Turns out that more White House aides used political e-mail accounts than originally reported. And that those accounts often were used to conduct official government business, which is prohibited. And that — surprise, surprise — thousands of those e-mails have been deleted and aren’t retrievable.
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee determined that at least 88 White House officials had e-mail accounts with the Republican National Committee. The Bush administration had previously said that about 50 aides had such accounts, the Washington Post reported.
White House officials have said the accounts were meant to keep partisan political activities separate from official government matters. But Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said the e-mails were really about "engaging in an effort to avoid oversight and accountability by ignoring the laws meant to ensure a public record of official government business."
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
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49 Comments
Leave it to bush admin., to take something Clinton admin. set up to comply with the law, to turn it around and use it as something to circumvent the same law! They have no shame.
And? We know that this administration is corrupt, it’s been shown time and again. Apparently Congress is not willing to do anything about it, so what’s the point? Bush/Cheney will continue to do whatever they please regardless of little things like laws or the Constitution, and Congress will continue to verbally and politically spar with the dimwitted President, and somehow manage to accomplish NOTHING!!
“Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said the e-mails were really about “engaging in an effort to avoid oversight and accountability by ignoring the laws meant to ensure a public record of official government business.”
Leaky Leahy knows this how?
I don’t know about you, but I make it a habit to delete insignificant emails ever so often or you get an “inbox” filled up with a bunch of trash. If it is significant, I will save it in text form or print it out.
I wonder how much more of wasteful spending of tens of millions of dollars Leaky Leahy and his crew are going to spend on this fishing expedition?
They ain’t got nothing.
Goodness, Karl Rove violate a court order? The Republicans must be in an uproar about this demanding his resignation. Oh what’s that? Silence from the party who promised to bring honesty and integrity to the White House? That’s no surprise.
The extent of politicians hypocrisy never fails to astound me
The Washington Post reported? And they have credibility how?
I agree with Republican, they ain’t got nothing.
Hank
“determined that at least 88 White House officials had e-mail accounts with the Republican National Committee.”
Official government business must be done on government e-mail accounts, not private (GOP) accounts.
That is the law.
I thought that the Republicans were all about the rule of law – that’s what they told us in 1998.
They do have something, republican: by law they are NOT allowed to delete the emails. There is a very good reason for that. And it appears that, again, this administration has chosen to bypass that same law.
This ain’t your home computer: It’s a GOVERNMENT computer. As such, what is on it is subject to GOVERNMENT oversight, again, for a very good reason. Which is supposed to stop exactly what Bush and his cronies are attempting to do.
They got bunches. Now if they got the rocky mountain oysters to do something about it.
Kinda reminds me of those missing minutes on Nixon’s tapes. I am not surprised at anything this Bush gang does anymore.
But to think GWB stated that he was going to bring honesty and integrity back into the White House. What a crock!
“insignificant” e-mails, they are required by Federal law to preserve those e-mails that are used in an official capacity. Beyond the fact that they have violated the Presidential records act, they also have emails showing the illegal caging of voters. It’s not a fishing expedition if there’s something there. I’m sure you didn’t complain at the millions spend on Whitewater and subsequent “scandals”…
So, Hank and Republican, I assume that anything coming out of, say, frontpage mag, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, etc, can be classified as “they got nothing” by any and all liberals (O hell, we do that anyway)?
boohoo stumper,
These were RNC email accounts, not government email accounts.
Or do you want Leaky Leahy to do another “Nixon” and break into files for his own politically gain? :)
If there was a directive from a senior level official, I would say there are some very good parallels to the Nixon admin.
If that is found to be true, I would certainly thing impeachmentS would be necessary.
“These were RNC email accounts, not government email accounts.”
What a dumbass – it is ILLEGAL for them to conduct government business on private e-mail accounts.
Christ.
This is why we walk on by………..
Okay, let’s open them up.
Then let’s open up the DNC email email accounts as well for all Democratic Congress and Senate. :)
“These were RNC email accounts, not government email accounts.”
Then why the hell were they using them for government business?
Is there probable cause to think they were using them for government business? If so we should look into it.
They deleted them, dumbass.
Walk on by………………………
I wonder how many emails are being deleted in the DNC email accounts about now? :D :D :D :D :D
Walk on by………………………
“There is evidence that the Office of White House Counsel under Alberto Gonzales may have known that White House officials were using RNC e-mail accounts for official business, but took no action to preserve these presidential records. In her deposition, Ms. Ralston testified that she searched Mr. Rove’s RNC e-mail account in response to an Enron-related investigation in 2001 and the investigation of Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald later in the Administration. According to Ms. Ralston, the White House Counsel’s office knew about these e-mails because “all of the documents we collected were then turned over to the White House Counsel’s office.” There is no evidence, however, that White House Counsel Gonzales initiated any action to ensure the preservation of the e-mail records that were destroyed by the RNC.”
