McClellan: Bush must blame himself for mistrust

Saturday 21st June, 07:30 AM JST

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Jahdog at 06:16 PM JST - 21st June

While questioning McClellan, GOP stooge Steve King takes the cake with this gem: “Couldn’t you have taken this to the grave with you and done this country a favor?”

You see, in bizarro Republican world, staying silent and allowing your fellow citizens to remain clueless about how their leaders lie to them is the right, patriotic thing to do. Only traitors speak up about how their country is being flushed down the toilet when there’s still time to actually do something about it. http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/06/20/rep-steve-king-r-ia-to-mcclellan-why-couldnt-you-just-shut-up/
Taka313 at 06:53 PM JST - 21st June

Jahdog,

Only traitors speak up about how their country is being flushed down the toilet when there’s still time to actually do something about it.

I think the phenomena of which you speak is referred to as "being Shinseki'd."

Taka
Betzee at 07:07 PM JST - 21st June

I linked was just the reality of what the left and right spin rooms use and face everyday to try to get their competing messages across.

Spinning is putting a positive gloss on news. Number of casualties up in Iraq? Well, it means the insurgency is in its last throes. It's speculation about future trends which cannot be proven right or wrong at that moment in time.

The GWB aministration went a lot farther than that. I remember reading Judith Miller, formerly of the NYT's, did draw the line at Karl Rove's suggestion she cite "hill staffer knowledgeable about nuclear issues" for information he was feedng her about Saddam's WMD arsenal. She was canned for lying to her supervisors. But such a standard has ceased to apply to government employees who lie to the public.

I personally fely sorry for McClellan when he learned he has conveyed information he thought was truthful, namely that Rove and Libby had no involvement in outing Valerie Plame, when in fact they did. He appreciated the difference between lying and spinning.
smithinjapan at 07:50 PM JST - 21st June

sarge: "Heh, it's never going to start."

hehehe... thanks, sarge. You're 'predictions' are almost always the guarantee of the opposite.

Anyway, McClellan is only stating the truth, and when Fratto 'retires' he'll be making his own book printing the same facts about lies at the top of this government. Nothing new here. As has been said many, many times, Bush will go down as the worst president in US history -- he's already there in most people's books, and now they're being published.
yabits at 08:41 PM JST - 21st June

But nobody in the WH was disciplined for circulating a forged document purporting to show Saddam had tried to buy yellow cake uranium, it even ended up as evidence in GWB's state of the union address in early 2003.

When Bush said that there was complete agreement among experts that the aluminum tubes Saddam purchased had a nuclear purpose, he was lying through his teeth. There was anything but agreement, and the real experts knew that the aluminum tubes could not have been for that purpose. (And they were proven right.)
yabits at 08:51 PM JST - 21st June

Since McClellan was a the face of the whitehouse to the media it should be in my opinion very relevant as to how the whitehouse has spun the media trying to win favor and the perception that the media is biased agaisn't the whitehouse, and that would cause some in the Bush administration to adopt a 'bunker mentality'

What McClellan eventually found out is that no matter how the media spins anything, honesty is always the best policy. He was serving a man who promised to bring honor and dignity back to the White House. Choosing to feed spokespersons like McClellan with lies and trying to excuse it all is not any reasonable person's definition of honor or dignity. A lot of the worst lies came when Bush's popularity was above 80% -- so much for a justification of "bunker mentality."
Betzee at 08:53 PM JST - 21st June

When Dick Cheney gravely intoned "There is no doubt..." in fact there was a whole lot of doubt. McClellan is simply asking that GWB take responsibility for the mistrust which ensued rather than, as some of his supporters have here, put the blame on the media. Maybe somebody could dust off the sign which Harry Truman kept on his desk informing visitors "The Buck Stops Here."
Madverts at 09:42 PM JST - 21st June

"Heh, it's never going to start."

Well, uh, sarge, based on your past Preditions that had such a sublime knack in getting it Wrong, - I'd say that's a definite President Obama will be taking the oath in Jan '09.

Sott McClellan is just jumping on his former employer because it is politicaly and financially expedient to do so.

