Sandy Berger, Clinton’s National Security Advisor. Here is part of his statement to the AP.
“In the course of reviewing over several days thousands of pages of documents on behalf of the Clinton administration in connection with requests by the Sept. 11 commission, I inadvertently took a few documents from the Archives,” Berger said.
“When I was informed by the Archives that there were documents missing, I immediately returned everything I had except for a few documents that I apparently had accidentally discarded,” he said.
Discarded, eh? Accidentally? Right. Mr. Berger has a bridge to sell us – who’s buying it?
the mainstream media?
Wouldn’t they keep copies?
and he “inadvertently” too the documents by stuffing them into his pants when no one was looking? Why isn’t the mainstream media all over this one?
oh, I forgot – Berger is a Democrat…
“Today,” my morning infotainment show, actually put the Berger story as the lead in the 7:00 hour.
I’m still waiting for the media to stop calling Berger a former Clinton advisor and focus on his current job, being a Kerry campaign advisor and spokesman. How long would a high Bush campaign operative be accused of a felony without demands for comment from the campaign and Bush personally? That would be the entirety of coverage until the day the advisor/spokesman was gone.
One other bit that hasn’t come up much, Does Berger routinely shred all his paper garbage? If he doesn’t, his defense implies that highly classified documents might have gone in his trash in readable form. It’s perfectly legal to pick up somebody else’s trash once it hits the curb. You lose rights to it. There’s a cottage industry in paying people to go through your opponents’ trash. I’m sure the spy world engages people to do the same.
Actually, Charles, if the documents were considered sensitive enough, there would be no copies.
Makes you wonder just which documents were lost, eh?
Speaking as, I believe, the only member of Catholic Light with a top-secret clearance, I will say that unless I’m mistaken, not only is removing classified documents illegal, disposing of them yourself is illegal too — even if you were to follow all of the official procedures for destruction. There has to be a record that the documents were destroyed.
As an Archivist, I’m horrified by Mr. Berger’s actions. I’m also puzzled by the seeming lack of vigilance on the part of staff. Why wasn’t his portfolio checked before he left the building — aren’t there any security checks? In the National Archives of any country, there jolly well should be! Unfortunately, though, there are often incidents of this kind because people simply don’t understand the purpose of Archives and consider them as another kind of lending library. I once worked for a School Board as Archivist when a 19th century document being examined by an outside researcher disappeared. The researcher was never directly accused of stealing the document, so for months I searched, searched, and searched again.. Eventually, the document was returned to my office. It had been “borrowed” by the Director of Adult Education w/out his notifying me or my supervisor. I immediately notified the researcher. Unfortunately, he never asked to use our Archive again. Last year, after four years of frustration, I quit my job. Of course, this doesn’t have much to do with Mr. Berger’s story. However, it’s illustrative of the general lack of awareness of the purpose and intent of Archives. I suspect this may have been one factor in Mr. Berger’s actions. As in so many situations, ignorance is at the root. Pretty sad …
Yes, Patricia, but ignorance of the protocols of historical documents by a Director of Adult Education is one thing. Ignorance of the protocols involving highly classified documents by a National Security Adviser is a bit harder to credit.
Will somebody let me know when some joker decides to “inadvertently” walk out of the National Archives with the Declaration of Independence and/or the Bill of Rights. Sandy, check your pockets again — before you “accidentally discard” anything worth hanging on to.