McClellan Testifies About The Plame Saga This Morning

This morning Scott McClellan went before the House Judiciary Committee to tell his tale of what he knew about the Valerie Plame case. His book is currently making millions about his time in the Bush Administration, but at least he came to Congress to talk about what he knows, free of charge. His introduction statement is a bit lengthy, but the end of it is key.

From The House Judiciary Cmte:

My book reflects the only idea of loyalty that I believe is appropriate in democratic government, and that is loyalty to the ideals of candor, transparency and integrity, and indeed to the constitutional system itself. Too often in Washington, people mistakenly think that loyalty to an individual officeholder should override loyalty to basic ideals. This false loyalty is not only mistaken, but can exercise a corrupt influence on government.

I am here because in my heart I am a public servant who, like many Americans, wants to improve the way Washington governs and does not want to see future administrations repeat the mistakes this White House made.

I do not know whether a crime was committed by any of the Administration officials who revealed Valerie Plame’s identity to reporters. Nor do I know if there was an attempt by any person or persons to engage in a cover-up during the investigation. I do know that it was wrong to reveal her identity, because it compromised the effectiveness of a covert official for political reasons. I regret that I played a role, however unintentionally, in relaying false information to the public about it. I’ll do my best to answer any questions on this matter that members of the committee may wish to ask.

Scott, first of all, it is great that you now realize a public servant's loyalty should be to the public and not the tyrant dictator current President. Secondly, unless you were just born yesterday, someone of your position knows that it is illegal and traitorous to reveal the identity of a covert agent, for political reasons or otherwise. The fact that you know it is wrong goes a long way to admitting it is criminal, so perhaps you are just trying to be sly about it.

Have fun in Congress today Scott, watch for Republicans to go at you with avengeance for turning your back on the supreme leader and your party.

What Can McClellan's Testimony Do To Bush?

Yesterday Scott McClellan agreed to testify in front of Congress about the "alleged" abuses of the Bush Administration and the lies that he "unwittingly" advanced to the public that were told to him by scumbags such as Karl Rove and Dick Cheney. Of course he has waited years to tell his story, first and foremost to sell a book that will undoubtedly make him a lot of money. He probably thought of (or his attorneys thought of) the consequences of writing this stuff on paper, that some Democratic members of Congress would be interested in getting Scotty's words under oath. Bush and Co. turned their back on him after the book came out, but I have to wonder if McClellan's testimony will mean anything to us.

From The Huffington Post:

McClellan's book "What Happened" detailed the "propaganda campaign" that led up to the Iraq war. His hearing is expected to focus heavily on the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame, an episode that McClellan has said was driven by political motivations from within the Oval Office. But the committee could press the former press secretary on other matters within its jurisdiction, including the possible authorization of torture by administration officials (though it remains to be seen how much knowledge McClellan has of that topic).

Earlier on Monday, Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers sent an letter to McClellan requesting his testimony.

"I have extended an invitation...after discussions between Committee staff and his attorneys," wrote Conyers. "In his book, Mr. McClellan suggests that senior White House officials may have obstructed justice and engaged in a cover-up regarding the Valerie Plame leak. This alleged activity could well extend beyond the scope of the offenses for which Scooter Libby has been convicted and deserves further attention."

It certainly deserves further attention and it should end with those who broke the law to be put in jail. Yet I doubt any of that will happen. Bush could try to pull his "executive privilege" card but he hasn't. The testimony is supposedly set for the 20th of June, a date that isn't that far off. If Bush isn't worried, then that worries me that anything Scott says will not be able to carry out justice for anyone in the Bush Administration. Karl Rove has taken that privilege and that makes me think he is the one with the hard evidence, not Scotty. He was merely a pawn in the White House's game to con and deceive the American public.

Byron York Calls McClellan Naive! What Nerve!

As usual on the Fox Sunday shows, ridiculousness ensues from its conservative guests. Here Byron York calls Scott McClellan naive for believing in the goodness of George W.



Hey Byron, who are you calling naive (not to mention twisted and demented)?

McCain Went Right Along With War Propaganda

It is so good to see that the DNC gets its best material for attack ads against McCain directly from the "Straight Talk Express."

The Answer Is No

The "media" talked yesterday about the run up to the war and the failure to ask the tough questions of George Bush. The NBC/CBS roundtable below suggests that the Administration threatened to cut access if they did stories the Pentagon and the White House weren't nice to them. Hindsight may be clearer for these anchors, but this is suppposed to be journalism and they failed at their jobs, miserably.

White House Scorns Scotty

The day of and the day after Politico got a hold of Scotty's new book about his life and times at the White House, the Republican machine kicked into high gear. It is easy for them to dismiss anyone outside their tight, little circle, but when one of their own turned against them to make a profit....well, watch out Scotty!

From The Huffington Post:

The White House responded angrily Wednesday to McClellan's confessional memoir, calling it self-serving sour grapes.

"Scott, we now know, is disgruntled about his experience at the White House," said current White House press secretary Dana Perino, a former deputy to McClellan. "We are puzzled. It is sad. This is not the Scott we knew."[...]

