For what must be reasons of their fading ideology, the major investigative journalism institutions of our country have paid little attention to the Sandy Berger affair, which has drifted out of their consciousness as quickly as you can say Valerie Plame. Nevertheless, the mystery of why the former NSA was “borrowing” papers from the National Archive remains – with the blogosphere seemingly left as the only outlet asking the significant questions.
And now , with the Able Danger revelations, Dr. Sanity has found a possible motivation. And she has a timeline. I wonder if the mainstream media will bother to check it.
Hey, they were ready to hang Rove for a lot less.
BTW Roger, did you know there was a post on instapundit about you?
Well, now we have the answer to our question, and the investigation for that matter.
The two people most responsible for the 9/11 failures are Jamie Gorelick and Sandy Berger. Enjoy your time in the PC sun, you two. History will judge you very harshly.
Roger;
I read the link and it seems plausible. The postponment of the sentencing is interesting too. But what will this speculation lead us. The memo’s are destroyed and Berger will never say what was on them. I don’t remember but how severe is the maximum punishment for the plea agreement that Berger agreed to? Does the judge have the ability to slap a long sentence on Berger? If he doesn’t I do not think Berger will sing and without him telling us what notes were on the memo’s the truth will never come out. This is all interesting but berger has erased history and I do not think the truth will ever come out.
Kevin, if they don’t accept the plea agreement, I’m pretty certain that Berger can be prosecuted under the Espionage Act, which if I remember the forms correctly, is potentially punishable by death.
I would love to know if any of the papers in Sandy Berger’s pants had the phrase “Able Danger” on them. — me
He noted, smugly.
Charlie:
As gratifying as it might be to think of Berger in the dock for espionage it would be an inappropriate charge. He stole the paper for personal reasons and did not turn them over to a foreign power. He is only guility of mishandling classified documents, theft and destroying government property.
“Lawyers within the administration ó and we’re talking about the Clinton administration, not the Bush administration ó said ‘you can’t do it,’” and put post-its over Atta’s face, Weldon said. “They said they were concerned about the political fallout that occurred after Waco … and the Branch Davidians.”
***
Right, they had the FBI draft up “Project Megiddo” before Y2K didn’t happen.
Every indication was that the Clinton administration was more concerned with domestic terrorists and not international terrorists.
The line of reasoning given above, is pure BS. The least the Clinton administration needed to do was deport them.
The military was doing it’s job, and had its hands tied behind its back.
The more I learn about the Clinton administration the more I wonder how we didn’t get attacked here sooner.
Here’s a NewsMax article from a year ago with some related escapades now-forgotten. Read it and weep.
Jerry — Well, yes and no. USC Title 18 Section 793 (d-f):
So, Espionage Act yes, death penalty, no.
bud — back then the focus was Kerry. now this thing looks (and smells) like the end of the Clintonistas and the DNC.
When I first heard of Able Danger I dismissed it. With thousands of people writing intelligence reports of one sort or another it’s almost a slam dunk that somebody at some level would get it right – even if they were guessing. But the implications of Able Danger go way beyond some higher-up simply failing to give the proper weight to a particular intelligence report.
Why do we need or even want a Federal Government that will not even make the effort to keep the Huns from invading Central Park? It’s bone chilling that after WTC I, the African embassy bombings, the Cole, and Bin-Laden’s 1998 declaration of war on the USA that Clinton Administration feel-gooders deliberately buried under the mattress the information that would have prevented 9/11. For what? They were worried about bad publicity?
I’m outraged. Not just at the incompetence. Able Danger is about the pathological indifference of the Clintonistas to the safety and lives of the citizens of the United States. One thing that has always stuck in my craw is that a Clinton DOD under-secretary prevented air and armor assets from coming to the aid of those US Army Rangers in Mogadishu because he was concerned about the publicity. 18 dead Rangers was small potatoes. Who could have imagined that 3,000 or 30,000 in New York were just as insignificant to these legacy mongers?
If people like Richard Clark and Sandy Berger knew about Able Danger and did nothing to fix it, I don’t want another Congressional investigation. I want to see them torn apart in Times Square and their body parts tossed into the East River. Metaphoricaly speaking, of course.
