The Weakest of Denials

At a year-end press conference this morning, President Bush staved off questions about White House complicity in the destruction of CIA interrogation videotapes, refusing even to flatly deny that he was personally involved.

Bush also declined to say whether he thought the destruction of the tapes was right or wrong.

The president had an opportunity to clarify what he told ABC News last week: "My first recollection of whether the tapes existed or whether they were destroyed was when [CIA Director] Michael Hayden briefed me" a few days earlier.

But when a reporter today asked about those comments, Bush had nothing to add.

Q: "Mr. President, there's ambiguity in the statement that you have no recollection about the existence and destruction of the CIA interrogation tapes. Why can't you say yes or no about the tapes and their destruction? And, regardless, do you think the destruction of the tapes was the responsible thing to do?"

Bush: "I -- it sounds pretty clear to me when I say I have -- the first recollection is when Mike Hayden briefed me. That's pretty clear. Secondly, I am confident that the preliminary inquiry conducted by the [attorney general] and the [inspector general] of the CIA, coupled with the oversight provided by the Congress, will end up enabling us all to find out what exactly happened.

"And therefore, over the course of these inquiries and oversight hearings, I'm going to reserve judgment until I find out the full facts. I know I'm going to be asked about this question a lot as time goes on. I'm just going to prepare you; until these inquiries are complete, until the oversight's finished, then I will be rendering no opinion from the podium."

That's far from a full-throated denial of White House involvement. It doesn't apply at all to the likelier suspects in the West Wing -- starting with the vice president, of course. And it was carefully parsed. In scandalese, "I don't remember" is a far cry from "No."

It's all highly reminiscent of Bush's no-comment strategy during the investigation of the White House role in the leak of Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA agent. Then, as now, Bush could have demanded that his aides tell him what they had done. But he obviously didn't want to hear it.

And now, as then, Bush can insist that he wants to wait for others to determine the facts, and then refuse to comment while an investigation is ongoing -- until the press corps loses interest in the matter.

Today, since former vice presidential aide Scooter Libby has dropped his appeal in the Plame case, the coast was clear for reporters to ask Bush any of the many important, unanswered questions about that case. But nobody did.

Echoes of Watergate

Yesterday's New York Times story, disclosing far greater White House involvement in discussions about the CIA tapes than had previously been known, sent the scandal into new territory.