Posted on 12/02/2015 6:51:53 AM PST by TroutStalker
Former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, who served under President Bill Clinton, has died at the age of 70.
"V sad start to day; just learned Sandy Berger passed away during the night," Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, tweeted Wednesday morning. "Good man & friend who served nation well as bill clinton's NSA."
Antony Blinken, the current deputy secretary of state and a Berger acolyte, tweeted, "Mourn the passing of Sandy Berger --- father, husband, mentor, friend, leader and great patriot. RIP SRB."
Berger, a longtime lawyer who founded Stonebridge International, a Washington-based advisory group, after leaving government, had just been awarded World Food Program USA's inaugural Global Humanitarian Award on Tuesday.
“We are honoring one of America’s most devoted and influential humanitarian champions,†Rick Leach, the group's president and CEO, said in a statement. “On behalf of WFP USA, Sandy has been our principal voice in advocating that the U.S. and the world respond effectively to the greatest humanitarian challenge of our generation.â€
Berger served as Clinton's top foreign policy adviser during the 1992 campaign before serving as deputy national security adviser and eventually national security adviser shortly after Clinton began his second term, in March 1997.
As the president's chief foreign policy aide, Berger oversaw the Clinton administration's push to expand free trade in Africa and Asia, as well as its response to the al Qaeda bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa, the NATO-led bombing of Kosovo, and the efforts to forge a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. 20151201_mitch_mcconnell_2_GTY_1160.jpg
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Following his time in the Clinton administration, Berger remained an active player in Washington's foreign-policy debates, informally advising Democratic politicians, including Hillary Clinton, and publishing articles about various international issues. As secretary of state, Clinton consulted Berger on topics from how to handle Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to how to "gain leverage over the Pakistanis" and persuade them to go after al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, her emails show.
In an op-ed for POLITICO Magazine in August, Berger warned Congress against rejecting President Obama's nuclear deal with Iran, writing that doing so would allow "Iran to move further toward a nuclear weapon, presenting the United States and Israel with terrible choices."
Berger's legacy was marred, however, when he pleaded guilty in 2005 to removing highly classified documents from the National Archives in Washington the previous year. The inspector general of the National Archives said that a staff member had witnessed the former NSA adviser wrapping the classified documents around his socks and under his pants.
He was fined $50,000, sentenced to two years' probation and stripped of his security clearance for three years. Following a Justice Department investigation and subsequent congressional hearings, Berger voluntarily gave up his license to practice law in 2007.
"While I derived great satisfaction from years of practicing law, I have not done so for 15 years and do not envision returning to the profession," Berger said, according to a contemporaneous Associated Press report, "I am very sorry for what I did, and deeply apologize."
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/12/sandy-berger-national-security-adviser-216344#ixzz3tAw7qbhL
No comment.
Fair enough. I agree the punishment was far, FAR to light. My response was predicated on believing you blamed the Bush Admin. for the theft ever happening.
Yup. And dead men tell no tales.
Couldn't help but think that myself. I'm not at all conspiracy-minded. But this was certainly a most convenient time for this man, of all people, to punch his ticket.
“Arkanicide?”
Murdered by the Clinton crime family?
What were in the documents?
Did we get them back?
Why is anything about 9-11 still classified?
Why are the 28 redacted pages that supposedly discussed Saudi involvement in 9-11 classified, and why did Bush classify them in the first place? http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/09/why_are_28_pages_of_the_joint_congressional_investigation_into_911_still_classified.html
The media is a propaganda machine not a news outlet.
Pingeroooooo!
The EPA is making an emergency visit to Sandy Burgler’s house because of all the smoke generated by burning documents.
Did he ever actually Pay that fine? Seems lib fines go bye-bye. No one checks and media does not care.
Arkincide?
Very Probable.
Dead men tell no tales.
Most likely this turd passed due to obesity related.
Can’t wait to hear same on the “Top Two”.
...And Gorelick was “rewarded” with a plum job at Fannie Mae, where she earned at least $26 million inflating the housing bubble. When it popped, she was long gone, counting her money and laughing all the way to the bank.
Also worth remembering that Ms. Gorelick (as assistant attorney general) created the wall between the FBI and CIA which helped lead to 9-11. But of course, she was never cited for that disastrous mistake, since Gorelick was sitting on the 9-11 panel.
Better scrub his casket of documents before you fill in the dirt.
No details on what got him? Absolutely no hint?
70 isn’t very old these days.
Yup.
Everything you say is correct...
I’m just shaking my head because not only did Gorelick get away with it, but almost each and every democrat and top RINOs get away with this stuff and more every day, and the driveby media (who also get away with plenty of unethical behavior and even crimes) has the nerve to call us hateful and angry!!!
We really are only a few more steps from our own Bastile uprising!
But then again, what’s on TV?
No need to whack him at this time. Had he posed a threat and was prepared to tell the truth, he would have been sleeping with the fishes years ago.
“...great patriot...”
Not even close, Clinton crony who tried to cover up for yet another Clinton crime! I guess we are all suppose to just forget about the Clinton secrets he stuffed in his socks! Anyone else would be in jail!
Get in bed with Clinton snakes and you will get bit sooner or later as the Clintons just keep rolling along as if they are some kind of super star!
No patriot, just another pawn in a Clinton scandal.
“I’m not at all conspiracy-minded.”
Why do so many of us feel a need to qualify our opinions with that statement? And no this is not intended to be critical of anyone except for the media and political elites who have had a lengthy propaganda program to convince us “conspiracy theory” should be outlawed or at least made politically incorrect. It is intended to muzzle the masses that we should never offer opinions that are outside the box when it comes to actions or motives of government or establishment.
So is blind allegiance for their benefit or our benefit? Do they prefer a nation of critical thinkers that question, or a nation of pied piper sheep that question nothing and believe all.
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