Maybe the often-remarked political mini-renaissance enjoyed by the Clintonistas on the heels of the bloody forward edge of the vast right wing conspiracy’s having attacked them at the federal building in Oklahoma City, simply didn’t “picture” well with Mohammad Atta & gang.
It is not only that they did not act on this information the truths seems to be that certain people within the Clinton administration tried to cover it up. If not, we would have heard about this during the 9/11 Commission Report hearings.
Just imagine what Moore would have done with something like this if it could have been associated with Bush. Trial by insinuation.
hypocrites.
Buddy:
My brother might get his news from Jon Stewart but I have a lot of other relatives in places like Texas and Oklahoma who believe Tim McVeigh and his Nazi friends had some kind of connection to the jihadis.
I can remember quite clearly Tim McVeigh talking aobut his sympathy for Saddam Hussein himself as far as that is concerned.
So it could be that they were afraid to look more closely at a lot of these things for fear it might require they “do something”. shudder.
Ahh, but those were the good old days of cheap gas and easy money and all the world loved us.
I think you have it, right there in your last para, Terrye. Who wanted to interrupt Elvis right in the middle of his act?
As if we the people aren’t culpable ourselves, for not marching on Washington following National Security Advisor Sandy Berger and Attorney General Janet Reno’s having thrown open the Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory to the PRC military.
But, who wanted to bother the star performer with the little housekeeping problems?
Anyhoo–that’s about the best face that can be put on his foreign policy, the idea that the whole nation was behind the Big Therapeutic Leadership Movement, and little Billy Clinton was just the new Christ-Child we pushed forward to eat up our sins for us.
Yuk. Hunter S. Thompson shoulda written it. Instead we all lived it. And are living it, and will be living it yet for some time to come.
Correction: We’re not all living it. Those of us who are dying in the sands of Araby aren’t living it. Crashing irony that most of them are too young to’ve voted such a gang of disgracers into office (twice) in the first place.
This little drama has all the makings of a spectacular novel and/or screenplay. “All The President’s Men” was miniscule in importance compared to this. I can see the screenplay now–the 9/11 terrorists getting ready to do their work; while the people who were willfully blind to what was going on and impeded any genuine effort to keep the homeland safe are basking in their power and righteousness. They are not evil like the murderous thugs who carried out 9/11–no, they are the prototypes of those who enable terror and evil by looking the other way and feeling safe and secure in their PC religion. Maybe Roger should write it. It could end with Berger getting caught with classified documents in his socks.
Roger:
Do you really think that the journalists covering this (or most other national security related stories) are asking all the questions?
It would seem that they’ve forgotten who, what, when, where, why, and how. Weldon suddenly appears with this news, and the media goes into a frenzy, yet it would seem that he got his information from a briefing – that no one else seems to recollect? Bizarre. Yet, everyone seems to recognize that Able Danger existed, and it did produce those names. That’s worth an AP story.
So, what’s the big deal? Simple. The 9/11 report doesn’t make a single mention of it. Not a single one. Again, bizarre. Why wasn’t it mentioned? That’s worth an AP report, dontcha think?
Too many questions have gone unanswered by all involved, but even more questions have gone unasked. Time for that to change.
It was stunning how soon after the attacks that the government produced the names of the hijackers/terrorists. Perhaps the existance of Able Danger helps to explain this.
chasing this story to its conclusion(s) should be priority number one for Pajamas Media.
His actions in stuffing documents into his clothing were those of a person in a state of panic, or high emotion (e.g. fear).
I’m curious to see how this plays out, but it would certainly help the credibility of Dr. Sanity and the rest if they stopped repeating the myth of Sandy Berger stuffing documents “into his pants”, socks or whatever. He had documents in his pockets, not frantically “stuffed into his clothing”.
If they can’t get that right, it diminishes my willingness to take anything else they say seriously…
“Berger and his lawyer said Monday night he knowingly removed the handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket, pants and socks, and also inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio.”
From the article cited by Dr. Sanity.
