Word: deaver
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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WASHINGTON--Michael K. Deaver, a close associate of Ronald Reagan through most of his political life, was convicted yesterday of lying under oath to deflect allegations he used his influence with the president in his career as a lobbyist...
...Deaver, who served as Reagan's deputy White House chief of staff, was convicted by a U.S. District Court jury of two counts of lying to a grand jury and one count of lying to a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee that was investigating allegations that his lobbying violated federal ethics laws...
Despite the medical recognition of alcoholism as a disease 21 years ago, there is still uncertainty over its legal status as an illness. Michael Deaver, the former aide to President Reagan who is on trial for lying to a grand jury about his lobbying activities, is arguing that he was not responsible because he is an alcoholic and his drinking at the time impaired his memory of events and facts. In the past the so-called alcoholism defense generally has not been very successful, but it has worked on occasion in perjury cases...
Such tales of buying friends and influencing people were recounted at Deaver's perjury trial last week. He is charged with five counts of lying before a congressional committee and to federal grand jury investigators about his lobbying activities. Although former Government officials have been selling their access and influence for a long time, the Deaver trial provided a vivid look at how prevalent this practice has become...
None of these activities were necessarily illegal: Deaver was charged with perjury rather than violations of the 1978 Ethics in Government Act. But as Michael Kinsley of the "TRB" column in the New Republic notes, "Lobbying is an ideal illustration of TRB's Law of Scandal, which holds that the scandal isn't what's illegal; the scandal is what's legal." The practices revealed at the Deaver trial not only taint former officials who peddle their connections but also raise questions about the ethics of corporate America. Besides, they are often wasteful: TWA could not withstand the Icahn takeover...