"Not once did Scott approach me _ privately or publicly _ to discuss any misgivings he had about the war in Iraq or the manner in which the White House made the case for war," McClellan's predecessor as press secretary, Ari Fleischer, said.

Said Fran Townsend, former head of the White House-based counterterrorism office and now a CNN commentator: "This now strikes me as self-serving, disingenuous and unprofessional."

Perino described Bush as "surprised" by the book but said the president wouldn't have anything to say about it. "He has more pressing matters than to spend time commenting on books by former staffers," she said.

Karl Rove even said, get this, he sounded like a left-wing blogger. Well Karl, not quite. He certainly did expose your criminality and that of the others around you, but like any other self-serving Republican, he made his dime on someone else's expense and remained ethically dubious about his own misgivings. No one seriously believes that crap about Scotty thinking what he said was true when he said it and then realizing it was wrong. That isn't surprising, in fact, it all makes sense. I wonder who'll come out with the next book, perhaps Dana Perino? Tony Snow? Maybe they could pen something together and title it "I don't and didn't know."

McClellan To Throw Bush Under The Bus

It looks like Scott McClellan is trying to distance himself from the Bush Administration he used to work for. All the arguments they made against the media was hogwash and McClellan said that we should have believed everyone but the White House. Damn, this book might actually be good:

So Mr. Bush, Are You A Criminal Or Just Out Of Touch?

It is now post-Turkey Day and a week since Scott McClellan's publisher provided an excerpt from his upcoming book. That excerpt showed that McClellan had no idea he had passed on false information from Rove, Cheney, Bush et.al and now he is ready to cash his chips out for this very lucrative book deal. Everyone has had some time to digest their turkey and the clip from Scotty's book....so what does the pResident have to say about it?

From SignOnSanDiego:

The excerpt, posted on the Web site of publisher PublicAffairs, renews questions about what went on in the West Wing and how much Bush and Cheney knew about the leak. For years, it was McClellan's job to field – and often duck – those types of questions.

Now that he's spurring them, answers are equally hard to come by.

White House press secretary Dana Perino said it wasn't clear what McClellan meant in the excerpt. “The president has not and would not ask his spokespeople to pass on false information,” she said.

Well of course he'd never do anything illegal, this is our commander in chimp chief we are talking about here. And Dana would never pass on false information about false information either, right Ms. Perino? Well if that is the case, then it was and is a sad state of affairs that Mr. Bush can not keep a lid on his very own press secretary. Right?

TBogg looks into his crystal ball on how future press conferences might go from here on out:

One months later:

White House press secretary Tony Fratto said it wasn't clear what Gordon Johnroe was going on about when talking about some woman named Perrino, and that he had no idea who Scott McClellan was. “The president has not and would not ask his spokespeople to pass on false information,” he said.

Six days later:

White House press secretary Joe Lieberman was clearly agitated today when he accused the nations press of playing "some kind of partisan media 'gotcha' game with the Bush Administration"when it was clearly in the nations best interest to "move on" and get behind the recent invasions of Iran, Syria, and Yemen, all of whom , according to the former Senator and current Republican Vice Presidential nominee, "harbor ginormous stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction and, did I mention that they hate our freedoms?" He later added, “The president has not and would not ask his spokespeople to pass on false information” to the few remaining journalists who hadn't already left the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room in order to start drinking heavily until they forgot their deep personal shame .

Damn, if Lieberman is press secretary number six, I pray to the almighty not to see who number seven might be.

Scotty Show Comes Clean

Unless you really, really, really wanted to believe the words coming out of Scott McClellan's mouth when he was the White House Press Secretary, you had to know he was spewing bullshit day in and day out. Seeing the realities of the world while George Bush saw only god knows what, there had to be someone willing to be the President's mouthpiece. Scott is long gone, having been replaced by Tony Snow and now Dana Perino. Yet Scotty isn't done talking, now he is espousing a little bit of truth.

From Public Affairs Publishing:

The most powerful leader in the world had called upon me to speak on his behalf and help restore credibility he lost amid the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. So I stood at the White house briefing room podium in front of the glare of the klieg lights for the better part of two weeks and publicly exonerated two of the senior-most aides in the White House: Karl Rove and Scooter Libby.

There was one problem. It was not true.

I had unknowingly passed along false information. And five of the highest ranking officials in the administration were involved in my doing so: Rove, Libby, the vice President, the President's chief of staff, and the President himself.

Only Scotty and that inner circle really know if he knew the truth (or untruths) that he was passing along. Of course in the process of "coming clean" he also passes the blame to his superiors while making a few bucks on the side. Despite the money, this excerpt from the book sheds a tremendous amount of light on what really went down during the height of PlameGate and many other controversies that surround the Bush Administration.

The book will definitely be an interesting read, thats for sure.

Scott McClellan On The Daily Show

Scotty McLiarPants had the balls to appear with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show recently. With all of Scott's lying to the press and the American people over the years, you would think he could hold his own for a few short minutes on Comedy Central to talk about the war and the State of The Union. Well, think again! McClellan gets nailed from a previous White House Press Corp. exchange showed he said no one in the White House was involved with PlameGate. Of course we know differently now.