Posted on 04/02/2005 6:17:05 AM PST by conservativecorner
The Powerliners are not happy with the Sandy Berger plea deal. But I'm a little surprised that Burglar - I mean, Berger - admitted so much. From today's Post:
Samuel R. "Sandy" Berger, a former White House national security adviser, plans to plead guilty to a misdemeanor, and will acknowledge intentionally removing and destroying copies of a classified document about the Clinton administration's record on terrorism. ...
The deal's terms make clear that Berger spoke falsely last summer in public claims that in 2003 he twice inadvertently walked off with copies of a classified document during visits to the National Archives, then later lost them.
He described the episode last summer as "an honest mistake." Yesterday, a Berger associate who declined to be identified by name but was speaking with Berger's permission said: "He recognizes what he did was wrong. . . . It was not inadvertent."
That all sounds pretty damning. But then you read the actual consequences:
Under terms negotiated by Berger's attorneys and the Justice Department, he has agreed to pay a $10,000 fine and accept a three-year suspension of his national security clearance. These terms must be accepted by a judge before they are final, but Berger's associates said yesterday he believes that closure is near on what has been an embarrassing episode during which he repeatedly misled people about what happened during two visits to the National Archives in September and October 2003. What? Just what do you have to do to get your clearance pulled permanently? Start the clock, he can go back and start deleting memos that make him and his colleagues look bad starting in 2008 or so!
The details of this story are even more damning:
Rather than misplacing or unintentionally throwing away three of the five copies he took from the archives, as the former national security adviser earlier maintained, he shredded them with a pair of scissors late one evening at the downtown offices of his international consulting business. The document, written by former National Security Council terrorism expert Richard A. Clarke, was an "after-action review" prepared in early 2000 detailing the administration's actions to thwart terrorist attacks during the millennium celebration. It contained considerable discussion about the administration's awareness of the rising threat of attacks on U.S. soil.
Although one element of this story apparently is a bit of an urban legend:
On Sept. 2, 2003, the associate said, Berger put a copy of the Clarke report in his suit jacket. He did not put it in his socks or underwear, as was alleged by some Republicans last summer. Now... what about this deafening silence that we have heard on this from Berger's associates, since this story first surfaced? Will we be seeing any criticism of him from former President Clinton, Madeline Albright, Hillary, John Kerry, or any other prominent Democrat? Is the perception that this is no big deal, standard operating procedure for that White House, and is something to be swept under the rug?
Do any Democrats want to confront the unpleasant truths of how the Clinton White House handled terrorism?
Because there were some facts out there that were so damning, Sandy Berger was willing to break the law to make sure the public never saw them.
[Posted 04/01 04:38 AM]
Martha Stewart goes to the slammer for telling a lie about a crime for which she was not charged, prosecutors having lacked sufficient evidence. Berger walks for stealing classified documents, evidence of his crimes being plentiful and airtight. Something ain't right.
In earlier posts here a number of posters thought that such a deal signified the fact that Berger rolled over on someone else. I think that's wrong. This is just another example of the Bush administration not wanting to stir up the pot for some reason. Drives me crazy.
Love the pic.
I feel and share your frustration.
There is no way he'd be getting off this easily were he
a Republican,and the rats were in power.....and he shouldn't!
My gut tells me he sang like a canary.
Bush will get anything he wants this session, cuz he got the goods on folks up for re-election in '06 and folks with White House aspirations in '08.
There is a character flaw in MOST people in elected office in that they believe they know better what is good for us and therefore they are exempt from many of our laws.
3 years???? Get real. Who would trust this person to ever handle sensitive documents?
The silence of the democrats on this will be deafening to be sure but as long as the Pope dies soon no one will notice.
I'm surprised the Burglar King admitted to ANYTHING.
For a slap on the wrist? He's be stupid not too. Whatever else he is he's not stupid. He gets his security clearance back just in time to help a certain junior senator from NY run for president.
Repeated for emphasis. clintbilly and company sold out this country.
We reap what we sow - I hope to see their crop come in.
"SUSPENSION"?
And Martha Stewart went to jail for telling a lie.
The plea bargain is not only a bargain for the Burglar, it also means that there will be no trial that might raise questions about, I don't know -- maybe the Clintons. Now no troublesome questions will be asked and the whole affair can disappear. That is some slick justice.
I agree. Not to get you more angry, had Berger been a Republican and/or in any of the Bush Cabinets, what do you think the punishment would have been?
>...plead guilty to a misdemeanor, and will acknowledge intentionally removing and destroying copies of a classified document...<
"misdemeanor"!?!?!
If I did that I would be in prison for AT LEAST 10 years!
Hope you're right!
As I stated on another thread yesterday.....
Someone's gotta' continually check Burgler's bank account!
There ain't no way that he's going to take the fall for the rest of his life for removing stuff that would damage Bubba's legacy.
He's being paid off, for sure! BIG TIME!
Martha Stewart did time for less...
"Martha Stewart goes to the slammer for telling a lie about a crime for which she was not charged, prosecutors having lacked sufficient evidence. Berger walks for stealing classified documents, evidence of his crimes being plentiful and airtight. Something ain't right."
Ain't that the truth - and how the hell did the MSM come to make Martha Stewart, a polish-american female, the poster boy for Enronesque corporae scandal?
A variation of the polack joke?
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