He's really, really sorry about his getting caught.


n a scandal enormously reminiscent of al-Qerry's last lying, cheating advisor Joseph C. Wilson IV, who leaked information about his CIA-undercover wife just so he could falsely accuse administration officials of doing it, and who publicly lied about his report showing that "Saddam [Hussein] had sought uranium from Niger," Hanoi John's latest "close, trusted advisor" has been caught on National Archives security cameras stuffing folded, highly-classified papers down the front of his pants and tucking a couple more into his socks. Now, in an exclusive interview with Liberal Utopia, the longtime friend of John-John, Bill al-Qlinton and his wife Hilldabeast, sits down to clear the air and empty his trousers over the entire mess.

LIBERAL UTOPIA: Thank you for joining us, Sandy Burglar, erstwhile high-ranking advisor to the Qerry campaign.

SANDY BURGLAR: Uh, that's "Berger."

LU: Whatever. Now, tell us. What possessed you to do such a thing as robbing the National Archives of scores of valuable, extremely sensitive documents? Are you insane?

SB: My attorney, who is here with me, advises me that I shouldn't answer that until the investigation into this matter had been completed. But I will say that it's not my fault!

LU: I don't understand. Are you saying that someone else robbed the archives—perhaps someone who bears an uncanny resemblance to you—and is trying to pin it on an innocent man? Or are your saying that—without your knowledge or awareness—some other person put those documents inside your pants and socks, like a reverse pickpocket?

SB: Well, as you know, a lot of strange things happen in this town [Washington, D.C.] every day, and there was a robbery a few decades back that got another presidential candidate into a lot of trouble later on, so it's not beyond the realm of possibility that something like you said could have happened. And, I don't know if you've ever been to London or places like that, but there are a lot of extremely skilled pickpockets over there who have been known to take a ring off a woman's finger and she wouldn't feel a thing or even know it. It's not hard to imagine, then, someone like that here who could accomplish the same thing but in reverse. I did feel a tingling sensation briefly while I was studying those documents in the archives room. Maybe that has something to do with how those papers wound up inside my pants, I don't know. There's still an ongoing investigation into what exactly happened.

LU: O.K. Was there anyone else there in that room with you?

SB: Well, there wasn't supposed to be, given the highly sensitive nature of the documents I was reviewing. But it is possible that someone else sneaked in while no one was looking and stayed hidden under a table or even behind a chair somewhere. I was concentrating on the documents, so I wasn't really paying attention to my surroundings all that much.

LU: Even you have to admit, however, that it's highly unlikely, wouldn't you say?

SB: On the advise of my counsel, I must admit that I don't admit it.

LU: All right. Moving on then. Why were you taking notes from those documents? Did you not know that doing so was in itself illegal?

SB: I don't recall seeing the law that says it was. I mean, if it was illegal wouldn't there be like a big sign in that room saying something like "No Note-Taking Allowed. It's Against the Law"? I don't remember seeing one. Of course, like I said, I was too busy concentrating on reading the documents so, even if there was one, I wouldn't have noticed it. Besides, everyone's assuming that I was taking notes from those documents. I could've just been doodling. I do do that a lot when I'm reading things, you know. Doodling, that is.

LU: Were you only doodling or were your taking notes?

SB: My attorney tells me I shouldn't answer that until the investigation is over. Sorry.

LU: Sure. Let's get back to your pants. Regardless how those papers got into them, what did you do once you got home and noticed what must have seemed a tighter waistline?

SB: Actually, I didn't think much of it. You know, I had a very big lunch that day. Oh, I could've just shrugged it off as simple overindulgence. You need to cut back on the appetizers, Sandy, I could've told myself. But, given my background as a trained investigator, I knew I should check them out to see if it could be anything else. And, lo and behold, right there in my pants were a whole bunch of papers. Well, you can just imagine my embarrassment. At first, I didn't know how they got in there. In my pants.

LU: What about your socks? Do your ankles normally swell up like that very often?

SB: Sometimes. Everyone's does as they get older, from what I understand. A good example is my friend Hillary. She apparently gets them really bad. Or maybe they're just like that all the time, I don't know. Anyway, I'm not taking medication for swollen ankles or anything, if that's what you're asking.

