Hatch seems to be aiding wrong party

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch is in the odd position of drawing praise from his foes — and flak from his friends — over how he handled the "memogate" scandal of two of his aides raiding Democrats' computer files.

So was Hatch a man who showed integrity as he waded through scandal, as Democrats say? Or was he duped by Democrats into overlooking their more serious sins as he flogged his own people instead, as upset conservative groups contend?

It all began last fall when 14 Democratic files were leaked to the press. The memos showed such misdeeds as liberal groups working with Democrats to block appeals court nominee Miguel Estrada specifically because he is Hispanic, and they did not want Republicans to win political points with Hispanics.

Others showed, for example, that liberal groups asked Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., to block two 6th Circuit nominees until after that appeals court heard a key affirmative action case. They did not want new judges upsetting a perceived favorable balance.

Democrats never denied such behavior. Instead, they howled that the only way such memos could have been leaked was for them to have been stolen.

At the time, Hatch told the Deseret Morning News, "That's typical. Whenever they get their hands caught in the cookie jar, then they start to attack the process."

Most politicians would have ignored the Democratic cries of theft — and focused on their sins. After all, memos are leaked in Washington every day without probes resulting.

But Hatch's committee was already deeply split in partisan rancor over ongoing, first-in-history Democratic filibusters blocking many appeals court nominees of President Bush. So Hatch tried to be a nice guy. In a gesture to try to bring folks together, he launched a mini-investigation of his own into theft allegations.

He soon announced he was "shocked and mortified" to find that a GOP clerk, Jason Lundell, admitted accessing Democratic files — but not leaking them.

So Hatch asked Senate Sergeant at Arms William Pickle to conduct a thorough investigation. That took three months, and the final report was issued last week. Meanwhile, Democrats howled and blocked all nominees before Hatch's committee, they said to prod along the probe and ensure its completion and fairness.

As the probe proceeded, Lundell quit and went to graduate school. Another former aide, Manuel Miranda, was pressured into quitting.

The report finally said publicly that those two aides for 18 months regularly accessed and copied Democratic files — and also even Hatch's own files. Lundell stumbled into finding that if he clicked "My Network Places" he could access most files on the committee computer system shared by Democrats and Republicans.

They took at least 4,600 files. Miranda has contended that broke no laws and said it was akin to Democrats leaving files on his desk.

Hatch denounced such actions, saying, "Regardless of whether any criminal law was broken, the improper activity was wrong and unjustifiable."

Hatch is right about that. And he showed integrity with a fair probe. But he was also likely snookered by Democrats, who have offered nothing in return for his good will.

In fact, they are not only calling for criminal charges against the aides, but want to widen probes into finding what data from their memos may have gone to the White House or Justice Department. Democrats did help vote 12 non-controversial nominees out of committee last week, but they should have passed easily long ago. Democrats continue to filibuster all controversial nominees.

If they had followed Hatch's example, they would have at least denounced unethical behavior revealed in the memos. But when Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., was asked about that, he replied flippantly, "What you want us to do is debate stolen property, is that it?" Hatch helped Leahy by adding, "I don't think we have had a right to read those memoranda."

So with Hatch's leadership, Democrats appear to be receiving a pass on their own misdeeds; prosecuting GOP aides appears imminent; probes may widen to the White House; and controversial judicial nominees continue to be blocked.

Good people can disagree about this whole notion of whether or not "gentlemen don't read other gentlemen's mail." But a double click on a mouse hardly outweighs influence peddling, a filibusters for cash scheme, violations of civil rights and tampering with the outcome of a court case.

The investigation report delivered to the committee showed that there was no hacking. Hacking means that some kind of firewalls, passwords, etc. were busted through. There was one server, no passwords, no firewalls and oh, by the way, the Dems were reading Reps materials as well.

This was a government employee on a government computer with government documents in a government office.

I am very, very glad that Orrin Hatch was not the commander of the OSS in World War II.

Orrin is not being blackmailed...he has a conscience and he is rightly concerned that hacking into the 'rats computer files is not ethical.

There was no hacking. Everyone could read everyone else's files. We taxpayers pay for the system; why shouldn't we know what's going on?
Hatch is weak. He's worried about people liking him. He should go.

Phooey on those who would have the Republican party behave like 'rats and demand concessions for doing what is right.

Hatch is the one acting like a Democrat, ignoring what that party did wrong and focusing on a trumped up charge against Miranda.

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