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"Bush Administration Scrubs the Web," writes Steve Aftergood in today's issue of Secrecy News:
-"In a gem of a news story, Dana Milbank of the Washington Post reported that the U.S. Agency for International Development had deleted the transcript of an ABC Nightline interview with AID administrator Andrew S. Natsios last April in which he said the reconstruction of Iraq would cost taxpayers no more than $1.7 billion, a gross underestimate. AID officials told the Post that the page was removed because ABC News was going to charge for it. But the exemplary Milbank contacted ABC News, which said that wasn't true."
Natsios has a history of underestimating the cost of public works projects by a few hundred million here or there, although the Iraq numbers make the Big Dig cost overruns seem piddly. But it is this Administration's serial practice of revising its statements after the fact that is so disturbing. And incredibly frustrating to think they can get away with it.