Read the entire report of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform here:
http://tinyurl.com/2sc8fh
Ahhhh…
Congressman Waxman’s Website lindainks!
I wonder how many beer cans Waxman can stuff up those nostrils? Those cavernous openings are obscene!
And please do note lindainks, that Congressman Waxman wrote, “There MAY have been evidence…”
In other words,
They ain’t got nothing!
Any emails at the DNC are not subject to the Presidental Records Act. For those of you with small minds, note the small difference.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2007/06/19/BL2007061900924.html?nav=hcmodule
Sure stumper, what ever let’s you sleep at night.
That’s not Waxman’s personal website, you freaking twit!
Republican, unable to understand details? Guilty of massive oversimplication? Nooooooooooo….
Hey Republican, how much are they paying you to spin the party line like that?
Or are you just taking it for free?
Be proud…Catching, not pitching!
How many laws do they have to break? Impeach them already.
“Sure stumper, what ever let’s you sleep at night.”
Actually, Hank, they do allow me to sleep better. It’s always better to head for bed on a chuckle, and the people I named earlier sure know how to make one chuckle, since they’re incapable of serious thoughts whatsoever:-)
Apparently people are not seeing what is really happening. It’s not that the emails were deleted, that’s the easy part of the equation. These emails were deleted off the servers, that’s what is raising the red flag. Someone had to deliberately erase those emails off the server so they couldn’t be found. Imagine that, Geedubyah & Co don’t know how it happened.
“Or do you want Leaky Leahy to do another “Nixon” and break into files for his own politically gain? :)”
Gee, Republican, wasn’t Nixon one of your mentors as well? How’s that worked out for you?
Stumpy another YAF (Yet another Fister) too cowardly to use his real blog name. :)
delsol, who said anything about that being Waxman’s Personal Website?
Are you a twit? :D
I recall a certain Democratic president that was charged with obstruction of justice and the Republicans tried to impeach him for that. However when the shoe’s on the other foot the Republicans make excuses. How can anyone ever take Republicans seriously?
Oh, let’s take a little trip down memory lane, shall we?
Joseph Farha, World Net Daily
Gore’s a crook, tooPosted: August 25, 2000
Al Gore was not a spectator to all this. He was a major player. He used his government office, phone, stature and privileges to shake down political contributors.
Can America stand another four or eight years of this kind of stench?
The evidence strongly suggests that Clinton and Gore illegally bought their elections in 1992 and 1996 — not that it was tough with the inept competition they faced. But this man shouldn’t be running for president on a major party ticket. He, like his mentor, ought to be in jail.
Bush on Al Gore’s “illegal” fund raising
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0003/27/ip.00.html
[Candidate] Bush also said Gore needs to stop “withholding information about his own fund-raising excesses,” comments echoed by McCain, who said the vice president needs to submit to — quote — “a complete and open investigation of 1996 campaign finance irregularities.”
September 21, 1997ESSAY/ By WILLIAM SAFIRE
Thompson Takes a Breather
WASHINGTON — Why, just as the investigation into Clinton campaign corruption was hitting pay dirt, did Fred Thompson suddenly strike a deal with Democrats to shift the hearings into a softer, gentler discussion of legislative changes?
Consider the momentum building:
1. Venerable Gore, now wisely hiring criminal lawyers, was shown to be fund-raising from Federal property for his own campaign, which forced Janet Reno to shake up Justice’s hapless bureaucracy — in hope of evading the law’s mandate to seek court appointment of a real prosecutor.
*****
Ah, the good old days, when RepubliCONs were spouting their well-choregraphed outrage — OURRAGE! I tell you! — that Al Gore would fund raise using his office phone.
Now at least 88 Bush CONs have scrubbed their illegal e-mail accounts and “nope, nothing to see here.”
What do you hate most about the CONs–the smug arrogance, the refusal to acknowledge law or even reality, or the sheer unmitigated hypocrisy?
Arrogance can be lived with. Ignorance can be taught. But hypocrisy…that’s a whole way of life. So from that list, Capn, I’d have to go with “sheer unmitigated hypocrisy”
Clinton’s famous statement while campaigning as Govenor or Arkansas for the office of President. I promise not to raise taxes!
Then after he was elected, the next January, Clinton raised taxes on the middle income class the highest it has ever been. :)
Walk…………………………..
Repuke,
“And please do note lindainks, that Congressman Waxman wrote, “There MAY have been evidence…”
And WHERE did he write that?
