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[nobody@REPLAY.COM (Anonymous)]

                 IS FOSTER KEY TO "THE OCTOPUS?"
                          Editorial

    When you start digging into the circumstances surrounding the
death  of  White  House aide Vince Foster, a number of names keep
popping up that have popped up in relation to a number  of  large
scandals of the last two decades.

    Starting with the "October Surprise,"  the  alleged  plot  to
delay the release of hostages from Iran to after the presidential
election in 1980 in an attempt to embarrass President Carter,  it
is  indeed  striking  that  the hostages were released just a few
hours after President Reagan was sworn in.  A number of witnesses
have testified to the involvement of Vice President Bush and Earl
Brian in this secret plot. These witnesses,  all  CIA  or  Mossad
assets,  have  received the "Terry Reed treatment": indictment on
false charges and  thorough  discrediting.  But  it  was  another
source, White House staffer Barbara Honegger, who wrote the first
"October Surprise" book in 1989.

    It was early in the Reagan administration  that  Earl  Brian,
Richard Secord and others used their influence and connections to
make money on selling the pirated  PROMIS  software  from  Inslaw
Inc.  Former  OSS  agent Jackson Stephens is alleged to have made
money on PROMIS as well through his Arkansas Systematics Inc.  It
was  there  that Vince Foster, as a partner of Hillary Clinton in
the Rose Law Firm and representing Systematics,  became  involved
with the Inslaw affair.

    A much  bigger  scandal  of  government  corruption  was  the
Savings  and  Loan  scandal  of  the  1980.  The federally backed
savings-and-loans were not only looted by  crooks  and  criminals
but  also  by well-connected politicians who needed an easy buck.
Neil Bush and Bill and Hillary Clinton are just a few examples.

    Apparently not content with the hundreds of billions in S & L
loot  from  the  taxpayer, corrupt government officials turned to
drugs. The CIA-sponsored Contra re-supply  network  was  used  to
ship  illegal  drugs of incredible volume into the United States.
CIA assets Terry Reed and  L.D.  Brown  implicate  Bill  Clinton,
George  Bush and Oliver North with this operation. A confidential
CIA document obtained  by  the  Washington  Weekly  supports  the
involvement  of  George  Bush by linking him to arms-dealer Adnan
Khashoggi, Richard Secord, and CIA asset John Hull,  whose  ranch
in  Costa  Rica  was  used  for  transshipment  of drugs and arms
through Mena, Arkansas and other U.S. destinations.

    Another of these scandals during the 1980s  was  the  illegal
penetration of the bank that the CIA preferred - the BCCI Bank of
Crooks  and  Criminals.  Politicians  across  the  spectrum   are
implicated  in  taking  bribes  to  allow  this bank to take over
American banks with  the  help  of  Jackson  Stephens  and  Vince
Foster.  No serious investigations have been launched by the Bush
and Clinton Justice Departments.


    Leaving aside for a moment the dispute over  whether  any  of
these  scandals  have  been proven, there is one remarkable facet
about the facts as they have been presented: some names appear in
several of these alleged scandals.

    Topping the list is George Bush, the  only  CIA  director  to
become  President  of  the  United  States.  It  is  difficult to
reconcile these serious allegations with the rather decent public
image   of   George  and  Barbara  Bush.  But  to  dismiss  these
allegations out of hand is to accept a conspiracy that includes a
large  number  of unrelated witnesses naming the same culprits in
different scandals.

    But it  should  also  be  said  that  participants  in  these
scandals  may  have thought they acted to defeat Communism, where
the end would justify every means. After all, that was the  prime
objective of the CIA during the Cold War.

    Are these  the  arms  of  the  octopus  that  reporter  Danny
Casolaro  referred  to just before he was found dead in his hotel
room in 1991? He  told  friends  he  was  tracing  a  network  of
government  corruption  involving  Inslaw,  BCCI, and the October
Surprise. Washington D.C. attorney Paul Wilcher was  tracing  the
same Octopus when he was found dead three days after Vince Foster
died.

    Think back to the 1992 elections for  a  moment.  Did  George
Bush  bring  up  any  of  the  scandals  that could have defeated
Clinton?  Did he mention  Whitewater,  Cattlegate,  Paula  Jones,
Gennifer  Flowers,  Mena?   Why  not?  Did  he know that it could
backfire seriously because of what Bill Clinton knew  about  him?
Did  Bill  Clinton take advantage of that in his unlikely bid for
the presidency?


    What, then, is this Octopus? It appears to be an  association
between  rogue elements of the CIA and certain elected officials.
An analysis of these structures  will  show  that  corruption  is
inevitable.  The CIA has a budget of $28 billion, it assassinates
people without being held accountable  in  a  court  of  law,  it
operates  in  secret,  it  has  almost unlimited power and is not
subject to any meaningful  oversight.  Only  saints  could  avoid
corruption and abuse of power in such an environment.

    Then what can we do about it? Limit the budget  of  the  CIA,
limit  its  role,  subject it to greater outside scrutiny, expose
past scandals and hold individuals responsible for their  crimes.
Three  presidents tried to do just that: John F. Kennedy, Richard
Nixon, and Jimmy Carter. None of them stayed in office for  long,
and none of them achieved their goal.





Copyright (c) 1995 The Washington Weekly (http://www.federal.com)