BACKSTORY: BERGER PLEADS GUILTY TO TAKING MATERIALS (this should fuel your outrage)

Sandy Berger answers questions in the White House briefing room in this Thursday, March 25, 1999 file photo. Former national security adviser Sandy Berger will plead guilty to taking classified material from the National Archives, a misdemeanor, the Justice Department said Thursday. Berger is expected to appear in federal court in Washington on Friday, said Justice spokesman Bryan Sierra. (AP Photo/Ron Edmonds, File)

WASHINGTON Apr 1, 2005 — Former national security adviser Sandy Berger, who once had unfettered access to the government's most sensitive secrets, pleaded guilty Friday to sneaking classified documents out of the National Archives, then using scissors to cut up some of them.

Rather than the "honest mistake" he described last summer, Berger acknowledged to U.S. Magistrate Deborah Robinson that he intentionally took and deliberately destroyed three copies of the same document dealing with terror threats during the 2000 millennium celebration. He then lied about it to Archives staff when they told him documents were missing.

Magistrate Deborah Robinson did not ask Berger why he cut up the materials and threw them away at the Washington office of his Stonebridge International consulting firm. Berger, accompanied by his wife, Susan, did not offer an explanation when he addressed reporters outside the federal courthouse following the hearing.

Noel Hillman, chief of the Justice Department's public integrity section, would not discuss Berger's motivation, but said the former national security adviser understood the rules governing the handling of classified materials. Berger only had copies of documents; all of the originals remain in the government's possession, Hillman said.

The charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material is a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of a year in prison and up to a $100,000 fine.

However, under a plea agreement that still must be approved by Robinson, Berger would serve no jail time but pay a $10,000 fine, surrender his security clearance for three years and cooperate with investigators. Security clearance allows access to classified government materials.

The court appearance was the culmination of a bizarre episode in which Berger, who once had access to the government's most sensitive intelligence, was accused of sneaking documents out of the Archives, which houses the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and other cherished and top-secret documents.

The Bush administration disclosed the investigation in July, just days before the Sept. 11 commission issued its final report. Democrats claimed the White House was using Berger to deflect attention from the harsh findings, with their potential for damaging President Bush's re-election prospects.

After news of the probe surfaced, Berger acknowledged he left the National Archives on two occasions in 2003 with copies of documents about the government's anti-terror efforts and notes that he took on those documents.

He said he was reviewing the materials to help determine which Clinton administration documents to provide to the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks. He called the episode "an honest mistake" and denied criminal wrongdoing.

Berger and his lawyer, Lanny Breuer, have said that Berger knowingly removed the handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket and pants and inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio.

He returned two copies of a sensitive after-action report on the Clinton administration's handling of al-Qaida terror threats during the December 1999 millennium celebration.

The Associated Press first reported in July that the Justice Department was investigating Berger. The disclosure prompted Berger to step down as an adviser to the campaign of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.

Clinton was among the Democrats who questioned the timing of the disclosure of the Berger probe three days before the release of the Sept. 11 report. Leaders of the Sept. 11 commission said they were able to get every key document needed to complete their report.

Yes, to cover the Clintons, and perhaps even more. I'd like to refernce this:

Ashcroft: Berger 9/11 Docs Reveal Clinton Security Lapse http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2004/7/19/221714.shtml

We know that the world was preparing for a computer meltdown due to Y2K. I assume, that the government took the lead to protect it's computer systems here and abroad. Further, I make an assumption that other nations also prepared for a terrorist attack(s).

Having said that, exposing the Clinton administrations lapse, or lack of adequate preparation for the 'terrorist' aspect, wouldn't one want to know whether there was a concerted effort among nations concerned with threats of a terrorist nature, and wouldn't there have been some minimal level of cooperation to share information... especially regarding Al-Queda??

OK.. I would think that would be true.

Now, consider the demand for the 9/11 commission inquisition.. what did Bush know and when did he know it, and who ignored the warnings, etc. Would not this be a question for the British government about 7/7?? Would not the same demands from their own people follow, as they cheered the left in this country to do the same here?? If not, why not? Did the lack of full disclosure in the 9/11 report contribute to 7/7??

Now, bear in mind that Berger took the documents to hide information from the commission. Skipping over indicting Clinton and is bags of crap in his cabinet, consider the final report and that it was shared with the world.

Would the world possibly have avoided other Al-Queda attacks that have followed since 9/11, had that shredded information been shared in the 9/11 report? Could Berger / Clinton and fellow travelers actually have more blood on their hands than the 3000 lost on 9/11.

If there was no sharing of intel between nations to prepare for terrorist attacks, then could the Clinton / Berger lapse opened major windows of opportunities for these barbarians to move on through undetected due to lack of preparedness??