The Committee did not say that at lindainks’ link,http://oversight.house.gov/story.asp?ID=1362
It’s not in the pdf at bottom of that page,http://oversight.house.gov/documents/20070618105243.pdf
Republican values for you…………
S.C. treasurer charged with cocaine distribution
South Carolina Treasurer Thomas Ravenel – Ran for GOP Senate nomination
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19317367/
I’d like to thank those of us who have put ReplagiarCon on “ignore.”
These last couple of weeks have been some of the best on the WEBlog because we have successfully organized to marginalize the Worst Troll Ever.
Sure, one occasionally has to put up with a Hank Price-ism or outlander’s perennial cheap-shots, but that’s NOTHING compared to Republiblank’s mean-spirited disruption.
This is how you fight back against the vicious right-wing–you organize for power.
Beats me cosmos, it was there this morning. tinyurl is a parser for long url’s and redirects after parsing to the URL. I suppose it’s possible that the update for URL was changed by the owner of the Website, because that’s not what I read this morning.
Yeah Capn, that was really effective.
Let’s see for every post I made, your gang of monkeys wrote:
“Walk on by”
or they fired up their trolls to make comments.
Yeah, that’ll teach me Capn.
ROFL!!!
Repuke is trying to be clever now.
It says a lot about the likes of Hank Price and Republican that they still support Bush the bag ‘O’ shit. No morals, no scruples, no honor, just a couple of dishonest pricks. Is there any level you two lackeys won’t stoop to?I thought not.
“Read the entire report of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform here:
http://tinyurl.com/2sc8fh
Posted by: lindainks55 | June 19, 2007 at 03:17 PM”
Goes here, dated yesterdayhttp://oversight.house.gov/story.asp?ID=1362
“too cowardly to use his real blog name. :)”
Oh PLEASE!!! This is the troll that said nic switching was no big deal, has been caught red handed stealing a long time poster’s nic, and then saying it was all in fun.
Hypocrisy, thy name is republican.
Clinton’s famous statement while campaigning as Govenor or Arkansas for the office of President. I promise not to raise taxes!
Then after he was elected, the next January, Clinton raised taxes on the middle income class the highest it has ever been.
——————————-Good example of changing the subject when you are loosing the original debate.
“House Oversight and Government Reform Committee yesterday released a report documenting how White House officials have regularly used RNC and Bush-Cheney ‘04 e-mail accounts for official government business, in apparent violation of the Hatch Act. http://www.osc.gov/hatchact.htm
The report also found that the RNC has overseen “extensive destruction” of these e-mails, which would likely violate the Presidential Records Act.
During yesterday’s press briefing, White House spokesman Tony Snow brushed aside this direct evidence of potential illegality. His response: Clinton did it too. “Those email accounts were set up on a model based on the prior administration, which had done it the same way, in order to try to avoid Hatch Act violations.”
Snow’s statement is false. In 1993, President Clinton’s then-Assistant to the President John Podesta issued a staff memo clearly stating that all administration e-mails dealing with official business had to be “incorporated into an official recordkeeping system,” stressing that no “e-mail document that is a Presidential record should be deleted.”
The Clinton administration’s policy also made clear that personal and political e-mail accounts — which are generally exempt from the Presidential Records Act — could not be used for official business. Indeed, the Bush administration has seemingly implemented a policy opposite of the Clinton administration’s.
The Clinton administration’s policy also made clear that personal and political e-mail accounts — which are generally exempt from the Presidential Records Act — could not be used for official business. Indeed, the Bush administration has seemingly implemented a policy opposite of the Clinton administration’s.Read the full memo HERE.
I don’t know if you will be able to access the full memo by clicking on “Here”, but I hope so.
By most odds, they are using Microsoft Exchange servers. Servers are backed up usually nightly. There is usually on and off site storage facilities. Unless they were really dirty, the deleted mail will be on the back up media.
Wonder if anyone even asked for that yet…
Sol,
According to the report the RNC has wiped the servers clean thus destroying the emails. This is blatant destruction, obstruction, illegal…
I posted the link to the report yesterday, cosmos also posted it, here it is again:
http://oversight.house.gov/story.asp?ID=1362
Obviously, the RNC thought it would be able to avoid the Hatch Act by using RNC email accounts and Blackberry phones. Duh. But they can’t have it both ways: they can’t do the public’s business while at the same time denying the public access to the record of how the public’s collective will was employed.
This is a big, big deal. The missing twenty minutes of Nixon’s White House tapes are miniscule compared to the Ratf*cking that Rove and Bush have administered to the Constitution. Impeachment is actually too kind a fate for them. They deserve jail.
The apologetics of certain “Christian” Republicans on this question are pretty loathsome to behold. Cracks me up to hear “small-government conservatives” (they only want it small when they aren’t in charge) admonishing us that nothing is up here. What miserable hypocrites.
But I’m giving them credit for having some ability to experience shame and embarrassment for their lies, hypocrisy, and contempt for the Constitution. Silly me.