And Speaking Of Hillary's Breezy Attitude Towards Illegality...

Forgive me for thinking the press might have a slight amount of interest in Sandy Berger's document-shredding had he been Reagan's NSA.

So, what does it say that Hillary Clinton chose Mr. Berger as one of her advisers, and that she will rely on the advice of a convicted criminal who is barred from access to the sort of national security information a party's candidate for President is routinely briefed on during a campaign?

Many politicians are loyal to their friends. Many Presidents, Republican and Democrat alike, have kept in place people who turn out to be engaged in activity that no one should endorse. And many politicians maintain friendships with associates who have fallen from grace, not condoning their misdeeds, but not abandoning personal ties.

Hillary has done something entirely different. She selected a key adviser she knows has scandalously flouted the law, lied to deflect blame onto others, and subverted the democratic processes that provide accountability for officials' conduct. She selected someone who has destroyed documents that could be crucial to America's security to be a trusted councilor on national security matters - documents that could have contained hand-written notes by her husband or information that would have called his judgment into question.

Hillary has had to renounce associates before. She's had numerous fund-raising scandals involving criminal wrong-doing by people she should have known to be criminals, Norman Hsu being the most recent and notorious. But in all of those instances, she has had the plausible excuse that she didn't know what they had done wrong.

In Sandy Berger's case, there is no excuse. Hillary's inclusion of Sandy Berger in her circle of advisers demonstrates that, notwithstanding her law license, she really doesn't care about the law. She doesn't care whether someone violates the law if they're on her team, if the violation in some way helps the Clintons. Hillary's indifference to criminal wrong-doing suggests that she sees herself as above the law, breezily ignoring law when it's an impediment to something she wants.

posted by Ace at 01:31 PM

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