, the Exclusionary Rule, the recitation by police of Miranda Warnings before the testimony of the defendant can be taken, and - most significantly to this case - the substantial right of the defendant to have access to evidence that might imply the innocence of the defendant.

What is even more remarkable about this assertion of privilege was the contorted logic the House panel used to assert its right to privacy, that "being forced to turn over its internal material for Clemens to use in federal court would violate the constitutional principle of separation of powers between the legislative and judicial branches. That principle is embodied in the Constitution's speech or debate clause".

Well, I guess that settles that. Heaven forbid that the tender sensibilities of Congress should be affronted by something as simple as a Freedom Of Information request. We all know how Congressmen view those pesky attempts by the Public to have access to what they are actually saying or doing whilst cashing their paychecks. And Heaven forbid that the constitutional rights of Congress should be interpreted on any basis except one which favors them.

All OffHisMeds knows is that every time Establishment politicians start talking reverentially about any "principle embodied in the Constitution", much less one as irrelevant as the "speech or debate clause", they're usually trying to cover their own asses. Recall that Nixon asserted similar privileges as regards his presidential papers and those damned recordings.

But let's take their argument at face value, shall we? First, they assert the right to hide their notes and testimony from the person they're attempting to destroy based on a separation of powers clause between Congress and the Judiciary. The glaring problem is, of course, that the Judiciary is not the entity seeking to procure this information, Roger Clemens the Defendent is. Second is the jarring inconsistency between the charter of this congressional committee and their claim of privilege: unlike, say, criminal prosecutors, their stated mission was not outcome based, but to get to the truth of PEDs in pro sports, whatever it might be. As such, they had even less rights - legal or moral - than prosecutors to protect their evidence from the public, and arguably a greater obligation to provide that information to the defendant, seeing as how it wasn't just his reputation that was on the line, but his very freedom.

What is ironic about this is that these same folks asserted for themselves the absolute right to know anything and everything about Roger Clemens that they wanted to know, as well as their right to pursue and publicize any and every thread - regardless of how irrelevant - such as questions as to whether Clemens' wife had taken HGH before a photo shoot. Such information may or may not have been admissable at trial, but it served the purpose these ham-handed Camera Hogs intended, which was to try and convict Clemens in the Court of Public Opinion long before they got around to the niggling formalities of an actual trial.

So, what is it that they're trying to hide? That one is simple: before the Mainstream Media decided to jump on the "Clemens Is Guilty" bandwagon, there was substantial reportage on the behind-the-scenes negotiations between the Mitchell Commission and Clemens' trainer Brian McNamee, and it did not portray Congress in a favorable light.

As a point of reference, you may recall that in the Eighties Major League Baseball commissioner Bart Giamatti conducted similar extra-legal negotiations with various bookies connected to Pete Rose so as to concoct a scenario most damning to Rose, and all outside the pesky constraints of Due Process. The Bookies in question were all provided immunity from prosecution or at most a hand-slap for their serial felonies not only - and allegedly - with Rose, but various others as well. The result was of course Rose's conviction, incarceration and a lifetime ban from Baseball.

This latest attempt by the Baseball Establishment and their toadies in Congress has the same smell as the Giamatti affair, and lends credence to claims that the Mitchell Commission colluded with McNamee by offering him immunity in return for testimony that would damage Clemens. Not coincidentally, McNamee obliged by telling exactly the story that the Commission wanted to hear, a story that he most adamantly had refused to tell until prior to the Commission's meetings with him behind closed doors, and out earshot of the Public, reporters, or anybody else devoted to the truth of the matter.

What is most damning to OffHisMeds, though, is how the statements by the congressional committee contradict themselves. At first, they wrap themselves in the sacred cloak of the Constitution, claiming that "being forced to turn over its internal material for Clemens to use in federal court would violate the constitutional principle of separation of powers between the legislative and judicial branches". Fine and dandy. If that is the rule, that is the rule, and they would need to offer no further explanation. That didn't prevent them from shooting themselves in the foot, though, offering as a petulant aside that Clemens was "on a fishing expedition," and that "Whether or not such documents exist, Mr. Clemens will have ample opportunity to examine Messrs. McNamee and Pettitte, as well as Ms. Pettitte, at trial".

So, which is it: Protecting the constitution or deflecting "fishing expeditions"? This would seem as good a time as any to trot out "OffHisMeds Razor", which states "whenver anybody offers more than one excuse for their actions, they are lying". These guys aren't exactly covering themselves in glory, and their over-reaction has about it an air of desperation. You can literally smell the sweat coming off them, and along with it, the lies.

If Clemens walks - and I believe he will - how long will it be before a Vengeful Media, pissed at how their own reputations had been sullied, descends on the Vengeful Clerks who brought this prosection? Not too long, I suspect.

Of greater significance, though, is their reason for the cover-up: the whole story will reveal the extent to which Congress purposefully avoided investigating MLB Owners and management, who didn't just ignore the use of Steroids and HGH, but at least passively - and possibly actively - promoted it.