Way to go, Otter – you’ve established your bona fides in a single post.
That what Sandy Berger was stuffing in his socks had something to do with Able Danger sure doesn’t jive with what the director of the archives said: http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110006534
The implication is that when Berger asked for the reports, the archive staff pulled the drives in question, plugged them into a computer, and printed out the docs. And that when he was done with them they would have shredded the hard copies. And if the 9/11 commission had come back a month later asking for the reports then the staff would have made new hard copies and shredded them immediately, too. (At least that’s what I would do if I were running the operation.)
If I understand this correctly, it means that if the reports were circulated through the administration when they were written, and collected marginalia when circulating, then any marginalia was shredded at that time and only the original documents on the hard drives are in the archives.
It also means that Berger’s behavior goes back to bizarre and mysterious. Either the guy is so flakey that he was a grossly inappropriate choice for any position of trust, and it boggles the mind that he ever had a security clearance, let alone was the national security advisor. Or he was conducting espionage for somebody. I mean if he wasn’t destroying any information (these were just printouts) and he had all the access for himself that he needed (he had a security clearance and the archive people brought him the docs to read), then the only reason that he could have taken the printouts with him is to show them to someone else, right?
cathy
The Able Danger story is a big deal whether or not the MSM keeps it in a dark corner. Its tentacles go to the heart of the nature of government in our time and the nature of the relationship between government and the people. If nothing else it’s very sobering to realize that spending enormous amounts to maintain a supremely competent military doesn’t mean squat for your safety when the political command structure is focused on ideological purity and avoiding criticism from the chattering class.
Two undisputed facts overwhelm the issue.
(1) People in the Federal government with the power and ability to prevent 9/11 were handed the information which would have in fact prevented 9/11 and they willingly chose to disregard it or ignore it. You should be aware that there was no statutory prohibition that prevented the Able Danger information from being passed to the FBI. The decision not to do so was entirely ideological or political, however you want to phrase it.
(2) X number of people in the Federal government were completely aware of #1 after 9/11 and did nothing to use that information to correct the mistake or to inform the proper authority or the American people that such a devasting mistake had been made.
3,000 died an ugly death on 9/11. 10 times that number had their lives irrevocably affected. 10,000 times that number have changed the way they make decisions about how they will live their lives. There cannot be more overwhelming evidence that words, and ideas, and values, and making judgments on the priority of values have consequences.
I’m not sure how Berger fits into the Able Danger puzzle. I can understand why he would think that it was worth the risk of getting caught pilfering the National Archives if there is any connecting documents.
lawhawk: 9/11 commission now admitting they knew about Able Danger, from NYT bylines Jehl & Shenon, dateline Washington, Aug. 10: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/11/politics/11intel.html?
“The Sept. 11 commission was warned by a uniformed military officer 10 days before issuing its final report that the account would be incomplete without reference to what he described as a secret military operation that by the summer of 2000 had identified as a potential threat the member of Al Qaeda who would lead the attacks more than a year later, commission officials said on Wednesday.”
This conflicts with the latest from AP, Washington Aug. 11:
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Sept-11-Hijackers.html
in which a co-chairman of the commission that keeps on omitting says “The 9/11 commission did not learn of any U.S. government knowledge prior to 9/11 of surveillance of Mohamed Atta or of his cell”.
Curious. Why aren’t those stories staight?
Cathy, back when the story broke, it was reported (among many albeit often contradictory items) that some of the docs were “missing”, and were originals, and that no copies existed. This doesn’t fit with your print-out-from-disc proposed scenario…I’m wondering if I missed something along the way. I had a different picture of the National Archives in mind. Something like a big safe, with the Top-Secret papers specifically not transferred to electronic or digital storage. But, I’m just guessing.
Otter, your standards are so high that you must find almost everything falling short. I’d at least try to glean essence, even in the midst of hyperbole and decorative detail.
Peter Boston asks the appropriate question re Berger’s pilfering of documents–esp considering the larger context of the near-obsessive concern of the Clinton Administration’s concern with their “legacy.”
