Reagan’s ‘Scandal’

Ben Wattenberg seems to have missed the point in his column (Editorial Pages, March 5), “It’s a Scandal, Sure, but Not Really a Big One.”

He has devised a “scandal-rating system” in which he attempts to place the Iran- contra scandal into historical perspective while at the same time casting blame for the whole mess on the American media. He claims that the Iran-contra scandal would rate a mere 2 on his rating system scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the most severe, and blames the uproar on “firestorming journalism.”

Unfortunately, Wattenberg has missed the point and managed to numerically rate only the first half of the Iran-contra affair: the selling of weapons to Iran in exchange for American hostages held in Beirut. “The diplomatic honor of America was tarnished. Ranking: 2,” he writes. He then tries to bypass the truly scandalous aspect of the entire ordeal.

President Reagan, either actively or passively, established as a priority the procurement of aid for rebels in Nicaragua that his “free-lance cowboys” saw fit to carry out. This policy goes against the wishes of Congress, which voted to stop aid to these same Nicaraguan rebels.

The legality of the issue will be bandied about for some time to come, but it appears clear that the Administration overstepped the constitutional boundaries that give the executive branch the obligation to enforce the laws of Congress. It is not the place of the President to circumvent Congress, either actively or passively. That is the real scandal.

After failing to address this issue in the rating system. Wattenberg attempts to compare apples and oranges. The benchmark chosen for the rating system is the Cuban Bay of Pigs fiasco. Albeit it was indeed a fiasco, it was not so much the scandal in the same legal sense. This fiasco (not scandal) was given a severity rating of 5.

Perhaps the Teapot Dome scandal of the early 1920s, which almost ruined the presidency of Warren G. Harding, would be a more appropriate benchmark, and it should be given Wattenberg’s 5 rating.

Using this more accurate rating would lend the system validity, and one could derive a more fitting rating for Irangate. Perhaps a 7, for the fact that the President didn’t have the control to stop the wishes of Congress from being circumvented.

There is even a more significant problem with Wattenberg’s rating system. What about Watergate? Surely the scandal that prompted the resignation of Richard M. Nixon has to be on the scale. Or is it that this precedent of presidential wrongdoing is too damaging a comparison to be included? Whatever his reasons for leaving Watergate out, it would certainly be a more fitting case for assessing the full impact of Irangate.

In reference to the Iran-contra scandal being blown out of perspective by the American media, Thomas Jefferson said, “The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.” Surely Jefferson would continue to press for the freedom of the American people to know that their chosen leaders are acting within the constitutional limits that he helped establish.

Unfortunately, Wattenberg has missed the true point of the Iran-contra scandal or has just tried to brush it aside with a misleading rating system that is too flawed to hold up to close scrutiny.

KEVIN H. FOX

South Pasadena