Yeah don't stray off track this is a most important subject that is very realevant to the CURRENT health and well being of our nation. If you don't discuss this most important topic then the terrorist are gonna win.

BE AFRAID!!

How is that at all obvious? It's pure speculation.

Let's see.... he stole and destroyed copies of classified documents -- which were themselves classified. When confronted, he lied about it. Seems pretty natural to me -- he didn't want to get in trouble for stealing and destroying classified material. What's so complicated about that?

Possibly. It's also possible he was covering up Bill's written confession to Vince Foster's murder, and claiming credit for offing JFK as well. Either scenario has the same amount of evidence supporting it.

The story today says Berger didn't realize they were duplicates until he got to his office, and so he destroyed the dupes.

Again, what is so darn "obvious" about that? You're making stuff up.

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Man up.

Not exactly "pure speculation." You don't think those Archives employees knew those copies were different with hand-written notes? Why do you think they coded them so they could catch him?

I don't think it's complicated at all. It's pretty clear to me what was going on.

Oh yeah, right Raytri. When all else fails and there is absolutely NO WAY to defend the indefensible----then make light of it.

Baloney. There was no reason for him to take it upon himself to destroy classified documents....EXCEPT for the fact there was something on them he didn't want the hearing commission and/or public to find out.

There is no other explanation. Look Raytri---dont' be so naive because you're bending over backwards to defend Sandy Berger and the Clinton administration. Point is NOBODY in their right mind would take it upon themselves to destroy 3 copies of Classified documents "just because." I mean---use your common sense here. EACH one of these copies went to different Clinton administration officials. They, in turn, make notes and comments on them and return them. Each copy may have notes and comments from more than one administration official. So, once they've been distributed they are ALL different documents. And they were ALL Classified documents. I can't believe you are acting like this was all "no big deal" and probably innocent. There is NO WAY this could have been innocent.

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"What exactly is this foreign policy experience?" Obama said mockingly of the New York senator. "Was she negotiating treaties? Was she handling crises? The answer is no."

They didn't want him removing classified documents. Seems pretty obvious to me. Whether they were different or not was immaterial. And the Archive says they have the originals of everything he took. You don't believe them?

I'm not making light of it. I'm just highlighting the complete lack of any evidence to support your position.

Again, it just doesn't seem that complicated to me. He had successfully removed them; was he going to risk trying to put them back? No; that would just increase his chances of getting caught. I imagine he planned on destroying the other documents as well once he was done with them. Yes, he was covering up a crime -- his own.

I've given you several, all of which have the advantage of being simpler than yours, not requiring conspiracy theories and not relying on speculation.

Please point to where I defended them. I specifically said what Berger did was wrong and should be punished. It was.

I'm merely taking issue with your vigorous assertion that there was a plot of some sort. Maybe there was; anything's possible. But there is simply no evidence for it.

And he didn't. He did it to avoid getting caught.

At issue here is whether this is actually the case in this instance, and whether when the Archive says it has the originals, it means the annotated originals or pristine originals. The Archive itself seems pretty unworried about it, indicating to me that it doesn't think it lost anything irreplaceable.

Every report I can find says nothing about margin notes. It merely says the various versions of the report -- of which Berger, again, only had copies -- were largely similar but contained slight variations -- not handwritten comments, but variations within the printed text itself.

Again, please show me where I said that. He stole classified documents, which is a crime; he deserved to be punished. And he was.

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Man up.

Whether they’re a: Republican, Democrat, Independent, Libertarian, Conservative, Liberal, Quasi-Fascist, Quasi-Communists/Socialist, etc, etc, etc...:

If any American official is caught doing something like this, and is found guilty in court, they should be getting a serious jail sentence and permanently banned from ever serving in public matters.