I recall the Apr 8th WSJ piece linked above. I remember it as a bit of pique expressed by the Journal’s editorial board because its previous editorial, Berger’s Plea: The Justice Department shows admirable restraint, was generally derided. IMO, the second WSJ piece prompted more questions than it answered:
For instance, why was 4/8 the first time we were informed that Berger’s purloined documents were not originals nor even copies of originals with unique handwritten notes but hard copies made from a disk? Why would any archivist print 5 copies of the same document for one person when that one person would be reviewing that document in the archives? Prosecutor Hillman told the Journal “Those documents, emphatically, without doubt–I reviewed them myself–don’t have notations on them”. Really? And that includes the 3 copies that Mr. Berger shredded with his scissors? When did Mr. Hillman, emphatically, review those copies?
Hillman told the Journal that the report of margin notes is simply an “urban myth,”…based on a leak last July that was “so inaccurate as to be laughable.” Okay, fine, why then did it take so long to correct the record? Mr. Hillman is quoted previously as saying “There is no evidence that he intended to destroy originals,” and “There is no evidence that he did destroy originals. We have objectively and affirmatively confirmed that the contents of all the five documents at issue exist today and were made available to the 9/11 Commission.” It certainly would have helped to clarify things if we had been told that the 5 documents were identical and that the “original” was a computer disk that had not been removed from the archives by Mr. Berglar. Omission of such pertinent details seems strange indeed.
A very bad odor permeates this entire affair. To date, I have heard no completely satisfactory explanation from any quarter.
Buddy, I also was watching the story closely, and everytime I read the archive director’s quotes in that WSJ story I look for a hidden meaning. (To be honest, his snide tone pisses me off and makes me suspicious!) But he said “printed out from a hard drive” and I don’t see any wiggle room there at all.
There is still one small detail that no one has explained (or at least I haven’t seen any explanation)… Is the file on that hard drive simply the document that was printed out originally in 2000 and circulated? Or is it a scanned-in image of the document, with any annotations, after it circulated?
My guess would be that it is the former — what’s on the disk is the five .doc files written by Clarke, and if there was any reaction to the info that was scribbled in the margins of the 2000 printouts, it got destroyed when those physical pieces of paper got destroyed.
If it’s the latter situation — scanned-in images — then I have another theory for what Berger was doing. Suppose he didn’t realize that he was dealing with printouts rather than the originals. (If the marginalia was in black rollerball and it’s a good resolution scan, it may not have been obvious.) Suppose Berger decided to doctor the reports by adding all sorts of marginalia which would make him and the Clinton administration look better. (If they had been originals, he could have gotten away with it — his marginalia would be expected to be in his handwritting, right?) The reports were that he kept finding excuses to send his archive “minder” out of the room — so he was using those breaks to “alter” what he thought were originals. Then he realized, too late, that they were just printouts, and if anyone saw his “doctored” versions then the gig would be up. So he snuck them out to destroy the evidence…
Anyway, I think that second thing is probably not what happened. It’s the result of me grasping at straws, still completely mystified as to just what Berger was up to!
cathy
The story is still breaking, ie facts are still comming out. So conclusions based on information in current articles are at best speculation.
NYT via LGF
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=17016_Outrage_of_the_Day&only
Al Felzenberg, who served as the commissionís chief spokesman, said earlier this week that staff members who were briefed about Able Danger at a first meeting, in October 2003, did not remember hearing anything about Mr. Atta or an American terrorist cell. On Wednesday, however, Mr. Felzenberg said the uniformed officer who briefed two staff members in July 2004 had indeed mentioned Mr. Atta.
*************************
All we “know” from this is that 2 staff members were breifed on A.D., not that this information was noted, or passed on.
So it is very possible that Lee Hamilton can say, the “Commissioners” ie those at the top, did not know what those “staff members”, ie those doing the work, knew about A.D.
Ironic isn’t it, that a commission setup to “discover” the fact that our bureaucracy is disfunctional, is itself disfunctional.
From the article cited by Dr. Sanity.
Way to go, Otter – you’ve established your bona fides in a single post.
OK, I’m an idiot.
