by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 31, 1998

In August of the sixth year of his presidency, Richard Nixon resigned. In August of the sixth year of his presidency, Bill Clinton must contemplate the same end.

For if what Monica is telling Ken Starr is true — that she and the president had a sexual relationship and agreed to lie about it, under oath — how does Clinton survive?

Is perjury consistent with remaining Chief Law Enforcement Officer of the United States?

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 28, 1998

“As American objections to the treaty’s text were trounced in one overwhelming vote after another, delegates … stood and cheered.” Thus does The Washington Post describe the reaction, as the final votes were taken in Rome to establish a permanent global court for prosecuting war criminals.

The tribunal will have 18 judges and a staff of investigators and prosecutors free to roam the world, conducting show trials of alleged war criminals, including U.S. soldiers. The accused — let us say the U.S. captain of the Vincennes, which mistakenly downed an Iranian airliner — would enjoy few of the rights guaranteed by our Fifth and Sixth amendments.

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 24, 1998

As America was annexing the Philippines in 1898, preparing to send a U.S. army to crush Filipino resistance to the new American empire, William Graham Sumner gave a speech titled, “The Conquest of the United States by Spain.”

“(W)e are submitting to be conquered by her on the field of ideas and politics,” said Sumner. “If we believe in liberty, as an American principle, why do we not stand by it? Why are we going to throw it away and enter upon a Spanish policy of domination?”

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 21, 1998

Of all the myths out of which the Republic was born … none was more hopeful than the crowning myth of the Presidency — that the people, in their shared wisdom, would be able to choose the best man to lead them.

From this came a derivative myth — that the Presidency … would make noble any man who held its responsibility. The Office would burn the dross from his character; his duties would, by their very weight, make him a superior man … ”

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 17, 1998

At noon, July 15, effective Republican resistance to the global agenda of Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Strobe Talbott and Robert Rubin came to an end. The House leadership capitulated.

From Most Favored Nation trading privileges for Communist China to $18 billion in fresh funds for the global bailout agency, the International Monetary Fund, Clinton’s agenda seems assured. If the president does not get “fast track” — Congress’ surrender of all rights to amend his trade treaties — it will be only because Bill tells Newt not to push it.

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 14, 1998

Before the markets opened Monday in Moscow, Boris Yeltsin’s government issued a statement saying a new International Monetary Fund bailout was on the way. Russia’s stock market shot up 7 percent in a single day.

And so the game goes on. In the run-up to this latest bailout, priced at $15 billion, Moscow’s stock market was in a sky dive, railway workers had blocked the Trans-Siberian line, defense workers were on strike, and there were reports of an impending coup d’etat. The sources of the coup reports were newspapers run by Russia’s vulture capitalists who want to bring Yeltsin down.

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 10, 1998

The economic fate of Asia and to a great extent the rest of the world … rests more than ever before in the hands of Japan’s political leaders and bureaucrats,” writes James Baker on July 8 in The Washington Times.

The “worst-case scenario,” says an alarmed ex-secretary of state, is “now all too easy to see. … If Japan does not follow up its most recent rhetoric of reform with a resolve to act, the yen is bound to sink further, taking down the Chinese yuan.

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 7, 1998

A collision between the United States and China over Taiwan now seems certain. And Bill Clinton’s gratuitous assertion in China that the United States opposes Taiwan’s membership in any organization that requires nationhood as a condition makes it more certain.

Why did Clinton have to pander? Apparently, Taiwan had been given assurances he would do nothing to harm its interests while in China. Yet the president went out of his way to recite China’s “three noes”: no U.S. support for Taiwan independence, no U.S. recognition of a separate Taiwanese government, no backing of Taiwan’s entry into international organizations.

by Patrick J. Buchanan – July 3, 1998

If a tree falls in a forest in Australia, out of earshot, does it make a sound? That old teaser is more than a party riddle today.

For the tree falling in Australia is the conservative coalition of Prime Minister John Howard. And the ax chopping at the foot of that tree is the One Nation populist party, the talk of all Australia.

One Nation has existed only 18 months. Last December, The Washington Post wrote that its popularity seem to have peaked at 4 percent. But in June, One Nation swept 23 percent of the vote in Queensland — and ousted the ruling coalition from power in that northern state.