Posted on 01/07/2007 9:13:54 AM PST by 13Sisters76
Worse than Watergate -- But Invisible in the Media By Alan Nathan FrontPageMagazine.com | January 5, 2007
President Clinton’s Former National Security Advisor was caught stealing and destroying classified documents from the National Archives (before the 9/11 Commission could read them), but his actions have garnered less media attention than a fly breaking wind.
Sandy Berger illegally removed four documents, hid them under a construction trailer for later retrieval, then cut three of the four with scissors upon returning to his office. He admitted to lying about it when first questioned by their officials, according to a December 20, 2006, report by Inspector General Paul Brachfeld.
We already knew that in September of 2005, Berger was sentenced to pay a $50,000 fine and complete 100 hours of community service for taking and destroying documents never meant to leave the Archives in October 2003. However, at the time of his plea bargain, much of this story was never reported, and most of us were unaware of just how premeditated had been his cloak and dagger exercises.
Well, now we know, but little of it is making the headlines or the airwaves. Why? Why is it that secret material failing to reach the 9/11 Commission never ignited explosions of press inquiry? He was chosen by Clinton to provide these after-action reports of the 2000 millennium terror plot to the Commission investigating the state of our intelligence on terror before the September 11, 2001 attacks. Wasn’t that beyond a conflict of interest? Why didn’t the Commission send someone not connected to the investigation?
And don’t embarrass yourself by even imagining that Berger, his attorney, and all of his apologists are to be taken seriously when they contend that the documents still exist in their entirety and were submitted to the Commission. As Virginia Republican Representative Tom Davis accurately pointed out when commenting to the Associated Press, “Working papers of National Security Council staff members are not inventoried by the Archives.” He added, “Consequently, there is no way to ever know if the 9/11 Commission received all required materials.”
Nobody on the Commission (or on the planet) can assert to have the full accounting of an original tally never known. Why?
Because if it wasn’t inventories, you have no beginning number!
This all screams the question, “Why has the media allocated so little focus on this?” The normal order of things would suggest that we learn from our predecessors. While that remains true for most professions, the same cannot be said of the journalism community.
When debating a judicial nominee’s state of neutrality, one requisite is paramount: Does he have a greater allegiance to his vocation than he does his politics? When judges are meeting such standards, then both the liberal and conservative judge shall rule far more similarly to one another than would two fellow liberals or two fellow conservatives not meeting that requisite.
The average reporter also once had a stronger loyalty to his craft than his biases – perhaps the path to the good old days is through the future, and current journalism majors can lead us back to excellence.
Today however, the media’s five-to-one ratio of liberals to conservatives (as was reported by the Pew Foundation in 2004) is having a deleterious impact on us all in that we’re only fully protected when the GOP commit the offense.
Don’t get me wrong, as a centrist I’m delighted with the media exposing Republican criminality. But why should citizens be more vulnerable to other charlatans simply because they are Democrats receiving less scrutiny from their brethren in the Fourth Estate?
Every once in a while a story of great magnitude arises in a way that provokes such little initial coverage that it effectively hides in plain sight. When this occurs, it’s either because the original news worthiness appears to be at a lower level of importance, or because those with direct and indirect vested interests have enough aggregate influence so as to play down the story in question.
The Watergate scandal is an example of the first; Sandy Berger removing and extinguishing protected records of national security exemplifies the second.
In the Watergate burglary fiasco that revealed President Nixon covering up his campaign’s attempt to steal papers from the Democrats, there were political operatives wielding their influence to conceal the event. Thankfully, those operatives were far outweighed by a press more interested in journalism than anyone else’s political agenda. Consequently, what was originally reported as a garden-variety breaking-and-entry would later be understood as a grotesque violation of public trust.
What happened to that kind of passionate investigative journalism? Sandy Berger stealing and destroying classified documents is a story with so many startling facts already in evidence, even the layman newshound should think to ask, “What else is being hidden and what are the motives?”
Why is robbing national security documents less important than robbing campaign documents?
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We're talking about the Republicans here, the spineless wimps of politics.
bttt
Yep, I do think you are correct. I have signed several petitions to get Bush to pardon the two border patrolmen, do you think he will ever pardon them?
Does anyone think maybe the Republicans want whatever got covered up gone just as bad as the Democrats do?
Equally nice of the lame Republicans on the Hill to remain silent about it.
ping
And,,, how many doc did Sandy boy flush down the crapper on his many visits to the men's room?
Berger apparently believed that if he removed all copies of this memo from the Commission reading room, the Commission would never see it. In simple language, he was cooking the record. The fact that the Commission was not angered by this indicates that truth was less important than all members of the Commission getting along.
The fact that none of this is front page news is an indication that the MSM prefers to engage in propaganda, rather than reporting what actually goes on.
You'll get no argument from me!
They stll think they can be friends with the MSM types and they are WRONG!
For sure. . .wondering why he cannot be sued in some 'civil court' say. . .by 'the American people'; or maybe just an 'individual' on behalf of such. . .for Berger's travesty and the costs thereof.
It is incredible that Bush saw this as just another piece of dirt to be swept away on behalf of 'Repub reachout' to Demrats. . .our 'moving forward' rather than looking back. HUGE mistake; the American people deserved better here; and we did not get it.
Beyond Incredible; what the Dems have pulled off as well; and continue to; and how it all escapes our official historical record.
Might also ask her what was taken from office of the legal counsel in the WH who committed suicide. Mental block, can't think of his name right now. Just so many names and situations to keep track of with that bunch.
Compare Martha Stewart’s crime to Sandy Berger’s crimes.
Compare Martha Stewart’s conviction to Sandy Berger’s conviction.
Compare Martha Stewart’s penalty for conviction to Sandy Berger’s penalty for conviction.
Now, compare the media attention devoted to Martha Stewart’s charges, court case, defense, conviction, penalty, and release to the media attention devoted to Sandy Berger’s charges, court case, defense, conviction, penalty, and release.
ThAnd why does Bush refuse to pardon the two border patrolmen that were prosecuted so vigorusly for doing their jobs. They got 11yrs and 12yrs respectively in prison while this traitor got a slap on the wrist.
They went to the wrong university?
Might also ask her what was taken from office of the legal counsel in the WH who committed suicide. Mental block, can't think of his name right now. Just so many names and situations to keep track of with that bunch.
Yeah, the guy that shot himself in the head and then drove to the park to die.
Exactly. The current crop of reps will do NOTHING. They certainly will NOT speak out about the double standards employed by the left and their media.
What remains now, as more and more democrat and leftist abuses continue to surface, is WHAT are "we the people" going to do? Do we just sit back and assume there is nothing we CAN do? Scream into the blogosphere? Call Rush's show to b&tch?
There is less than 2 years to the "big show" and I (for one) am sick to death of all the media attention and prognostication regarding which RINO will be our candidate. And one more pic of Pelosi and that damn gavel and I WILL scream...
Now ladies and gentlemen just imagine the caterwauling and calls for investigation by the media if Burglar had been a Republican. MSNBC, Matthews, Olbermann, and the rest of the gang of liberal idiots would be screaming to high heaven about it. But since Socks the burglar is a Democrat...well then, intense silence and/or the chirping of crickets is the only thing one hears.
Her mind is jello...jello....jello...
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