When this story came out last summer, the original claims of papers in socks and underwear got quickly cut down to papers in pockets. I hadn’t seen the new admissions from his lawyers. My bad, Dr. Sanity.
cathyf,
What was the basis for your statement yesterday that “Rep. Weldon is not the brightest bulb in the congressional string”? I did a modest check on his previous utterances and I don’t see anything that marks him as deficient in intellect compared to his colleagues.
Wrt Sandypants – I doubt that we will ever have an answer the motive aspect. He undoubtedly had hopes for a position in the ephemeral Kerry administration, so it might be personal. I found Clinton’s explanation hilarious (to paraphrase) “Yeah, I appointed a National Security Advisor who’s an absent minded dork who needs to be reminded to zip his fly.”
I’m still curious as to the rationale for holding off sentencing until September. It’s a rather lengthy pre-sentencing period unless the convict has additional info of some potential interest to the DoJ.
For me, the key question is whether the “wall” has been effectively dismantled. I would like to read something on a regular basis that says that the FBI is making arrests on the basis of intelligence generated by military operations or by the CIA.
Otter,
That’s classy and causes me to regret throwing such a sharp elbow back. I happened to have just finished reading Dr. Sanity’s link when you posted and took umbrage at the tone of your post.
I apologize.
I was trying to be nice.:-) Not that he’s dumb, but maybe a little wacky. Here is the listing for his book: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0895260050/102-2873151-7540141?v=glance And this is the inside flap:
Maybe it’s the editor who wrote the hyperventilating description who is the wacky one. But there is certainly something a little weird about Weldon in this story. He says that he first found out about Able Danger identifying Atta right after 9/11. Then he was “surprised” that the Commission didn’t mention it a year ago. And now it’s blockbuster news right after he publishes his “blockbuster” expose of a book?
There are a lot of things about this whole chinese-wall, docs-in-socks, commisioner-Gorelick tale that seem totally off the wall. Weldon’s hyperventilating about intel failures months/years after they were timely doesn’t seem too odd in comparison. But, c’mon, man, you gotta admit that Weldon’s story has some weird elements, too.
cathy
Cathy, your penultimate post is so visual I found myself casting the Berger character sitting at a table in a vast echo-ey hall at the NA building, slowly coming to a stop in mid-scribble as he realizes he’s trapped himself (extreme close-up of the sweat popping out on the forehead). I guess Russell Crowe or Kevin Spacey, tho Dom de Luise might better suit the spirit.
Cathy,
Ok, can’t argue his eccentricity, although he’s certainly not alone in that respect. I inferred classical stupidity on a Boxer or Murray level – air conditioned room temperature IQ.
He seems to fall in line with the self hyping one noters, Tancredo, Hayworth, Paul, Deutsch – well, it’s a fairly long list. He’s just another example sustaining my pet theory that we would be no worse off if our legislators were chosen by lot.
Buddy, I vote for Dom de Luise.
If I’m right in my little imaginings, then it was probably also unnecessary. The archive staff would have dropped the printouts into the shredder as soon as he turned them back in, and probably never would have even looked at them.
cathy
Cathy, that’s the perfect closing scene, a natural Twilight Zone fade-out, like the half-blind old duffer who never wanted anything but a chance to read in peace, who sole-survives nuclear armageddon, and manages to find the book-filled ruins of the city library, and then breaks his glasses. Except unlike Shady Burglar, that guy was a sympathetic character. I guess Mr. Burglar, too, would be a sympathetic character, if overweening un-moral-compassed ambition happened to be a viral infection or some sort of accident.
bud — in a world like this, you mean? http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/07/22/184944.php,
that helpfully explain to us dimwits that “Mr. Berger took a copy of a well-known and readily available document out of the National Archives to help him prepare for the hearings…”
There are many different potentially damaging threads to be pursued here: (1) that the army’s MI was blocked from use by a white house lawyer or lawyers and others (who, exactly?); (2) that those people purportedly relied upon ‘the wall’ in doing so; (3) that specific people — including a 9/11 commissioner no less — were largely responsible for that very ‘wall;’ (4) that those white house individuals (who, exactly?) opted not to share that information with the commission (or others); (5) that neither did those lawyer(s); (6) that certain commission staffers (who, exactly?) either deliberately or negligently failed to pass on details of the DOD briefing from 2003; (7) that certain commission members (who, exactly?) either dliberately or negligently failed to include the details of the DOD information in their report after the 2004 briefing. Its only then, that we add (8) Berger may have tried to cover this up at the behest or at least with the knowledge of others (who, exactly?).
