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Show _ The SaltLake Tribune OPINION Friday, June14, 1996 Clinton Invests Klinton’s Klutzes Goofed Again In FBI Background Files Case Unwisely With His Tax Break SANDY GRADY PHILADELPHIA DAILY NEWS For Collegians WASHINGTON — Is Bill klutzes” That's the question nagging the X-Files Caper — the revelation that Clinton's crew snooped through 340 FBI files on ex-White House employees. including SEATTLE TIMES Investing in education andtrainingis a good idea. Sois investingin the children. Andinvesting in the future. But not all big-nameRepublicans or subsidized by — the federal government. Public investments are paid. after just dumb? I say. dumb. Very dumb goodideas can or should beinvested in — Are the Clintonites criminal sneaks” Or all, with other people's money President Clinton’s “New America’s ment that the bulk of the observed in- HOPE Scholarship Tax Cut” (a $1,500 crease in earnings is attributable to col- lege education. If that’s true, then people annualrefundable tax credit), combined with an old White Housetuition tax de- already have a strong incentive to go to college. This is therefore a strange rationale for government intervention. It would be far more persuasive if the proponents of Clinton's new plan showed that therearesocially important fields — science and engineering, for example — that do not lead to higher wagesfor students who study them. But mostscientists and engineers are well-compensated Other college majors — perhaps ethnomusicology — fare less well in termsof salary, but it is difficult to argue that a shortage of ethnomusicologists is society’s most pressing problem. If someone wants to studythe history of the timpani, they should go for it, but please don't ask duction (of up to $10,000) proposed last year, is a $43 billion spending program oversix years designed to increase access to higher education and job training. Individuals earning up to $70,000 a year, and families with income of up to $100,000 a year, would be eligible for the education tax credit or the deduction (but not both). The plan would mainlybenefit well-to- do individual families who don't need a tax break to invest in education — and whowill simplyrespond by saving less, according to former Congressional Bud- get Officer Robert Reischauer Granted, sending two children to col legeis a financial strain even for a family earning $190,000 a year. But if the goal is to invest in education, why waste money subsidizing an activity that will occur without the subsidy? White House economic advisers boast that the plan won't increase the deficit meto pay Arguments about educational invest mentsoften proceedasif each proposal is breaking new ground. But the federal government already funds numerous programs designed to increase access to higher ed and job training. More than six million students benefit each year from No, but it would consumetax revenues that could otherwise be used to reduce the Guaranteed Student Loan program Pell Grants and Stafford Loans. These the deficit or improve programs for the truly needy. For the cost of the HOPE tax credit, for example, the federal Pell Grant program — which targets the poorest students — could be doubled in size Clinton says more people should go to college because college graduates earn s carrya combinedcost of more 25 billion a year. In addition, the federal Departments of Labor and Education operate dozens of vocational-education programs, the On. The-Job Training Program, Jobstart and two separate School-to-Work programs. $250,000 morethan non-grads. on aver At last count, there were over 160 federal job-training programs spread across a age. during the courseof their lifetimes But just because X is correlated with Y doesn't mean that X (college education) caused Y(increased earnings). It is pos- sible that some other factor, Z (perhaps motivation or persistence), caused both X and Y People who vote earn more, on average, than non-voters. That doesn’t mean that voting caused the increase in earnings, just that people whovote tend to be from a higher income strata But let's assume for the sake of argu- Clinton's White House a nest of Nixonian dirty tricksters? Or a den of incompetent MICHELLE MALKIN dozen federal agencies. Some of these programs make sense Pell Grants, which are means-tested, help ensure that poor students are not denied access to higher education Other programs producebenefits that are too small to justify the costs. The Clinton administration's Americorps program, for example, spends $30,400 per person per year — but only $4,750 of that goes to schooling. As Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W. Va., noted on the Senate floor re- cently, instead of sending one Ameri corps participant (who may or may not need financial assistance) to college, five needy students could qualify for Pell Grants. Still other programsappearto do more harm than good Thefederal govern ment’s largest federal job-training pro gram. the Job Training Partnership Act (which was championed by Bush-Quayle At the very least. they've given Bob Dole fresh ammoto bombard the charac- ter andcredibilityissue And Dole’s not tooshy to fire away If nothing else, Clinton & Co. once again demonstrate an absolute genius for awakening ghosts of other administra tions’ dark sins. Not enoughthat their drip-dripdrizzle of documents made Whitewater a faint — OK, very faint — reminder of Watergate Their FBI file flap brings back the aro- scent of Haldeman and Dean and Ehrlich- grams