Serious: Theft of Papers Showing Al-Qaeda in US Under Clinton is HUGE(TrouserGate)

Rush Limbaugh ^ | 7-20-04 | Rush

[hope]

Listen to Rush…
(...explain just how serious the Sandy Berger document theft is)

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: President Clinton's national security advisor Sandy Burglar is the focus of a justice department investigation. Do you know this has been going on? This was first discovered last October, and the investigation has been going on. I mean, this thing, the pilferage (story) of these classified docs, happened last October and the investigation has been going on since the end of January. The 9/11 commission leaked this. This is a 9/11 commission leak, I think, and I'm wondering. The White House claims they didn't know about this investigation, even though the justice department was doing it. I'll tell you what this does. This puts this into even greater context. You remember when Ashcroft showed up and testified on television even before the commission and outed Jamie Gorelick with her memo that built the wall? I think this places a lot of that in greater context now, why he did that. I think he might have been -- he couldn't discuss the investigation, but he was letting everybody know what he did know.

Look it, listen to this line in the story. This is part of Sandy Berger's statement: "In the course of reviewing over several days thousands of pages of documents on behalf of the Clinton administration, in connection with requests by the September 11th Commission, I inadvertently took a few documents." (Laughing.) Can you imagine? Don't you just hate it when that happens? He "inadvertently took" stuff. He inadvertently took stuff that you're not... You know, John Deutsch, Clinton's CIA director was pardoned for taking things home. (EIB Excerpt of Story) Remember? This guy had it all on a laptop that he was taking home and he got pardoned for by Clinton for this, a little inadvertent thing. But, folks, the nut line in this sentence, in this statement: "In the course of reviewing over several days thousands of pages of documents on behalf of the Clinton administration..." There's no Clinton administration now! When he went in there to "inadvertently" purloin these documents and stuff 'em down his pants, there was no Clinton administration. He was sent in there by Bill Clinton, not the Clinton "administration."

Who the hell is the Clinton administration? Of course, Clinton will have no knowledge of this. Clinton won't recall this. Berger will not recall being sent in there by Clinton. Clinton won't know why Berger did this. He'll be saddened by it. But the Dem response is going to be, "Look, everybody makes mistakes. It's just an inadvertent little mistake. Can't we just get the documents back and move on? Don't we allow people to make mistakes in this country?" That's what the Dems are going to say, or they're going to say that Bush, somebody in the Bush administration, planted the documents down Berger's pants and they knew about this all along and waited to release this two days before the 9/11 commission report comes out. You just know what the left is going to say about this. Call it a bureaucratic snafu, whatever. Folks, I have so many lines with this that I apologize because I've gotten off the path where we need to take this, because this is huge. (Laughing.) Here I am laughing about it, but it's big. This is big, and I'll tell you why. It's the stuff that was stolen, the stuff that's probably now been shredded, the stuff that he just inadvertently sloppily can't find.

You know what those documents contained? Elements of evidence that Al-Qaeda was in the country in 1999! It's all part of this millennium plot that the Clinton administration tried to take a lot of credit for stopping when in fact it was just good police work by a single Customs agent. It was not the results of any directive. This all came out in the 9/11 commission report as well, or hearings. But what's missing is that there are documents elevating, or detailing elements of, Al-Qaeda entry into the United States in 1999, and so when Sandy Burglar says, "Yeah, well, I was sent by the Clinton administration," da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da, of course he was sent there by Bill Clinton to get the evidence out. That's what one of the suspicions is, because the whole point of all this has been to shove every bit of Al-Qaeda, 9/11 blame onto the Bush administration. So, you know, none of this is an accident. You don't go in there and inadvertently take things out when you're the national security advisor! You know what the rules are.

You know that classified docs don't get taken out of the room, you know they don't get taken home, you know they don't get stuffed down your pants and socks. You know all of this. What's a technicality? Of course his lawyer is going to say -- of course his lawyer is going to say that the archive rules that you don't take things out of there is a technicality, they're also saying that what he had were copies, you know, not originals. That's why I say, that's just as good as saying my client has a paper fetish. And that's -- and that's our defense. Forget what the lawyer says here. We got to look at the facts, and the facts are that this just does not pass any kind of smell test, particularly when one knows what the missing documents contain. So, look, all right, we have a little fun with this and we're going to have some more with it but also the serious elements need to be delved into.