Government corruption can not be a debating point, a campaign slogan “clean up the corrupt <insert party>”, a slap on the wrist, a tolerable thing in the United States. We need to bust a ‘Neo-Con on Corruption’ campaign. Lock up everyone involved in the Military-Industrial-Complex, Halliburton, No-Bid contractors, all the congressmen and women with family lobbyists and ‘close friend’ relationships making $1mil/year, all the frozen money stashed in freezers, all the leather briefcases at the Ritz-Carlton hotels, all the land deals profiting off of highway upgrades, etc, etc, etc, etc....These people deserve everything short of deportation or death. The liberal: “Lets be soft, everyone has a good heart and means well, rehabilitation will make everything all better, give these corrupted government officials a second chance...we’ll even make it easy with a psycho-lib judge, our dominating television media reporting certain stories and not others will make it all better, don’t worry America, everything will be alright, the middle eastern wackos are “mothers and fathers” too, they want the same thing as we do, just worry and complain about global warming, smoke your pot, do you drugs, and laugh over this white trash piece of flesh Parris Hilton, isn’t she funny?, isn’t she cute? omg omg”....

.....it’s not going to work....Neo-Con on Corruption, kick the <beep>ers out, make an amendment to never allow judges or lawyers to overturn the voters VOTE, and we’ll began an new era....

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"A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away."

The Solution for Illegal Immigrants (Gray areas discussed throughout the thread)

Now who wouldn't want this guy working for them? He pleads guilty to stealing documents related to the Clinton Administrations knowledge of 911,
and receives a fine, community service and suspension of his security clearance for three years. Even though the guy is a now known thief and sleaze, he'll be allowed to go back to the scene of the crime and potentially do more damage. The guy hides the documents under a trailer, then cuts up possible incriminating evidence. His loyalty is right up there with Al
Quaida operatives.
What was in those documents? Why can't the we see them? This story would of been in the news everyday if it would of been a member of the Bush staff. Impeccable

You are absolutely WRONG; it is VERY material that they were different. What made the copies different is all the hand-written correspondence written on each of them. Yes, they may have the clean original that Richard Clarke wrote. But what they no longer have---thanks to Sandy Burglar----are the other copies that went to the President, VP, and other administration officials and had their hand-written responses on them. It's hard to believe you don't see the importance of that.

YEAH, right: thanks to Sandy Berger--who destroyed it all. That's the point.

Question still remains: what was on those destroyed documents that he didn't want anyone else to see?

Yours are "made up" as well----"made up" in an effort to defend the indefensible. I know darn well you would not be so forgining had this been a Republican.

But you're not the least bit curious about why and what was on those destroyed documents.

Yeah, right: because Sandy Berger, former Sec of Defense for the Clinton administration destroyed them. HELLO????

But why? You don't seem interested in that.

They were worried: that's why they devised a code for the papers before they gave him when he came back in on Oct. 2nd. They suspected he also took some on his first visit. After devising the code for the second time he came in, they KNEW without a doubt he took some and confronted him later about it. He LIED.

Clinton, himself, was notorious for making margine notes on memos. There was also some hand-written notes by Berger on some of the documents.

He was NOT really punished. $50,000 is nothing to someone like him. He can't go there for a couple year? BFD. That's no skin off his teeth---seeing as how he already took care of what he intended to.

Remember Raytri---he went in there as a representative of Bill Clinton to answer questions about 9/11 and what the Clinton adminitration did and didn't do concerning terrorism in testimony before Congress. There was something on those documents Berger---and possibly Clinton(Archives employees saw Berger on his cellphone to someone while he was in the Classified documents room)---did NOT want the 9/11 Committee to discover or the public to ever know about. So, why wasn't their a hearing on it? Why didn't they get his cellphone records to find out WHO he talked with about those papers while inside the room? These are all legitimate questions.

And YOU are fine with never knowing.

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"What exactly is this foreign policy experience?" Obama said mockingly of the New York senator. "Was she negotiating treaties? Was she handling crises? The answer is no."

It's material to your belief that there was a conspiracy. It's immaterial to the Archive's coding them to catch Berger. They cared that he was stealing classified documents, period.

Please provide evidence that there actually WAS hand-written correspondence on the documents. As best I can tell, this is right-wing speculation that has been repeated so often people take it as fact -- just like the assertion that Berger stuffed documents in his socks and his pants.

Wrong question. The correct question is "why did he take them and why did he destroy them"? He offered -- and the IG accepted -- an explanation. You are rejecting that and jumping to the conclusion that there was something incriminating on the documents. Maybe there was -- but there is NO evidence of that. Merely speculation.