Where’s deep throat when you need him?
ex-democrat: perhaps sandy berger, putative nominee for secstate and jamie gorelick (sp?) putative nominee for AG in a Kerry administration–nahhhh, not likely–considering the damage that both of them did to national security, why ever would they be interested in a cover-up—sarcasm off
Remember, too, that the very idea of holding the 911 hearings in the middle of a war, in the middle of a presidential campaign, was bizarrely unpredictably dangerous insofar as the message sent to the enemy, and obviously politically-motivated besides (precedent being the Pearl Harbor Hearings–held after the war), and you arrive at a monument to hubris: If you need to cover your failures, then do it by extolling them, and hanging them on your opponent (why6 else extoll them?). This theme is in line with the philosophy which gave us Memogate, and Yellowcakegate, and the half-dozen other gates in this past campaign–where these folks understood the power of their ownership of the MSM–but not the power of the scalawag blogoshere to fight back. Bizarroworld is harder to live in when people keep blabbing out facts n’ stuff.
The preceeding is from the preface to See No Evil: The True Story of a Ground Soldier in the CIA’s War on Terrorism by Robert Baer, a former agent considered by many to be the most talented Middle Eastern case officer of the last 20 years. In his book, Baer claims that, in 1996, Osama bin Laden established a strategic alliance with Iran to coordinate terrorist attacks against the United States:
The road to stability and prosperity in the ME may go through Baghdad, but the terror road goes straight through Tehran. The CIA, which tells us we’re 10 years away from a nuclear Iran, has an exceedingly poor track record wrt Islamofascist terrorism (among many others). I’m not willing to shrug off Rep. Weldon, eccentric though he might be (I like eccentrics, btw–interesting people by and large), as an alarmist nor discount his assessments as mere “hyperventilation”.
There are those (Link–do consider the source) who claim Weldon’s sources have been thoroughly discredited. There are others, like Michael Ledeen for instance–Link, who would disagree with that assessment.
No doubt anyone presenting the 911 scenario a few years prior would have been characterized as “wacky” by more than a few of us. I’m not disposed to be quite so blase these days.
He’s just another example sustaining my pet theory that we would be no worse off if our legislators were chosen by lot. HA–reminds me a little of W. F. Buckley: “I’d rather entrust the government of the United States to the first 400 people listed in the Boston telephone directory than to the faculty of Harvard University.” Either method might work as well if not better than the one we have now. In my book, however, Weldon is one of the good guys.
I am too close to the situation to comment directly. But Baer is vastly understating the scope of the problem the D of O had to deal with. There is much I would like to say, but I am filled with such boiling rage over this, it would come out as one massive scream.
John Podhoretz’ rage perhaps will make you feel a little better, OCESpook:
What, please, is “D of O”?
From the AP report:
A delicate mission like this demands a pro. Time to call The Berglar out of retirement.
OCE – I’ll just speak for myself. I’d rather hear informed rantings of someone like yourself, then the uninformed conjecture by the likes of the mainstream media.
…I’d rather hear informed rantings of someone like yourself, then the uninformed conjecture by the likes of the mainstream media.
Agreed. Scream away, exspook. Be as cranky as you like.
Kyda,
I believe that it is Directorate of Operations – Spook Central in the good old days before Church (and other most lamentable legislators) screwed up the CIA. Goss is out of Operations. Here is the CIA structure on their website.
Keith – OCE probably is of the funny type that actually honors agreements. Too much public ranting might abrogate them. The short story is that every time a cretinous congresscritter calls for an “oversight review” the effectiveness of the CIA is diminished. Until Congressional oversight is severely limited, the effectiveness of our intelligence field operations will continue to be diminished.
