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Elián Sound Bite
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A play date with Congress?
"Bill Gates is not Elián González," says Robert Bork.

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By Daryl Lindsey

May 2, 2000 | Spurned Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork draws on Elián for a Waco-like analogy, evoking the Cuban boy in a Wall Street Journal op-ed endorsement of the Justice Department's proposal to break up Microsoft. "The first thing conservatives need to remember is that Bill Gates is not Elián González," Bork writes, comparing the conservative fervor against the antitrust case to their response to Janet Reno's raid on Little Havana. (Indeed, if Gates resembles any member of the González family it's Marisleysis, for his uncanny ability to deny the obvious.) Bork completes the tortured analogy by writing: "Nor are Microsoft's executives the counterparts of Elián's rescuer, clutching their browser to their bosoms as armed federal agents break in to snatch the code in the middle of the night."

Writing in the Washington Times, American Enterprise Institute fellow Diana Furchtgott-Roth is less concerned about conservative political passions than the need for Elián to get his day in Congress. Overlooking, apparently, the trauma of the Iran-Contra hearings of the '80s and the Clinton impeachment proceedings of the '90s, Furchtgott-Roth suggests such an appearance might be just the leisurely diversion the boy is seeking, since he "may very well be tired of playing soccer with his father and friends and want a change of scenery" from Wye Plantation. But isn't it possible the comb-overs in Congress will frighten young Elián? "Some may argue that after Elián's gunpoint experience with the INS a subpoena to come before senators or representatives may cause further trauma. However, a visit to the U.S. Capitol would come during the day, not at night, and the trip would proceed in a quiet and orderly matter. He could be accompanied by his father, and he would be able to see the relatives with whom, as photos document, he spent so many happy hours."
salon.com | May 2, 2000

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Daryl Lindsey is associate editor of Salon News.

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