So the former Clinton national security director, Sandy Berger, admits to stuffing classified documents down his pants and in his socks and "inadvertently, sloppily" taking them out of the archive room -- and now they are missing, damn it! "We just hate it when this happens, but..." You know, this gives a whole new meaning to the term "White House plumber." See how we can recycle these terms? And you know who he's working for now is John Kerry. Now, how much of what he saw did he pass on to John Kerry? Is it time maybe for John Kerry to have something to say about this? I mean, look at two of Kerry's advisors: Joe Wilson -- now patented liar -- and Sandy Berger, thief. Well, presumed, alleged thief. Oh, he admitted it. He's a thief. He admitted he took the documents, a sloppy, sloppy thief. I think it's time for Senator Kerry here to maybe tell us a little bit more than just that he went to Vietnam: what he thinks of some of his advisors.

All right, "President Clinton's national security advisor, Sandy Berger, the focus of a justice department investigation, after removing highly classified terrorism documents and handwritten notes from a secure reading room during preparations for the September 11th Commission hearings. Berger's home and office were searched earlier this year by FBI agents armed with warrants after he voluntarily returned documents to the National Archives. However, still missing," (clearing throat) "are some drafts of a sensitive after-action report on the Clinton administration's handling of Al-Qaeda terror threats during the December 1999 millennium celebration. Berger and his lawyer said Monday night he knowingly removed handwritten notes that he had made while reading classified anti-terror documents at the archives by sticking them in his jacket and pants. He also inadvertently took copies of actually classified documents in a leather portfolio, they said."

Here's his statement: "I deeply regret the sloppiness involved, but I had no intention of withholding documents from the commission, and to the contrary, to my knowledge every document requested by the commission from the Clinton administration was produced." Mmm-hmm. "Lanny Breuer, one of the Berger's attorneys, said his client has offered to cooperate fully with the investigation but had not yet been interviewed by FBI or prosecutors. Berger has been told he's the subject of the criminal investigation." You know, Charles Colson went to jail for something a little less than this, maybe, something like this. He entered a guilty plea. He had really nothing to do with Watergate. Colson entered a guilty plea on an obstruction of justice charge in the Daniel Ellsberg case, Pentagon papers, stolen documents. Anybody want to draw a parallel here? He served seven months of a one-to-three-year sentence, Chuck Colson did, on a stolen documents case.

"In the course of reviewing over several days thousands of pages of documents on behalf of the Clinton administration in connection with a request by the September 11th Commission, I, undersigned Sandy [Burglar], inadvertently took a few documents from the archives." On behalf of the Clinton administration? On behalf of President Clinton -- who will no doubt not recall any of this -- and by the time we're all finished here, this is going to be something, a conspiracy set up by John Ashcroft who runs the justice department, of course. "When I was informed," this is more from Burglar, "when I was informed by the archives that there were documents missing, I immediately returned everything I had, except for a few documents that I apparently had accidentally discarded." Burglar said he "believed he was looking at copies of the classified documents, not originals." Burglar was allowed to take handwritten notes but he also knew that taking his own notes out of the secure reading room was a technical violation of archive procedures but it's not clear to us that this represents a violation of the law, said his lawyer, Breuer.

"Government congressional officials familiar with all this who spoke only on condition of anonymity because the probe involves classified materials said that the investigation remains active. No decision had been made on whether Burglar should face criminal charges. The officials said the documents were highly classified and included critical assessments..." (Laughing) Be still my beating heart. I lost my place. Where...? "...included critical assessments about the Clinton administration's handling of the millennium terror threats, as well as identification of America's terror vulnerabilities at airports and seaports." Now, look, there are many of us, uh, ladies and gentlemen, who suspect that one of the objectives of the 9/11 commission Democrats is to deflect any blame or association for any acts of terrorism on this country to inaction or lackadaisical behavior, laziness on the part of the Clinton administration -- and the reason we believe this is because we know that the Clinton people have been hauling ass trying to rewrite a legacy for this man.

