Monday, July 25, 2005

12 hours > 18 minutes

Those of you old enough to remember the Nixon administration, can't forget the 18 minute gap in the tape recording of the telephone recording that was "erased" by accident by secretary, Rosemary Woods. What was on that tape and why was it erased? Now we have another gap in time, but this time it is the Bush administration's problem.

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=politicsNews&storyID=2005-07-25T051753Z_01_N25690956_RTRIDST_0_POLITICS-BUSH-LEAK-DC.XML
Here is a small part of that ariticle:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said on Sunday that he immediately told White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card -- but delayed telling others -- when the Justice Department launched an investigation into who leaked the identity of a CIA operative.

Gonzales, who at the time was White House counsel, told CBS's "Face the Nation" that he waited until the next morning to discuss the issue with President Bush and to formally notify the rest of the White House staff, requiring them to preserve any materials connected to the investigation.

Democratic Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware said the approximately 12-hour delay in notification "raises a lot of questions" about whether some White House officials could have received an early warning from Card.

"The real question now is, who did the chief of staff speak to? Did the chief of staff pick up the phone and call (Bush political adviser) Karl Rove? Did the chief of staff pick up the phone and call anybody else?" Biden said.

Do you think that anyone in the White House did anything during those 12 hours?