WASHINGTON -- On the morning of Jan. 24, Ellen Feuer, like the rest of the
country, was shocked to read the news that vandals, most likely outgoing
Clinton-Gore staffers, had trashed the White House.

But what really caught her attention were all the W's -- President Bush's
famous middle initial -- that had been plucked from computer keyboards.

She rushed to tell her husband, who happens to run the nation's largest office-supply chain,
OfficeMax Inc., which sells computers along with pens and paper.  Michael Feuer, chairman
and CEO of the Cleveland-based chain, immediately  smelled opportunity.

In a gesture of corporate good will -- and what he thought would be great
publicity -- Feuer decided to donate computer equipment from his store
inventory to replace the sabotaged White House equipment.

"This morning we read of the 'W' key caper at the White House and seized the opportunity
for recognition and plain old fun," Feuer's executive assistant,  Kathy Davis, announced in a
company-wide e-mail, a copy of which was obtained  by WorldNetDaily.

In case the keyboards with the missing W's were permanently damaged, Feuer ordered 100
"state-of the art" keyboards made by one of OfficeMax's largest  vendors, Logitech, to be
shipped to the White House from one of OfficeMax's  Washington-area stores.

He threw in an extra 500 W's to cover any keys that turned up missing at other federal offices.
For this he enlisted Logitech workers.

"A number of people from Logitech pulled them off of old keyboards," said
Nathan Papadopulos, spokesman for Fremont, Calif.-based Logitech. "We just
started yanking off W's till we came up with 500."

Then Feuer wrote Bush a letter, explaining the shipment: "We're delighted to make this contribution
of state-of-the-art Logitech keyboards in the spirit of giving you the tools to do the good work
your country is expecting of you and your team."

The donation of 100 Logitech cordless iTouch keyboards, which retail for
$59.95, was not only generous and timely, but also prescient.

As it happens, precisely 100 keyboards, not just keys, had to be replaced by incoming Bushies.
They were damaged beyond repair by the unidentified vandals, who not only pried off the plastic W keys
but also gouged out the electronic contacts underneath them.

Bush officials made that known just this month in a belated damage report to the press, although
WorldNetDaily, citing preliminary estimates by career White House employees, reported Jan. 26
that 50 to 60 keyboards had been destroyed.

"It wasn't based on any inside information," said OfficeMax spokesman Steve Baisden of the decision
to send over 100 new keyboards. "We just picked a round number."

Taxpayers stood to save thousands of dollars from the corporate charity -- if, that is, the White House had accepted it.

But WorldNetDaily has learned that the White House turned down the donated equipment, citing rules against
accepting gifts that big. Logitech valued the donation at about $6,000.

"If you look at the legal rules for what the White House can and cannot accept, in terms of gifts over a certain amount,
there was a problem with  that donation," a White House spokesman said. He did not elaborate.

A White House computer worker, who helped replace some of the 100 damaged keyboards in the first week of the presidential transition, said he was provided a box full of new Microsoft "split" keyboards with ergonomic features.

Wait a minute!
Didn't Smirk deny compensation claims for workers with carpal-tunnel syndrome?
Didn't Smirk say that wasn't a "real" problem?
Why should they get keyboards that eliminate a problem that doesn't exist?
 

Rejecting OfficeMax's good will was one thing. But it didn't get the "recognition" it sought, either, from the White House.
(Or from the media.  Despite issuing a press release,
 OfficeMax's donation was cited by only CNET.com and NBC's "Today" show.)

Both OfficeMax and Logitech say the White House never thanked them or even acknowledged their donation.

The White House, however, says it replied to Feuer's letter.

"I haven't seen it if they did" send a letter, OfficeMax's Baisden said.

"I'm sure we shipped" the keyboards, he added. "But I don't know if they accepted them or refused shipment."

"A thank you? Not that I heard of," said Logitech's Papadopulos.

"We haven't heard anything back from the White House about whether they accepted them or anything," he added.
"We don't know that happened to them.  And they never replied with a thank you."

And Logitech was actually the one that footed the $6,000 bill.

"We donated the keyboards," Papadopulos said.
"We were charged. We got the  invoice. They just came out of OfficeMax's supply."

He says it's surprising the White House didn't take them up on their offer now that it's clear the damage
to keyboards was worse -- and costlier -- than first reported. He also wonders why the White House
hasn't tried to hold the vandals accountable.

"I'd like to know if they ever caught the guy who pulled the W's off the keyboards," Papadopulos said.
"It sounds like it was more than just a practical joke. It sounds pretty destructive."

The General Accounting Office has reopened its investigation into the vandalism, now that Bush officials,
who initially just wanted to "move on" from the scandalous Clinton administration, have decided to cooperate.
The new probe is expected to take months.