They have been doing everything they can to erase the Monica Lewinsky image from everybody's frontal lobe when they think and hear the name Bill Clinton, and so Clinton has been doing everything he can to rehab his image. He has a very large coterie of loyal supporters, one of whom is on the 9/11 commission, one of whom should have been a witness, not a member -- one of them, Jamie Gorelick, whose memo erected the wall that prevented intelligence from sharing information it gathered with law enforcement, and now we find out that Sandy Burglar, Clinton's #1 spook outside of the CIA. I mean this is the national security advisor guy! Look it, Sandy Berger was to Bill Clinton as Condoleezza Rice is to George Bush, and if this were Condoleezza Rice and George Bush she would already be in an orange jumpsuit. If this investigation had been going on since last October or January, Condi Rice would be wearing an orange jumpsuit and be setting in a cell next to Martha Stewart. That would be what's going on. Now, with this case, we get "sloppiness;" we get "inadvertently."

We get, "Oh, damn, we hate when this happens. Isn't it a shame? I don't know what I could have done with these documents that implicated my administration. Gee it's just too bad." So you will pardon us if we have some doubts and suspicions about this when it's the critical assessments that are suspiciously missing. The former national security advisor himself, Sandy Burglar, had ordered his anti-terror czar Richard Clarke in early 2000 to write the after-action report. He has spoken publicly about how to review brought to the forefront a realization that Al-Qaeda had reached America's shores and required more attention. That's what's missing. Berger testified that during the millennium period, "We thwarted threats, and I do believe it was important to bring the principals together on a frequent basis to consider terror threats more regularly."

"The missing documents involved two or three draft versions of the report as it was evolving and being refined by the Clinton administration, officials and lawyers say. The archives are believed to have copies of some of the missing documents. Samuel Burglar is the second high level Clinton-era official to face controversy over taking classified information home. Former CIA director John Deutsch was pardoned by Clinton just hours before Clinton left office in 2001 for taking home classified information and keeping it on unsecured laptops in his home during his time at the CIA and the Pentagon. Deutsche was about to enter into a plea agreement for a misdemeanor charge of mishandling government secrets when the pardon was granted." So we're still, ladies and gentlemen, having Clinton scandals during the Bush administration. We still are. Another Clinton scandal here has erupted.

Now, let's go back, and ask: "What is this really all about, folks?" because this, despite the obvious humorous aspects, this is really serious stuff because there is an ongoing effort to spare the Clinton administration -- and Bill Clinton personally -- of any responsibility whatsoever for anything that has happened deleteriously to this country in the world of terrorism. Now, F. Lee Levin, our legal advisor here at the Limbaugh Institute, wrote a great piece for National Review Online on April 15th, shortly after John Ashcroft testified before the 9/11 commission, and let me read to you excerpts of F. Lee's piece.

"In his public testimony before the 9/11 Commission the other day, Attorney General John Ashcroft exposed Commissioner Jamie Gorelick's role in undermining the nation's security capabilities by issuing a directive insisting that the FBI and federal prosecutors ignore information gathered through intelligence investigations. But Ashcroft pointed to another document that also has potentially explosive revelations about the Clinton administration's security failures. In part, Ashcroft stated: "... (T)he Commission should study carefully the National Security Council plan (that's where Berger worked) to disrupt the al Qaeda network in the U.S. that our government failed to implement fully seventeen months before September 11. The NSC's Millennium After Action Review declares that the United States barely missed major terrorist attacks in 1999 — with luck playing a major role. Among the many vulnerabilities in homeland defenses identified, the Justice Department's surveillance and the FISA operations were specifically criticized for their glaring weaknesses. It is clear from the review that actions taken in the Millennium Period should not be the operating model for the U.S. government."