And it also raises the question of, if these documents were so explosive, why those conniving Clintonistas released to the National Archive in the first place instead of simply destroying them out of hand....

I was. But I'm willing to believe the National Archive when it says all that were taken were copies and nothing was lost. I'm sure if there were important margin notations, the Archive would be a little miffed.

You seem to think they're lying.

Yep, he did. That's not in dispute. Nobody is defending Berger.

Berger took notes as part of his preparation. So now you're saying Berger took notes, then had to steal them because they were so explosive?

It's perfectly legitimate to believe he got off lightly. Personally, I believe he got a relative handslap because his crime was so pathetic and did no actual harm. And I doubt he'll get his security clearance back automatically. But if you want to argue he should have been jailed, okay.

My only point here is that the entire conspiracy theory being ginned up over this incident is based on.... nothing.

Again, this is pure speculation on your part.

First, it's not clear that he actually was on the phone to anyone. But I imagine the inspector general asked that question, because I have a hard time believing that they allow cell phone usage in classified reading rooms.

By the way, you asked if I would have a similar reaction if, say, Condi Rice was caught in the same situation. I think yes, and by way of evidence I'll note that I don't stay awake at night worrying about whether Rice, Cheney or whomever is destroying documents right at this moment -- even though they have ample opportunity to do so.

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Man up.

I already said Berger needs to be punished. We need to find a similar situation where "National Security" and illegal activity along with stealing and destroying documents are involved to see what punishment was handed out in the past.

Besides, someone sent me a "PM" stating that a few posters here like to bring up Clinton everytime Bush does something wrong.

This is Watergate-type stuff. I have written my Senators and Congressman demanding that they insist on thorough investigations and hearings into this entire matter. We needs to know exactly what was in those documents......why Berger stole them and destroyed them.....and if Clinton or anyone else ordered him to do so. Threaten Berger and put some pressure on him and then maybe we'll get the entire truth. The good news is at least CNN and MSNBC are now covering this latest development. Here's what MSNBC says....

"Berger was authorized as the Clinton administration’s representative to make sure the commission got the correct classified materials." Seems to me that he was authorized to make sure the Commission did NOT get some of these Classified materials.

Here's what the Inspector General of the Archives had in his notes about the construction trailer incident:

"Brachfeld’s report included an investigator’s notes, taken during an interview with Berger. The notes dramatically described Berger’s removal of documents during an Oct. 2, 2003, visit to the Archives.

Berger took a break to go outside without an escort while it was dark. He had taken four documents in his pockets.

“He headed toward a construction area. ... Mr. Berger looked up and down the street, up into the windows of the Archives and the DOJ (Department of Justice), and did not see anyone,” said notes prepared by the inspector general’s office.

He then slid the documents under a construction trailer, according to the inspector general. Berger acknowledged that he later retrieved the documents from the construction area and returned with them to his office.

“He was aware of the risk he was taking,” the inspector general’s notes said. Berger then returned to the Archives building without fearing the documents would slip out of his pockets or that staff would notice that his pockets were bulging."

THEN when confronted later, Berger panicked as he knew he'd been caught. This was after his first initial lies about it:

"In October 2003, the report said, an Archives official called Berger to discuss missing documents from his visit two days earlier. The investigator’s notes said, “Mr. Berger panicked because he realized he was caught.”

The notes said that Berger had “destroyed, cut into small pieces, three of the four documents. These were put in the trash.”

After the trash had been picked up, Berger “tried to find the trash collector but had no luck,” the notes said.

The significant portions of the inspector general’s report were redacted to protect privacy or national security."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16304450/

That last portion is important. "Significant portions of the IG's report were redacted to protect privacy or national security." This is an issue os national security, folks. I urge ALL of you who are really concerned about the truth and getting to the bottom of this to contact your Senator and Congressmen and demand that there be thorough investigations.

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"What exactly is this foreign policy experience?" Obama said mockingly of the New York senator. "Was she negotiating treaties? Was she handling crises? The answer is no."