before proposing new ones Mas FBI memories — Lyndon Johnson having terful politics? Maybe Dismal publicpol icy? No doubt In theend, this is a wasted and wasteful debate for thosefighting to improve edu cation at the most elementary levels While the president tinkers with the tax codeto offer tens ofbillions of dollars in higher-edassistance to middle-class families, millions of inner-city kids are ma of Richard Nixon's enemieslist. the man Worse, the Clintonites dredge up sour the agency bug Martin Luther King’s ho- tel room, Nixonusing the FBI to wiretap 17 aides and newsmen in search of leaks There must be a mischievous polter- geist in the Clinton White House who says, “What can wedo idiotic today to remind people of another old scandal’ Unless other facts emerge, I assume the X-Files rhubarb was not criminal trapped in shoddy schodls that fail to teach the most basic reading, writing and snoopery but clumsy ineptitude mathskills. peoplecould run a one-car funeral. much Earlier this year. Clinton proposed a simple, tiny $5 million demonstration project for means-tested public school vouchers in the District of Columbia backed by low-income minority parents whocan't afford to sendtheir kids to Sidwell Friends — theritzy, private D.C school attended by Chelsea Clinton. Just imagine the opportunity that $43 million spent around the country on school vouchers for inner-city kids, rather than on tax credits and deductions, would cre ate An administrationinterested in fostering an ageof possibility cannot be taken seriously when it rejects even the most narrow of investments in choice for the poor while embracing expansive pro grams for thebetter-off. Michelle Maikinis an editorialwriter and columnist at The Seattle Times she’s right. Most 10-year-olds would have been smarter than the White Housedolts But a major seandal, no. Marceca says the search of the outdated lists halted at the letter “G.~ Real enemieslists don't run out of steam. ‘That makes me doubt a major plot says Joseph DiGenova, who probed the flap over Clinton's passportfiles What about secrets in the X-Files Marcecasays he turned over “derogatory information” on three people to W House political hireling Craig Livin stone. has no effect on employment and a nega tive effect on earnings for young male participants, according to a major study Clinton made noeffort to kill bad pro. WhenClintonpolitical aide Ann Lewis deridesthe file caper as “Sesame Street Sometimes you wonder how these less the country I'mnot merely accepting Clinton's airy dismissal that the File Flap was “a bu reaucratic snafu.” Or White House chief Leon Panetta’s confession, “Obviously it was an inexcusable mistake I think we owe an apology to those involved Nobetter evidenceis the affidavit by Anthony Marceca, Army civilian investi- gator who was helping clear up a 1993 White Housesecurity backlog. He says he sent outdated Secret Service lists to the FBI “1 was not told. and had no reason to believe, that some persons on the lists no longer should have been included.” Enter klutziness. Why wasn't anybody at the White House sharp enough to say Hey. this is a screwup — Jim Baker (George Bush’s secretaryof state] is long gone. And good lord. Tony Blankley’s {Newt Gingrich spokesman] FBI file? Sure doesn't work here.” Theyincluded a phone operator, a low level bureaucrat and a groundskeeper C'mon, were they going to spread tales about the groundskeeper” Anyway, why would a dirty-tricks oper ation hopeto dish dirt on faded Republi cans? James BakerIII, now out of poli tics? Marlin Fitzwater, who's peddling his memoirs? Ken Duberstein. hardly a household Republican name” Sure. one FBI dossier rings a skeptical note — that of Billy Dale. fired in the travel office imbroglio. But with their ruthless Travelgate fir. ings haunting the Clinton team. to keep pursuing Dale would have been foolish No, the X-File Botch was the dumbest blunder since Nixon tried to dress up White House cops like Buckingham Pal ace guards That doesn't mean Rep. William Cling er, R-Pa.. the honest watchman who's the chief sleuth of Travelgate. shouldn't hold X-File hearings This has thepotential to be moresweeping.” he says And independent counsel KenStarr. if he has time from his moonlighting should dig into the X-File facts Just what the Clintons needed — more grist for Starr's legal mill But I suspect the goat horns will be hung on the Federal Bureau of Inv tion. whose boss, Louis Freeh, swore to keep the agencyout of polit The FBI wasclearly slipshod in dumping these boxesof files so cavalierly at the White House. The request wasn't even signed, but had ex-White House counsel Bernard Nussbaum’s nametypedin Freeh is reportedly furious And should be. Youcan bet it will be a long timebefore a White House henchmangets a free load of FBI files without a high-level signature, a good reason and a Justice Depart ment OK But the only Clinton & Co. crime was muddlehead folly Considering the firstyear blunders — Travelgate. military gays fiasco, the X-Files — it's a miracle Clinton emerged from his rookie bun gling cc PS. Thanksforfilling up the car 39 with gas—nice touch. People have said that it's the ‘little things’that makebuying a Saturn diferent. Well, the way wesee it, that should hold trueifyou're buy- | We invite youto a personal signing by Artt ind Elena Court, Saturday, June 15, 1-3 p mn n our ZCMI Cottonwood Gifts departmer Join us for this appearance by the desig the beautiful fine of hand-polished alur mn. 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