Again, these documents are the ones missing. "In March 2000, the review warns the prior Administration of a substantial al Qaeda network and affiliated foreign terrorist presence within the U.S., capable of supporting additional terrorist attacks here. This is what is reputed to be missing. Furthermore, fully seventeen months before the September 11 attacks, the review recommends disrupting the al Qaeda network and terrorist presence here using immigration violations, minor criminal infractions, and tougher visa and border controls. These are the same aggressive, often criticized law enforcement tactics we have unleashed for 31 months to stop another al Qaeda attack. This is Ashcroft still speaking. These are the same tough tactics we deployed to catch Ali al-Marri, who was sent here by al Qaeda on September 10, 2001, to facilitate a second wave of terrorist attacks on Americans. Despite the warnings and the clear vulnerabilities identified by the NSC in 2000 - Sandy Berger -no new disruption strategy to attack the al Qaeda network within the United States was deployed. It was ignored in the Department's five-year counterterrorism strategy.

Ashcroft continues, "I did not see the highly-classified review before September 11. It was not among the 30 items upon which my predecessor briefed me during the transition. It was not advocated as a disruption strategy to me during the summer threat period by the NSC staff which wrote the review more than a year earlier. I certainly can't say why the blueprint for security was not followed in 2000. I do know from my personal experience that those who take the kind of tough measures called for in the plan will feel the heat. I've been there; I've done that. So the sense of urgency simply may not have overcome concern about the outcry and criticism which follows such tactics.'" Now, what is he talking about? One of the things that Ashcroft is saying, and if you go back -- and I remember these hearings. Remember, many of the Clinton people that came up, said, "There wasn't the political will to be tough to catch terrorists," meaning they didn't think the public would go along with Patriot Act-type measures, or tougher immigration, tougher this, you know. "Go get these guys? People wouldn't (stand for it)."

It's the same argument that I raised yesterday. Here old Bob Byrd is out there all upset that we went into Afghanistan, or he supports the fact we went into Afghanistan after 3,000 Americans are killed, but would he have supported going to Afghanistan a day or two or week or month before 9/11 happened if we had information 9/11 was going to happen? The odds are he would accuse Bush of being a run away fear monger, a warmonger, and not care to that's right -- and of course the Clinton administration tried to get away with saying, "We didn't do anything because there wasn't the political will for it," meaning they weren't leading; they were assuming they would fare poorly in the polls if they implemented parts of this action plan. So they didn't do it, because they were all about rehabbing Clinton's legacy from Monica, which is what is continuing today and which is why I think Berger inadvertently, sloppily stuffed documents down his pants and now inadvertently, sloppily doesn't know where they are.

In addition to what Ashcroft is talking about, there's an article that appeared in Readers Digest March 2002 by Ken Timmerman called "Codes, Clues, Confessions," and in part it states that: "French counter-terrorism magistrate, Judge Jean-Louis Bruguière, first began tracking Ahmed Ressam back in 1996. As a Magistrate, he was allowed to use prosecutorial evidence, as well as share intelligence gathered by French intelligence agencies in his investigations and prosecutions." This little piece in the Readers Digest goes on to detail the wall of separation constructed by Jamie Gorelick and how it made it virtually impossible for U.S. authorities to stop Ahmed Rassam, the millennium bomber, it turns out, by design or intention. Remember, a lot of people, and I think Berger was one, who went up and testified to the 9/11 commission that they did great work in catching the millennium bomber, that they had their systems all in place and everything was great -- and other witnesses came, Condi Rice specifically, "I hate to tell you it was blind luck because there were no policy initiatives in place. We had not put anything from that after-action plan into action because there wasn't the political will for it."

So it wasn't in place. This was pure blind luck, and one of the reasons why it had to be pure blind luck is because what this French magistrate learned was not allowed to be shared because of the Gorelick memo that created the wall which prevented this kind of information getting to the proper authorities, in this case from legal to investigatory or intelligence agencies. It worked both ways. The wall prevented information going either way back and forth. So the millennium bomber which was said to be great work by anti-terrorism policies of the Clinton administration was simply blind luck and good work by a single Customs agent in the Seattle area, and Ashcroft made that point as well in his testimony. So: "Given all the past intelligence information that has been made public by the 9/11 Commission — including that August 6, 2001, President's Daily Brief, which had never before been released — there appears to be no legitimate basis for the 9/11 Commission keeping the Review under lock and key. It is time to release it."

