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Journalism of Courage
United States President Bill Clinton agreed to pay 850,000 to Paula Jones to settle her sexual harassment case against him. The settlement, which was announced by Jones8217;s lawyers, contained no mention of any apology by Clinton or any formal acknowledgement of Jones8217;s allegation that Clinton propositioned her in an Arkansas hotel room when he was still governor of the state.
The deal follows the dismissal of the case by an Arkansas judge in April. Jones was appealing against the dismissal, but will now stop pursuing the case. She claimed that Clinton invited her to a suite in a Little Rock hotel in 1991. She said he exposed himself and asked her to perform oral sex. She alleged that after she refused, he discriminated against her in her role as a state employee.
Starr took two new steps against Clinton, less than a week before Congress begins its impeachment inquiry into the President8217;s cover-up of his liaison with Lewinsky. After weeks of speculation about the possible submission of a Starr 2 report, he sent Congress only the details of his investigations into the President8217;s relationship without recommending any new impeachment charges.
The House of Representatives8217; judiciary committee is to open its impeachment inquiry next Thursday, when the first and possibly only witness is scheduled to be Starr. The independent counsel would have been bound to face questions about the Kathleen Willey investigation at those hearings. Unlike his report on Clinton8217;s relationship withLewinsky, which set out 11 possible grounds for impeachment, including perjury and obstruction of justice, this one simply consists of the material on the Willey allegations, leaving Congress to decide what to do. In a second move, Starr formally charged the Clintons8217; Arkansas friend Webster Hubbell with 15 counts of fraud, perjury and corruptly impeding a federal banking regulators8217; investigation into the Whitewater affair. This was a failed Arkansas land development deal in which the Clintons invested before they moved to the White House.
