Andy on NYT on Sandy
 

Seattle?

Nukes Reportedly Found in Iraq
 

Yes, but that's one of the type guys you've been saying has been lying all along. Why should we trust him now?

I will pose to you the question you often ask me. Why do you so quickly reach the conclusion that there is no wrong doing here? I can understand a wait and see attitude (which is the one I always take and am taking here), but you seem to dismiss this out of hand.

Terry McAuliffe has just filed a FOIA request for any and all correspondence related to Sandy's investigation under the guise of who leaked this and why.

Which, judging by Terry's smoke and mirror acts in the past, almost assures me that Drum and Yglesias are correct and it was the Dems doing early triage.

By the way, Byron York over at the Corner notes that he "inadvertantly" took with him between 75-180 pages, of different drafts of the same document, in five to six drafts, AND on two separate occasions, which makes this look a hell of lot less like an accident.

eta for precision

From Kate O'Beirne:

Who demonstrably benefits from the timing of the news that Sandy Berger is under investigation for sneaking highly classified documents from the National Archives? Berger and his defenders. So, it is far more likely that the leak came from his side. It would eventually become known that he was under investigation. Would the Democrats' convention week be a better time? How about an October Surprise for the informal Kerry adviser? Republican convention week would be no good because the GOP couldn't be fingered for it given that they have no reason to create a distraction from their own big show. The news this week provides his defenders with the only "defense" they have - suspicious timing! It's worked like a charm--Dan Rather headlined the alleged well-orchestrated leak to coincide with the 9/11 Commission report before the underlying charges were even mentioned. And, the timing provides the Democrats with a two-fer: dastardly Republicans are smearing Berger to distract attention from the pending criticism of President Bush who ignored warnings about 9/11, which is not the conclusion of the Commission but who the heck is actually going to read the report?

Had someone friendly to the Administration wanted to distract attention from uncomfortable coverage of the White House by disclosing the Berger investigation they sure missed plenty of better opportunities than on the eve of the 9/11 Commission report. How about when Berger's successor Condi Rice was being pilloried for refusing to testify in public? It would have been a helpful distraction during Richard Clarke's media blitz. When Berger himself testified about how the Clinton Administration did everything humanly possible to get OBL and thwart attacks questions about what he was up to in the National Archives would have been pertinent.

Anyone who doesn't appreciate how the Berger bunch has used the fortuitous timing to their advantage must have slept through the Clinton years. The defense is classic. First, the mean Republicans, then the meaningless personal testimonials--"if you knew Sandy Berger like I know Sandy Berger (or Betty Currie). . .," then the irrelevant--he is an extremely hardworking guy who was only trying to help the Commission (we're working, working, working here at the White House), and finally (the political use of FBI files, the lost billing records) the removal of the classified documents was "inadvertent."

link

nttawwt
 

Penske, clue: I, like you, am a moderator.

I think he did something wrong, but that too much is being made of it. The punishment does not fit the crime.

And I was not dismissing a wait and see attitude out of hand. That is why I said, "It's hard for me to believe that Berger [deserves the treatment he's getting], but we shall see."

eta: Slave, I hear the point about how the timing now is better than later, but following that analysis, why now, and not three or six months ago? And since we have the WaPo get government sources close to the investigation talking off the record, it's clear that at least some of the investigation is coming from the GOP side.

an update from California
 

How's Arnold doing?

• Total dollar amount of the 2003-04 budget signed by ex-Gov. Gray Davis: $99.1 billion.
  
  Total amount of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's first budget after promising to shrink government: $103 billion.
  
  ....Number of employees on Gov. Schwarzenegger's staff who make $100,000 or more: 14.
  
  Number of employees on Gov. Davis' staff who made $100,000 or more: 8.
  
  ....Schwarzenegger's whereabouts just hours after vowing to stay in Sacramento and fight like a warrior to end the budget stalemate: Beverly Hills fund-raiser.
  
  Amount raised at Beverly Hills fund-raiser by Schwarzenegger, who earlier promised to end fund-raising during budget season: Roughly $400,000.

LA Times

How do you know until you see the facts? What punishment? Based on the reports, which may or may not be correct, I think it looks really bad for him. One does not taek 5 draft of the same document accidentally.

What facts? Well, some of my posting preceded the latest spate of unattributed disclosures about him in today's papers, so I was going on what his lawyer, Lanny Breuer, said on CNN last night. I'm not sure about this business about five drafts. Here's part of what Breuer said:

• The minute he was told that that document was missing -- and that was in October, wolf, it wasn't before -- he immediately searches his home. He searches his office. He finds the two documents. He contacts the Archives. He returns those two documents. He returns the notes that the government didn't even ask him about. We do a search and find no more. And three months later when the FBI decides to get involved they do find nothing more.

He's told nine months ago that one document is missing. Now today it's five drafts. I suppose there are different possible explanations for this.

What punishment? This media spectacle, having to resign from the Kerry campaign, and (per the conventional wisdom) losing a chance to be Kerry's Secretary of State. I'm not talking about criminal punishment. It doesn't sound like the prosecutors care about the case.

If someone was trashing Condi Rice for the same thing, I would be have the same reaction. There are a ton of rules and regulations about handling classified paper, and I'm sure they get broken all the time. Is this good? No. Can people do better? Surely. Should senior government officials be tarred and feathered for it? No. It's the sort of thing that makes sane people want to stay out of politics.

Conf to Slave Club and P. pls. read below-

Guys, this is my nomination for the most transparent lie ever.

Parsing thorugh all the dreck, my read it was multiple working drafts of the same document (the post-millenium report) and the notes related thereto.

I'm also seeing that he "inadvertantly" removed these docs - was called out on it - returned them PLUS the notes no one knew was missing. He then removed the same draft(s) a second time.

But as you pointed out earlier? Why? The Commission already had the papers so he couldn't be covering up anything. And the Kerry port speech idea sounds ludicrous.

Well, this stuff was classified at the absolute highest level, so I'm fairly certain any breach gets investigated quite thoroughly.

Nukes Reportedly Found in Iraq
 

That's sort of like a defense lawyer attacking the prosecution for offering the defendant's confession, on the grounds that the prosecutor thinks the defendant is a criminal so why should you trust his confession?

"Vote or Die, You ^%#^%#&!"
 

I don't know much about California, but somehow I think the target audience for Mr. Diddy's [Mr. PD?] message hangs much in Orange County. Or do I miscalculate?

Nukes Reportedly Found in Iraq
 

2.

Now you know how our side feels about 40% of your posts, 63% of Panda's posts, 48% of Ty's and how we think we'd feel about most of Atticus' if translated into normal.