No person able to pass a minimal intelligence/sanity test would ever trust sensitive information to a press hungry pol. Add the congresscritters staff rats into calculation and the CIA is turned into the CYA. I can’t blame them.
Have we learned nothing from our enemy?
It’s not the nature of the evidence, it’s the gravity of the charges.
glad to see you all are sticking with this thread. i for one won’t be interested in any others until this thing has burst wide open.
ex-spook, jerry, I haven’t had a clearance in enough years that I know more about the rules for handling carbon typewriter ribbons than data on hard drives on desktop machines … but this notion of just printing off codeword documents, and then disposing of them later, just doesn’t sound like the SOP to me. I would imagine, first, that you’d have to have a second signature to make a new copy, and second, I’d think that they’d become accountable, controlled documents, just like a draft document on paper that has to be tracked.
I can imagine someone like Berger handing back a red-cover folder of papers and the document control person not checking to make sure the count is still right; but printing new copies and not making sure they were returned? I wouldn’t think so.
Rick – I have a great deal of respect for people who can keep a secret, esp w/ regards to national security. But OCE did say there was much he’d like to say, but didn’t want to come off as a raging screamer…
Just giving him my blessing (not that it means much) to scream away.
Some things are important enough to start screaming about.
Keith,
Good point.
OCE,
Rant away to the extent that you feel allowable. You’ll probaly wind up being deafened by applause.
Colorado Charlie, not sure if you are still here or the thread is dead by now, but the “second copy” would not have been the second copy of the first document, but the first printout of the second document. The way I understand what I’ve read from the prosecutor’s statements I see 2 possible scenarios.
First, the common part: Richard Clark (and staff) wrote a report which was an analysis of the (thrwarted) Millenium Plot and assorted other terrorist topics. It was probably written in ms word, and called something like MilleniumPlot.doc. This report would have been printed out and circulated in 2000. It apparently went through 4 more revisions, and most likely those revisions reflected some or all of the Clintonites’ comments on the previous revisions. The next 4 documents were probably named something like MilleniumPlot2.doc, MilleniumPlot3.doc, MilleniumPlot4.doc, and MilleniumPlot5.doc. The printouts of the 5 reports were shredded in 2000 when people where done looking at them, because the best way to keep things secret is to not have them sitting around when there is no need for them.
Ok, now the stuff which I would love to know and nobody (as far as I know) has explained.
Scenario 1: When the Clinton administration wrapped up operations, they send the disk with Clark’s 5 .doc files to the National Archives. While some comments from earlier versions of the doc made it into later revisions, any year-2000 Clintonista marginalia was otherwise forever lost. When Berger got there in Fall of 2003, he wanted to review the documents. So the Archive staff pulled the disk from storage and made printouts.
Scenario 2: What’s on the Archive disk is not the .doc files that were printed out and circulated, but instead is the scanned-in images of the pages after they were circulated in 2000 with whatever Clintonista marginalia was scribbled on them in 2000. This is the scenario which has me & Buddy imagining the entire Twilight Zone episode (Dom DeLuise as Berger) where Berger thought that he was working on the only copies of the originals and he was “doctoring” them by adding marginalia, and then when he realized they were just printouts he snatched them to destroy the evidence.
Back to the common scenario: He only looked at one revision at a time over the space of weeks. At the end of a day working in the Archives, Berger would turn in the docs back to the staff, and also the regulations require him to turn in any notes that he took. The Archive staff realized at some point (pretty quickly, from the news reports) that he was not giving them back all of the printouts. Over the course of the weeks/months he was working there, he took out his printouts of all 5 revisions of the Millenium Plot report, as well as some of the notes he was taking while he was there. He claims that he did this inadvertantly, and destroyed them when he discovered them in his office.
Ok, I think that the Twilight Zone thing is far-fetched, and I think that Scenario 2 isn’t even very likely. I think that if there was ever any Clintonista marginalia, it was destroyed in 2000. The prosecutor has said very clearly that Berger did NOT remove anything from the archives that they don’t have another copy of. Something like this is the only way I can make sense out of the reports of what the Archive staff and the prosecutor said.
cathy