LU: No, it's about the papers that were in your socks. Forgetting for a moment how they got in there, or what else you thought could've contributed to your increased ankle size, what did you do once you discovered a bunch of papers stuffed inside them.

SB: First of all, there's one thing I have to clear up. Only one of my socks had what you might call an abnormal amount of papers stuffed into it. The other sock just had a few.

LU: How is that relevant, other than your admitting that you did in fact have papers inside them?

SB: Well, I just need to let people know that it wasn't as bad as it could've been. I mean, I could've had both socks filled up with papers, but I didn't. I only had one sock filled up.

LU: Ok, tell us what you did when you discovered that those papers had gotten inside your socks and into your pants somehow. Did you call the National Archives folks right away?

SB: No. Because at first I wasn't sure that those were the same papers I was looking at in that room. They could've been, you know, like entirely different papers. I didn't have time to check because I had to meet with the senator, whose presidential campaign, as you're aware, I've been advising on national security matters. And there just wasn't time to check.

LU: Did you wonder that they might be the same papers, the classified ones you were studying? And if so, didn't you think you should have found out first before doing anything else?

SB: Not really. As a matter of fact I kept the papers with me after I pulled them out of my socks and pants and while I went to go meet with the senator. It was only when I got back from his campaign headquarters, after I finally got a chance to actually look at them, that I noticed they were the classified documents.

LU: At the senator's presidential campaign headquarters, did anyone besides yourself see the papers or what was in them?

SB: You sound like the FBI agent who interviewed me after it happened. I'll give you the same answer I gave her. No, to the best of my recollection, no other person saw what was in all those papers. Some of the people there may have noticed that I was carrying some papers around, but I do that pretty much all the time. When I was meeting with the senator in his office he wanted to show me the tape of his newest campaign commercial down the hall in the mini-theater he has set up there. Well, I didn't want to lug around a bunch of papers with me, so I left them on the senator's desk in his office while we were looking at the commercial.

LU: Were the papers still on the senator's desk when you got back?

SB: Actually, they'd been moved to a table in the conference room across from the office. But I didn't find that out until after we'd been discussing the commercial for a while and noticed that my papers were missing. So I asked one of his secretaries what happened to them. He said they'd been moved to the conference room.

LU: Did the secretary give you a reason for why the papers were removed from the senator's office?

SB: No. I just assumed that they needed to clear the senator's desk for something and had figured those papers belonged in the conference room or something.

LU: Do you know whether anyone read what was in those top-secret papers, either while they were being moved to the conference room and after they were in it?

SB: No, I don't. But you have to remember, as my attorney has emphasized to investigators, that I didn't even know at that point they were the classified documents.

LU: The same documents that you found earlier that day stuffed in your pants and socks?

SB: Correct.

LU: When did you discover that the papers you'd brought to the senator's headquarters were the classified documents you were looking at in the National Archives reading room?

SB: Not until after I returned home from the senator's headquarters. On my answering machine was a message from the National Archives staff asking me to return their phone call. That it was urgent.

LU: Did you call them back right away?

SB: Yes. The section's director talked to me about papers missing from the reading room and asked me if I had them.

LU: What did you say?

SB: I told him I didn't think I did but that I would check and get back to him. So I looked in my folder. That's when I discovered that I had those classified documents in my possession. I called the director back and told him about it and he asked me to return the documents immediately.

LU: About what time was it then?

SB: Oh, I don't know. Probably late afternoon.

LU: Did you immediately return the documents?

SB: Certainly. He specifically warned me that having those papers outside the archives building without proper authorization was inappropriate. So I drove straight to the National Archives with the papers and gave them to the director in his office.

LU: Did he say anything to you at that point? Did he ask you why you took those papers out of the reading room?

SB: I can't recall exactly what he asked me. There was no one else in the room, by the way. He just seemed very concerned that some papers were missing and was most anxious to get them back where they belonged.

LU: That was it? You just left after that?

SB: Yes. I had an appointment to return two days later to review other documents. So I figured if he had any questions, he could ask me about it then.

LU: Did he? When you returned two days later?

SB: No, not that I can recall. I just went into the reading room and began reviewing the additional documents in preparation for my upcoming testimony before the 9/11 commission.

