Kerry's people spun it as "He was only an informal adviser" - not explaining the "informality" of a person who was set to give a major speech for Kerry at the DNC convention. Also spun was that it was a Republican leak - but that would have occured after the convention.
The press dutifully bought the "informal" line, the lines about "only copies" and such. It was a pre-convetion dump by his own people.
Interestingly, Kerry might not have known about the investigation that had been going on since 2003. Bill Clinton knew about it - what does it say if he didn't warn Kerry?
Exactly. And Sandy Berger just spoke for Kerry a few weeks ago, but nobody in the media bothered to ask him about him stuffing documents in his pants.
That's why I think it's laughable that some people on this thread assume Kerry couldn't have cheated, because he'd have too much to lose. You would think smuggling out classified documents from the National Archives would cause somebody to be permanently disgraced. But Berger is still speaking for Kerry!
You know what Kerry would have said if he had gotten caught red-handed? He would have used the Sandy Berger "sloppy" defense and say he forgot he couldn't bring in notes. And he would question the timing of the charge, and say we need to get back to the real issues. And that would have been the end of the story.