Richardson Watch -- Saturday, February 24, 2007

Keeping tabs on Gov. Bill Richardson as he seeks the Democratic nomination for president ...

GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER: Richardson and other governors attending the National Governors Association's winter meeting are invited to the White House on Sunday night for a "black-tie evening with President and Mrs. Bush." A Richardson spokesman said the governor will be in attendance, but first lady Barbara Richardson is not making the trip.— J.J.

PASS THE RELISH: Richardson got a pretty big piece in The New York Times on Friday. They call him "an imposing, exuberant figure with a relish for attention." They also quote the Journal's story from 2005 about the governor publicly poking at the lieutenant governor.— L.L.

MOVIN' ON UP: In a sit-down with the Indian Country Today newspaper, Richardson said, if elected, he would make Indian Affairs its own presidential Cabinet department, not just a subset of the Interior Department.— L.L.

CRITICS CORNER: The New York Times in its Thursday arts section featured a story on the many books written by presidential candidates— and it called Richardson's book, "Between Worlds," one of the "unqualified duds." Ouch. For what it's worth, at least two Journal reporters found Richardson's book to be an interesting read.— J.J.

SIN CITY PRAISE: A Las Vegas Review-Journal column gives Richardson a nice look, saying "no declared Democrat can match Richardson's work experience" and quoting Richardson's senior contact in Nevada, Reynaldo Martinez, saying, "I think Bill Richardson is a guy who will give Latinos a reason to register and go to the caucus."— L.L.

Yes and yes.

Read about it here:

High Ambition: Richardson Eyes the White House - Part 3 (The Clinton Years)

In June, a panel commissioned by Clinton to examine security lapses at the labs issued a report that called the Energy Department "a dysfunctional bureaucracy that is incapable of reforming itself." It said the department's "organizational disarray, managerial neglect and a culture of arrogance" set the stage for a spy scandal. Lee was never charged with espionage. He would eventually be indicted on 59 counts related to copying classified information with the intent to harm the United States. With Lee in jail and new security measures in place, Richardson told Congress that security at the labs was back under control. Then along came another embarrassing lapse.

As the Cerro Grande fire roared out of the Jemez Mountains toward Los Alamos that May, an employee of the lab's Nuclear Emergency Search Team went to a secured vault to save computer hard drives that were loaded with sensitive information— designs of the nation's nuclear weapons labs. Two were missing. A search after the fire failed to turn them up, and employees waited a month before they reported the loss....The hard drives were found later, concealed behind a copy machine at the lab.

Richardson sat before the members of the Senate Armed Services Committee and told them the little he knew about the hard drives ... Richardson said there was no evidence the drives had ever left the Los Alamos X Division or that espionage was involved in their disappearance. ...He said security procedures weren't followed and people at the lab delayed three weeks in notifying in the Energy Department about the loss. "I am outraged at what has taken place," he said. "There are no excuses."

Then Richardson sat for the worst public whipping of his career. Shelby, with the secretary seated before him now, told Richardson he should resign. "You've lost all credibility," he said. Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia was even more brutal, lecturing Richardson as he sat at the witness table. "You've shown a contempt of Congress that borders on a supreme arrogance of this institution," he said. Then he told Richardson, in so many words, that he was dead on arrival if he ever was nominated again for a Cabinet post. "I think it's a rather sad story, because you've had a bright and brilliant career," Byrd said. "But you would never, you would never again receive the support of the Senate of the United States for any office to which you might be appointed. It's gone. You've squandered your treasure, and I'm sorry."

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