LU: Isn't it true that more papers went missing from the reading room after you left it that second time?

SB: Uh, yes. Some did. But not as many as that first time. Somehow, one or two more classified documents ended up in my leather folder. But I returned those too once I found out—once the National Archives people told me that they thought I might have taken out some more papers with me that last time.

LU: Did you return those second set of papers to the archives.

SB: No. I didn't get a chance. After I got off the phone with the archives people I received a call from the FBI. They told me to stay at my home and not leave until they arrived to collect the papers themselves.

LU: Did you stay at your home like they asked?

SB: Yes. They mentioned it was, in their words, a national security breach, and I was under strict obligation, according to my oath, to do as they ordered until the matter was resolved.

LU: Oath?

SB: Yes, the oath I took, which is still in effect, that I not divulge or cause to be divulged any classified or sensitive material that I may have access to.

LU: What happens if you violate that oath?

SB: I could go to jail, of course. But that's not what happened, because I never had any intention—any willful intention of violating it.

LU: Can you still go to jail even if you didn't intentionally violate your oath?

SB: Uh, my counsel tells me that it's possible but highly unlikely. Besides, it's not like I sold the information in those documents to anybody or anything. Just found out that I accidentally had them inside my pants and socks and my folder and forgot that they were there, that's all. And I immediately returned the documents after I was asked to do so.

LU: Did you return all the documents?

SB: I believed I had. But according to National Archives officials, some are still missing. I don't know what happened to those. If I recall, the ones they say are missing they already have copies of elsewhere. So it's not like anything is entirely missing. Just a few copies of what they still have.

LU: Hasn't the National Archives stated there are some original documents missing, too? Documents that no one was allowed to make any copies of because they were so sensitive, and that they were supposed to stay inside the archives building?

SB: Uh, I can't answer that. You'll have to ask them if that's the case.

LU: O.K. Getting back to the FBI. When they arrived at your home to collect the documents, what happened?

SB: Well, they had a search warrant. Not just for my home but for my office.

LU: And it was after they executed those search warrants that they discovered not only that you had the classified documents but that others were missing?

SB: They did recover everything I had, to the best of my knowledge. I told them that I might have accidentally thrown a couple of them away, not realizing what they were. But I couldn't confirm that was the case one way or the other. They thoroughly searched my home and, from what I understand, my office too. So if they didn't find any missing documents, either I didn't have them to begin with or there really aren't any missing.

LU: You're saying that the National Archives might have made a mistake and somehow misplaced highly secret documents?

SB: I suppose that's for the investigators to determine. They haven't told me what their findings are so far.

LU: Have you lost your security clearance as a result of this?

SB: I've been told that it has been suspended pending the investigation. However, I have every reason to believe that I will be exonerated of any wrongdoing.

LU: Why do you say that?

SB: Because, as I said before, it wasn't my fault. What I did was inadvertent, an accident. Nothing more. I can't recall how those documents and notes got into my pants and socks. It was such a long time ago. I figure that the country is really ready to move on now to more important matters, like why Mr. Bush lied about Iraq and things like that.

LU: Is the FBI going to just "move on" too?

SB: That's up to them. But you should ask them if they're ready to waste the American people's money on investigating what is clearly a unfortunate accident. No one got hurt. No information was divulged, as far as I can tell. At least ninety percent of the papers have been returned. So where's the harm?

LU: What about those papers that weren't returned. Can you tell us what was in them?

SB: [Giggles.] Even if I knew, which I'm not admitting that I do, I couldn't tell you. I've heard some people say that those are the most sensitive of the documents I saw. I simply have no knowledge about these so-called missing documents.

LU: Do you think you should apologize to, say, the American people for removing highly secret documents from their secure location?

SB: I will apologize on behalf of our government for its putting them through this ridiculous episode of wasting their hard-earned tax dollars on such a flimsy but obviously partisan-motivated investigation into absolutely nothing. I did not steal papers from that place, the National Archives.

LU: I'm sure they appreciate that apology. Thank you, Mr. Burglar, for taking some time out of your schedule and those papers out of your pants. It was nice of you to share your thoughts with us today about this matter.

SB: Ugh! It's "Berger."

	5:52 PM

Comments (registered users)