And something very, very suspicious about this information that was never put into action, and that's I think another reason why it's vanished. But this information clearly illustrations and I think points out how Al-Qaeda in 1999 and 2000 are in the country, and the United States government knew it, and they didn't put any plan into action to deal with it, and that's what they are deathly afraid of having been seen. So Sandy Berger has fallen on the sword -- and as Web Hubbell had to do, may have been asked to roll over here. The information was so obviously damning that he risked his career and freedom to take this information out of there and do who-knows-what with it, and that means, folks, that that report and those documents related to it provided advice and information relevant to the 9/11 attacks, some kind of complete breakdown which was not improved later otherwise it wouldn't have been necessary to get rid of it, and that's the bottom line. Take all this sloppiness out. Take all this inadvertently out.

Take all this "he's a fine guy" and so forth out. I have no doubt that he is, but there are a lot of people that were fine people that associated with the Clinton people and they end up being tarnished, all because they got to protect the Clinton legacy or build one or what have you. But there simply is no reason for this documentation to have been taken or sloppily stuffed down pants or whatever, unless it was devastating. It wouldn't have been necessary to get rid of it otherwise, and gotten rid of it is what has happened -- and about Berger, I want you to take note of how brazen these people can be. Madeleine Albright, a demonstrable failure in my mind as secretary of state, terrorism and all this, continues to show up on all these TV shows as an "expert," ripping the Bush administration. Sandy Berger knew what he did. He knew he inadvertently, sloppily stuffed documents down his pants, and he knew that they were asked to be returned, and he "can't find 'em." So he knows he took documents out of the archives room and he can't find them. They're not back there. However it happened, he knew he was under criminal investigation, but as recently as a few weeks ago he was on Meet the Press dumping on Bush -- and that is, I mean, as brazen as you can get.

END TRANSCRIPT

[anniegetyourgun]

Berger just made a statement - about 30 seconds long. Lame...very lame...and there was nothing believable about it.

[SierraWasp]

BUMP ENTIRELY ALL THE WAY TO THE DANGED TOP!!!

[gljones]

Is there a Rush ping?
If so can someone put me on it?

thanks:-)

[headsonpikes]

This is all very good news. ;^)

[alisasny]

This all is so RICH I just dont know what to say.

I love the liberal excuse of the timing the most....as if it was OK what BERGER did until the leak today....clearly a vast right wing thingie LOL

[Paleo Conservative]

HUGE(TrouserGate)

Well it's not like he dropped his trousers for an intern.

[hope]

What did he say?

[Political Junkie Too]

Well it's not like he dropped his trousers for an intern.

Berger was just having a premature redactulation.

-PJ

[pieces of time]

ROFLOL

[Grampa Dave]

That is why we decided to go with Soxgate. No sex or trousers just Sox filled with purloined secret data.

[Grampa Dave]

You should make this your tagline:

Berger was just having a premature redactulation.

[AlbionGirl]

That was genius!

[ICX]

I was lucky enough to catch part of this rant on my lunch break today. Hysterical, sharp, and right on target - vintage Rush. Especially the Gorelick reference.

[Grampa Dave]

Some good reading in this thread posted by Hope!

[ChadGore]

Is this Sirius ?

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for the ping. It has been bumped, linked and key worded to soxgate.

Go to the keywords on this thread, and click the key word soxgate to see what we have so far.

[DoughtyOne]

Hey Sandy, are you just happy to see us, or do you have another load in your pants?

I always thought he was a pantload. It's grand being vindicated.

[Dutch Boy]

This kind of thing will continue until someone is executed for it. If there is no real punishment for stealing classified government information there is no incentive to stop. It doesn't matter if it was a copy, the original or just an empty folder. It's theft of secrets, period. Try him and if he is guilty hang him, hang the next guy, hang them all. It's high time crimes like this are taken seriously.

[taxcontrol]

The real nugget in all of this:

"....The information was so obviously damning that he risked his career and freedom to take this information out of there and do who-knows-what with it...."