Not only does our nation deserve to see justice served to all who have committed treason against this country, the world expects it.

We have asked the world to help in the WOT, and to the extent that sharing intel is not used against us, as the French did, we should hang those responsible for violating the highest oath of their office, which is to protect our citizens, and follow the constitution.

This deal, for Berger, drips with the blood of thousands. THAT'S how cheap life is to the political elite, who now trot above us as rulers rather than public servants.

One more reference:

Berger on the 'Wall'

The election debate behind the documents-in-pants caper

Wednesday, July 21, 2004 12:01 a.m.

We'll grant that visions of a former National Security Adviser stuffing classified documents down his trousers or socks makes for good copy. But count us more interested in learning what's in the documents themselves than in where on his person Sandy Berger may have put them when he was sneaking them out of the National Archives.

For the evidence suggests that the missing material cuts to the heart of the choice offered in this election: Whether America treats terrorism as a problem of law enforcement or an act of war.

Mr. Berger admits to having deliberately taken handwritten notes he'd made out of the Archives reading room. On the more serious charges involving the removal (and subsequent discarding) of highly classified documents--including drafts of a key, after-action memo Mr. Berger had himself ordered on the U.S. response to al Qaeda threats in the run-up to the Millennium--he maintains he did so "inadvertently."

There's only one way to clear away the political smoke: Release all the drafts of the review Mr. Berger took from the room.

If it's all as innocent as Mr. Berger's friends are saying, there's no reason not to make them public. But there are good reasons for questioning Mr. Berger's dog-ate-my-homework explanation. To begin with, he was not simply preparing for his testimony before the 9/11 Commission. He was the point man for the Clinton Administration, reviewing and selecting the documents to be turned over to the Commission.

Written by Richard Clarke for the NSC, the key document was called the Millennium After-Action Review because it dealt with al Qaeda attacks timed for the eve of the Millennium celebrations. In his own 9/11 testimony, Mr. Berger described these al Qaeda plans as "the most serious threat spike of our time in government." He went on to say that they provoked "sustained attention and rigorous actions" from the Administration that ended up saving lives.

But Attorney General John Ashcroft, who has the advantage of having read the document in question, had a different take. In his own 9/11 testimony in April, Mr. Ashcroft recommended that the Commission "study carefully" the after-action memo. He described it as laying out vulnerabilities and calling for aggressive remedies of the type he and the Bush Administration have been criticized for. Mr. Ashcroft further noted that when he took office, this "highly classified review" was "not among" the items he was briefed on during the transition.

Maybe that is because of the potential for embarrassment at the mentality the memo reveals. Mr. Ashcroft testified that the Justice Department's "surveillance and FISA operations were specifically criticized for their glaring weaknesses." The most glaring, of course, were the restrictions on the sharing of critical information between intelligence and law enforcement--even within the FBI itself. This was the infamous "wall of separation" that Clinton Deputy AG Jamie Gorelick instructed the FBI director should "go beyond what is legally required."

From today's vantage we can see the consequences. Ahmed Ressam was one of the would-be Millennium bombers whom the French had identified to U.S. intelligence agencies as an al Qaeda operative planning to attack America. But the "wall of separation" meant that when an alert U.S. customs officer stopped Ressam as he tried to enter the country from Vancouver, the Justice Department had no idea who he was. This helps illuminate the claim made in the missing memo, according to Mr. Ashcroft's testimony, that our success in stopping these 1999 attacks was a result of sheer "luck."

Assuming Mr. Ashcroft's characterizations under oath are true, it would explain why Mr. Berger's "inadvertent" actions seemed to zero in on the various drafts of this review. Sources tell us that Archives staff noticed documents missing after one of Mr. Berger's visits. After gently raising the issue with him, they were shocked to have him return other documents they hadn't even noticed missing. The result was that the next time Mr. Berger went to the Archives, the documents he was given were all marked.

Mr. Berger attributes the disappearance of this classified information to the kind of "sloppiness" that comes from reviewing "thousands of pages of documents." But it strikes us as amazing that mere sloppiness could account for how Mr. Berger seized on the same memo during two different visits.

We're not interested in rehashing what the Clinton Administration or even Mr. Berger did or didn't do vis-a-vis the al Qaeda threat pre-9/11. Nor are we much interested about Mr. Berger's troubles with the law. What does interest us is what this memo might tell us about how America should respond to terror. Given Mr. Berger's role (until he resigned yesterday) as a Kerry adviser, surely this is something worth debating.

And if the missing memos say what Mr. Ashcroft has hinted they do, we can well understand why Mr. Berger would want to keep them in his trousers during a crucial election year.

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