Newsweek: The COMMISSION'S findings SETBACK FOR BUSH! [View All]

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Much Ado About Little

The GOP's focus on Sandy Berger may have deflected some attention from the 9/11 report. But the commission's findings are still a setback for Bush
By Eleanor Clift
Newsweek
Updated: 3:01 p.m. ET July 23, 2004July 23 - The House and Senate leadership doesn't have enough time to take up the 9/11 commission's recommendations about overhauling the nation's terror fighting network until next year, but the House Government Reform Committee can find the time to squeeze in an investigation of Sandy Berger before the election.

Republicans are acting like Berger is the worst threat to national security since Julius Rosenberg. You'd think Berger was charged with passing nuclear secrets to Iran. He is guilty of removing copies of classified documents from the National Archives—and of serving in the Clinton White House as national-security adviser, which is enough to re-activate the right-wing scandal machine.

This is much ado about very little. "Between jaywalking and Julius Rosenberg, this is closer to jaywalking," says a Senate aide on the Republican side.

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Still, Republicans should beware of overreaching. Berger didn't remove any original documents or do anything to imperil national security. The originals of everything he examined are safely stored at the archives. "This is the national-security equivalent of the Gary Condit story," says a Senate staffer, recalling the media frenzy over the California congressman's relationship with a missing intern in the months before 9/11. While the press chased Condit, implying he was a murderer, Osama bin Laden put the finishing touches on his audacious plan to attack America.

SNIP...

Kerry goes to Boston next week in a stronger position than any recent Democratic challenger. The party is united in its determination to beat Bush, and liberals and New Democrats alike are delighted that John Edwards is on the ticket. Yet Kerry might as well be emerging from a cocoon when he takes the stage to accept the nomination on Thursday night. For all the millions he's raised and the countless campaign trips, he hasn't said anything memorable enough or significant enough to enter the public consciousness.


SNIP...

Bush caught a break this week with the Berger revelations, but Democrats are on the march. As a Senate Democrat put it, "If we can't beat Bush and Cheney after all this, we don't deserve to exist as a party."


lINK: DEFINITELY WORTH A READ!

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5498001/site/newsweek /