Copyright 2000 The Washington Post
The Washington
Post
View Related Topics
May 8, 2000, Monday, Final Edition
SECTION: A SECTION; Pg. A21; THE FEDERAL PAGE; IN THE
LOOP
LENGTH: 886 words
HEADLINE: Missing E-Mail: Burn Before Reading
BYLINE: Kamen , Washington Post Staff Writer
BODY:
Clinton adviser Sidney Blumenthal, a
lightning rod for right-wing outrage, says he's solved the riddle of the e-mail
that was deleted from his White House computer at the height of the impeachment
crisis.
"It was an early version of the Love Bug," he says.
The
e-mail started as a note from a friend at the U.S. Embassy in London. But it
kept repeating itself until it paralyzed his computer. Finally, Blumenthal
called in White House computer cops who deleted the offending mess.
High-level discussions then ensued about what to do with all the junk
that had been automatically transferred to the permanent archival system at the
White House. According to Mark Lyle, director of the White House Office of
Administration, one copy of the e-mail was preserved and the rest were expunged.
House Government Reform Committee investigators first learned some
Blumenthal e-mail had been erased in connection with the new investigation of
missing White House e-mail that should have been examined in response to past
subpoenas. A newly unearthed Jan. 6, 1999, memo mentioned the deletions from
Blumenthal's computer, but without any hint of what the correspondence was
about.
Given Blumenthal's reputation as White House attack dog during
impeachment days, some House and media folks figured the deleted stuff related
to something like an effort to undermine President Clinton's opponents.
An excellent theory, but the apparent sender of the deleted e-mail,
Blumenthal friend Nina Planck, who was working at the time as a speech writer in
London for U.S. Ambassador Philip Lader, has a different recollection.
Planck says she sent the e-mail note to Blumenthal and another friend in
Washington because she wanted their reaction to a speech she had written for
Lader. She attached her draft to the note. She doesn't remember just what she
said in the note, but she does remember getting a reply from Blumenthal that
said:
"Your e-mail has crashed my system and it keeps repeating itself."
"I'm glad Chairman [Dan] Burton [R-Ind.] is investigating," Blumenthal
said.
Moving Band to the Wagon
Speaking of the
New York campaign . . . Ann Lewis, a veteran Democratic strategist and
communications guru and now counselor to the president, is moving up there in a
couple of weeks to be senior adviser to Hillary Clinton's operation.
Virus: I Don't (heart) NY
Speaking of the Love
Bug e-mail virus, word is it wasn't able to infect Hillary Rodham Clinton's
Senate campaign in New York. Not that it didn't try. A staffer in New York got
the "I Love You" attachment but didn't open it up. Why? It came from former
White House deputy chief of staff Harold Ickes.
When the staffer saw the
attachment and the sender, "he immediately knew something was wrong with the
message," said a knowledgeable source.
Roll Up the Rug--GOP Turf
Fight on Floor
Look for a bitter fight among Republicans over a
major environmental bill going to the floor this week. The bill called the
Conservation and Reinvestment Act (CARA) by supporters--and the
pork-barrel Land Grab Bill by critics--would create $ 3 billion in environmental
trust funds for land acquisition.
The bill's strange alliance, headed by
House Resources Committee Chairman Don Young (R-Alaska) and top committee
Democrat George Miller (Calif.), boasts 315 members.
Even so, opponents
are not giving up. Rep. Helen Chenoweth Hage (R-Idaho) is briefing staff and
reporters today to derail it.
"You know that when Young and Miller agree
on any legislation, one of them doesn't understand it, and you know it's not
George Miller," said Myron Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute,
quoting a House wag.
Au contraire, said a Young aide. "We hope they use
the Monday event to actually read the bill because they might find they like
it," he said, arguing that it protects landowners and provides money so
localities can set up whatever conservation programs they want.
Albright's Magic Carpet Ride
The State
Department press corps, though by now accustomed to Secretary Madeleine K.
Albright's brisk pace as she travels about, can recall great journeys of old,
when secretary George P. Shultz would maintain a more gentlemanly pace or when
secretary James A. Baker would hunt in the Gobi Desert.
But last month
in Uzbekistan, Albright slowed the pace a bit to do some cultural diplomacy in
ancient Bukhara, visiting an ancient synagogue and a mosque.
And she
unleashed her staff and reporters to help the struggling Uzbek economy by
relieving it of some of its magnificent rug and tapestry inventory. Albright,
heeding the radio commercial that "now is the time to buy an oriental rug," was
on her cell phone getting the right measurements for a rug to give her brother.
There was also a long and quite elaborate luncheon with traditional
dancers, ably assisted out on the floor by press aide Price Floyd and Peter
Afanasenko, the senior Russian translator, dressed in a ceremonial robe and hat.
Then some folks stopped by to see the Spice Man of Bukhara, Mirfaiz
Ubaidov, who sells exotic spices from a primitive stand in an old domed
marketplace. For those too rushed to visit the stall, the ancient vendor has a
Web site, www.bcc.com.uz/spices, and an e-mail address, spices@bcc.com.uz.
LOAD-DATE: May 08, 2000
