Let's repeat this, just in case it didn't sink in. Just how is the White House going to archive political email? Here goes:

So you would either print it off, or you would forward it to another email, to your personal account -- I'm sorry, to your White House account, in some way keep that so that in the future, if the Counsel's Office needed to look back at those records, that they would have access to that.

You would either print it off or forward it to another email. Each of the 1,000 White House staffers with political roles. They're going to print or forward their messages, individually, with no management controls at all.

I am actually shuddering. And I'm a big dude. I don't normally shudder. Yet, now, I am actually shuddering.

Question: Are they stoned?

Seriously, this is the White House's solution for archiving political email? It can't be, can it? How could they have possibly come up with this plan? Don't they have qualified IT advisors?

Question: What, did they hire FEMA to come up with their email archiving program? Is Mike Brown the new IT czar at the White House?

I don't think Jeff Averbeck, the guy operating the RNC servers, would have signed off on this "plan". Seriously, White House people. If you don't listen to me on this, listen to Jeff. You've used him before and he seems to really have a clue.

As always, there's more to the story, but after reading this transcript, I had to stop for now. This approach is so incomprehensibly badly thought out that either Ms. Perino's simply getting it wrong or President Bush has to -- immediately, without passing Go -- shitcan whoever's coming up with his IT plans. That's one firing no one could possibly complain about.

I guess there is one other reason the White House could possibly be willing to run with an archiving plan so transparently unworkable. Maybe they actually want to lose some email messages.

Nah.

Steve Niles is Senior Editor for ZATZ Publishing. He is also an independent filmmaker and freelance writer. For more information, visit http://www.sn-films.com.