We Got Ours

The Washington Post has returned once more to the Clinton Library, with a willfully obtuse roundup of the usual crimes:

Did You Know He Collected Arab Money?

Let us certify that fundraising for these entities is, was, and shall forever be a scandal and a shame upon the nation,

That said, the Post largely recycles The New York Sun’s three-year old discovery of names, nations and amounts.

Then it’s on to the Clinton as a campaign issue, and one strong voice:

“Obama has introduced legislation that would require disclosure of all contributions to presidential libraries, including Clinton’s, and Congress has actively debated such a proposal. Unlike campaign donations, money given to presidential libraries is often done with limited or no disclosure.”

True as far as it goes, but with enough information left out to bend reality. Obama is not alone in this. The House has passed a bill, as has the relevant Senate Committee after Republican quibling. In the end the Houses may split on this, as they have in the past. Obama’s support, while a fine thing, did pretty much jack to move the bill.

The Post revisits the greatest Clinton hits yesterday and today.

They resurrect the Louie Freeh’s tale that Clinton passed up asking the Saudis about the Khobar Towers investigation in order to hit them up for Library cash. But the Post itself reported that Freeh wasn’t at the meeting he claimed to have heard this at.

While dissing the Clinton Library for not disclosing donors, including the ever-festering wound that is Marc Rich, they paint the Bush Library as almost an open book by contrast:

“Except for a few donors who asked to remain anonymous, the Bush contributors have been named publicly, and the names of the largest among them are either chiseled into a wall or onto the bricks of a walkway at the library in Texas.”

One exception being the million dollars crazed Korean Holy Man, felon, and seer, the Reverand Sun Myung Moon funneled the Bush Library in secret.

The Press of Time

The Abraham Lincoln Observer keeps us current on Lincoln cents and the fans who squish them. Blogger Mike Kienzler reports on The Penny Collector, a central depository of all things in flattened coins.

The Collector’s review of the Springfield Lincoln Museum gets to the point quickly:

“There are two 4-die machines: one outside the gift shop, near the entrance/exit, and the other near the entrance to the cafe, around 5 yards from the women’s restroom. You can access the machine outside the gift shop without paying admission.”

Pyongyang Penpal

North Korean Strongman Kim Jong Il has responded to President Bush’s personal letter.

Sadly, we have no idea what he said, and little about Bush’s opening letter beyond a demand Kim offer up information on his nukes.

It all sounds like semi-normal diplomacy, but some of us are still nostalgic for the old Gnome of Pyongyang crazy.

Up Your Bolton

You may be among the first,* or even the only to crack wise, smear, insinuate and smirk about the Prairie Colossus of Our Present Day, Springfield Illinois’s Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library And Museum, in a blog devoted solely to this topic.

Touch the Void

And yes, you may pseudonym-asize your self!

Your anonymous blogger, “Bill,” leads off.

*As of midnight EST Saturday, two comments recorded on the first, er, slim, blog entry

Bush Seeks Smaller Presidential Library

President Bush is learning from Hillary Clinton.

Apparently anxious to avoid future controversies over Presidential documents at Bush’s Library-To-Be, the White House is reducing it’s document mountain unilaterally. They have told a federal court that the as many as five million lost Executive Branch emails are nobody’s business.

And screw off:

“It is clearly established law, however, that the President’s recordkeeping practices are not
judicially reviewable…This Court may not, as plaintiffs request, order the restoration and retrieval of any
allegedly missing federal records. The D.C. Circuit has held that such relief must be achieved, if
at all, through the administrative and legislative scheme set forth by Congress. Plaintiffs’
broader claims under the FRA[Federal Records Act], therefore, must be dismissed…. under the FRA such relief can be sought, if at all, only by the government through the FRA’s detailed and exclusive
administrative enforcement system.”

The National Security Archive had sued, and got a federal court order blocking the Administration from destroying documents or foreclosing their recovery. Bush is seeking to overturn this court order.

Bush killed automatic archiving of emails in 2002, allowing White House functionaries to manually delete their work. Nothing has been done by the White House or National Archives to fix this, prevent other losses, or find the lost documents since the problem was discovered.

NSA’s rebuttal argues that private parties like themselves have standing to sue for document preservation, and that the Archivist of th e United States has take no action to recover documents which even the White Press Secretary acknowledged disappeared. As the NSA says, the Bush Administration is inviting them to rely on the care of those who “lost” the emails, or who have not pursued them.