The American Media Has Conveniently Forgotten The George W. Bush Email Scandal During April 2007

The American Media Has Conveniently Forgotten The George W. Bush Email Scandal During April 2007

Eric Boehlert, Media Matters reported that responding to congressional demands for emails in connection with its investigation into the partisan firing of eight U.S. attorneys, the White House announced on April 12, 2007  that as many as five million emails, covering a two-year span, had been lost during Mr. Bush’s Presidency.

The emails had been run through private accounts controlled by the Republican National Committee and were only supposed to be used for dealing with non-administration political campaign work to avoid violating ethics laws. 

Yet congressional investigators already had evidence private emails had been used for government business, including to discuss the firing of one of the U.S. attorneys. The RNC accounts were used by 22 White House staffers, including then-Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove, who reportedly used his RNC email for 95 percent of his communications.

As the Washington Post reported, “Under federal law, the White House is required to maintain records, including e-mails, involving presidential decision- making and deliberations.” But suddenly millions of the private RNC emails had gone missing; these emails that were seen as potentially crucial evidence by Congressional investigators. 

By comparison, not only did every network Sunday news show this week cover the story about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emails, but they were drowning in commentary. Between Meet the Press, Face The Nation, This Week, and Fox News Sunday, Clinton’s “email” or “emails” were referenced more than 100 times on the programs, according to Nexis transcripts.

What has become clear over the last eight days (during March 2015) however is that the Clinton email story isn’t about lawbreaking. “Experts have said it doesn’t appear Clinton violated federal laws,” CNN conceded.

The National Law Journal agreed, noting that while the Clinton’s e-mail story has created a political furore, “any legal consequences are likely to prove negligible.”

Instead, the millions of missing Bush White House emails were treated as a 24-hour or 48-hour story. It was a subject that was dutifully noted, and then the media pack quickly moved on.

There’s been no such Post inclination as given to Mr. George W Bush to give Clinton any sort of benefit of the doubt regarding email use as the American newspaper piled up endless attacks on her.

To sum-up , In 2007, the story was about millions of missing White House emails that were sought in connection to a Congressional investigation. Yet somehow the archiving of Clinton’s emails today were given exponentially more coverage, and exceedingly more critical coverage by the American Press.

Courtesy: Eric Boehlert 

 http://www.salon.com/2015/03/12/the_george_w_bush_email_scandal_the_media_has_conveniently_forgotten_partner/