Vindication for the Bush Critique

Former McClellan deputy Trent Duffy writes in a Washington Post op-ed: "Was it the truth or a lie when you told me, during a series of personal discussions in your West Wing office in late 2005 and early 2006 (at the apex of what you now call your period of 'disillusionment' and 'dismay'), that you were happy in your job and proud to serve President Bush and that you had no intention of leaving soon? What about in April 2006, when rumors swirled about a change at the podium, and you again told me you wanted to stay? . . .

"The press was easy on us? How many times did you race up the ramp from the briefing room to your office after a raucous media cross-examination to complain how the press was unfair, naive, too tough and way too 'liberal.' Would any in the White House press corps agree they were softies?"

Michael D. Shear and Michael Abramowitz blogged for The Washington Post on Wednesday: "Karl Rove, the subject of many of McClellan's charges, said on Fox's Hannity & Colmes last night that . . . McClellan sounded like a liberal blogger.

"'First of all, this doesn't sound like Scott. It really doesn't,' Rove said. 'Not the Scott McClellan I've known for a long time. Second of all, it sounds like somebody else. It sounds like a left-wing blogger. Second of all, you're right. If he had these moral qualms, he should have spoken up about them.'"

But as Scarecrow, a contributor to the Firedoglake blog, writes: "Scottie didn't say anything that fits on a liberal-to-conservative continuum, unless one views truth as a liberal bias."

The Media Critique

One of the biggest surprises in McClellan's book is his ferocious criticism of the media -- for being lapdogs.

Here are some excerpts of his thoughts on the media:

"If anything, the national press corps was probably too deferential to the White House and to the administration in regard to the most important decision facing the nation during my years in Washington, the choice over whether to go to war in Iraq. The collapse of the administration's rationales for war, which became apparent months after our invasion, should have never come as such a surprise. The public should have been made much more aware, before the fact, of the uncertainties, doubts, and caveats that underlay the intelligence about the regime of Saddam Hussein. The administration did little to convey those nuances to the people, the press should have picked up the slack but largely failed to do so because their focus was elsewhere -- on covering the march to war, instead of the necessity of war.

"In this case, the 'liberal media' didn't live up to its reputation. If it had, the country would have been better served."

For more on this subject, see my article last week on NiemanWatchdog.org, where I am deputy editor.

Warren P. Strobel and Jonathan S. Landay, who as reporters for Knight-Ridder were almost alone in reporting skeptically about the campaign for war, blog for McClatchy Newspapers: "It's not news. At least not to some of us who've covered the story from the start. . . .

"The news media have been, if anything, even more craven than the administration has been in defending its failure to investigate Bush's case for war in Iraq before the war."

Michael Dobbs blogs for washingtonpost.com: "As a former operator of the White House 'propaganda machine', Scott McClellan lacks credibility as a critic of the press. But on the question of whether the American press did its job properly during the run-up to the Iraq war, it is difficult to argue with his conclusions. We failed you. . . .

"[T]he bottom line is that we spent too much time, as McClellan says, 'covering the march to war' rather than 'the necessity of war.' We devoted a lot of attention to the small questions -- the counting of votes in Congress and the United Nations, the procedural disputes over weapons inspectors, the selling of the war -- without addressing the big questions. Was the war necessary? Would it make us Americans, and the rest of the world, safer? How would it upset the balance of power in the Middle East between Shia and Sunni (terms that were unfamiliar to most Americans)?"

Michael Hirsh writes for Newsweek: "Bush's own spokesman is acknowledging his error on Iraq. Why can't the media?"

Flashback

Press blogger Jay Rosen reminds us of the key role -- stooge -- that McClellan played in the White House's attack on the press: "It denied the whole theory of the 'fourth estate,' ridiculed the idea that the press is part of the system of checks and balances, told reporters they were a special interest group rather than a conduit to the public-at-large, wiped out all remaining distinctions between propaganda and public information, and welcomed the de-legitimizing of the news media by allies in the culture war.

"'Back 'em up, starve 'em down and drive up their negatives' is the way I summarized this approach. In July 2003 Bush took it further when he installed in the White House briefing room a stooge figure, a pathetic character who had no power, no in-in-the-loop knowledge, no respect from key players in the Administration, no talent for improvised explanation under the lights, and no problem being made to look like an ass in front of the country, the cameras and the rest of the world."

David Corn blogs for CQ: "Where's the apology? . . .

"[W]hen it counted there were a few of us in the media who were indeed arguing that the Bush White House was setting new records in presidential deception--especially when it came to Iraq. McClellan, though, was part of the White House's defense team, pushing back against media coverage that questioned Bush's rationale for the war and Bush's serial abuse of facts. Apparently McClellan has seen the light. Well, where's his plea for forgiveness? If he were truly contrite about his involvement in a deceptive, propaganda-wielding administration, McClellan could demonstrate his sincerity by pledging that all profits from his belated truth-telling will go to charities supporting the families of American soldiers killed or injured in Iraq. For history's sake, it is good that McClellan is confirming what most Americans (according to polls) have long known: the Bush administration trampled the truth to win public backing for the Iraq war. But as an enabler (witting or not) of that process, McClellan owes the public more than a for-sale account. He should not profit from this book, making bucks for correcting war-supporting falsehoods that he defended. He ought to be doing penance. True heart-felt confessions come free."

In his book, McClellan barely mentions torture, or his role in defending the indefensible. And yet he frequently went well beyond just parroting the administration's talking points when it came to attacking reporters who questioned the administration's tactics in its war on terror. See, for instance, my Nov. 9, 2005, column, which offers just one of many examples of the McClellan that McClellan would probably not want us to remember.

Cartoon Watch

Views of "What Happened" from Matt Davies, Mike Luckovich, Signe Wilkinson, Jim Morin, Ann Telnaes, Tom Toles, Nick Anderson, Rex Babin, Walt Handelsman, Kevin Siers, John Cole, Joel Pett, Jeff Danziger, Adam Zyglis, Ed Stein, Bruce Plante, Rob Rogers, Ben Sargent, Steve Sack, Bob Gorrell and Jack Ohman. Plus an Ann Telnaes animation.