The rest of us knew years back the true nature of Bush Co.
Sarge at 09:47 PM JST - 21st June

Madverts - "uh, sarge"

I'm laughing at the superior intellect.

"Sott McClellan..."

Har!

"... is just jumping on his former employer because it is politicaly and financially expedient to do so."

Hey, you got that one right, Madverts!
SushiSake3 at 10:36 PM JST - 21st June

Sarge, almost as many people believe you as the number who believe Bush and the bad news for both of you is that that figure is getting closer to zero by the day.

Mate, the number of times you've been proven left-right, up-down, black-white Flat Wrong is reaching near Biblical proportions.

As a Republican, that's something you can put in your pipe and smoke :-)

McClellan is right to come out and expose Bush - Cheney on this one.

The nutjob thing is that many Republicans are criticizing him for not speaking out earlier, and for speaking out at all - ie: when he was employed by Bush and would have got his arse fired in an instant had he done so - instead of analyzing McClellan's claims on their own merits.

ie: attack the messenger, not the message.

McClellan did the sensible thing and waited until he was not in Bush's employment before he spoke out, and good on him for putting it in book form for everyone to read about how their Dear Leader has been misleading and lying to them for so many years.

Are any Republicans here going to honestly look at McClellan's claims, analyze why he is claiming they were lied to and misled, etc?

Or are Republicans simply too gutless to examine the message?
SushiSake3 at 10:39 PM JST - 21st June

Madvert - "Madverts - "uh, sarge"

Sarge - "I'm laughing at the superior intellect."

That's only about the 10th time you've written exactly the same quote in the last 3 days.

Congrats on your consistency - you must be proud :-)
RedMeatKoolAid at 01:31 AM JST - 22nd June

What's really funny, har har, is the video of Madeline Albright, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Howard Dean, Sandy Berger, Jay Rockefeller, Teddy Kennedy, HRC, Bill Clinton, Joe Biden, John Edwards, Evan Bayh et al gravely intoning the exact same assertions Bush made about Iraq. http://www.bercasio.com/movies/dems-wmd-before-iraq.wmv

Shame.

Shame on those who come here with "Bush lied."
SezWho2 at 07:41 AM JST - 22nd June

The telling comment in the video is Edwards' statement that Congress had seen briefings on the progress of weapons development in Iraq.

Despite what Bush said in 2005 about there being "no pressure" to shape the intelligence, we now know that this was not the case and that the administration consistently ignored evidence that suggested that Saddam did not have weapons or weapons programs. Not the least of this evidence was from the inspectors on the ground.

Some will find it funny that a person who complains of media bias will be caught posting propaganda paid for by the Republican National Committee. What Bush did was worse than simply lying. He showed no interest in the truth.
Taka313 at 09:30 AM JST - 22nd June

Nice vid there redmeat. So...what do you suppose we do about this?

Should we make them all accountable? I think that would be a fantastic idea. You make a list; I'll make a list and we'll hold them all accountable for their actions and misdeeds.

Or was this just a "quit picking on my dear leader" thing for you?

Here's a little poker advice: Don't bluff on any hand you aren't willing to lose their sports fan.

Also, I think it's kind of funny that your little vid stops with the wmd issue. Your argument fails to take into consideration bush's lies regarding the ties between saddam and al quaeda. Your argument fails to take into consideration bush's lies about the aluminum tubes bush said saddam was after. Your argument fails to take into consideration bush's yellowcake uranium lie. Your argument fails to take into consideration bush's lies about saddam's unmanned aerial vehicles. He's lied about stem cell research. He's lied about his criminal record. He's lied about his military service.

Why? Because bush lies.

That's what liars do. They lie.

Deal.with.it.

Taka
Betzee at 01:56 PM JST - 22nd June

He showed no interest in the truth.

Exactly. David Kay said, after concluding his exhaustive search for WMD, "We were all wrong and that's very disturbing." Yet there was never any sense GWB was disturbed in the slightest. Quite the contrary; he's emphasized he would make the same decision to invade Iraq all over again. But how would he sell it to the public? Presumably the same way. I take this as an admission he knew the case he made, in which nuclear weapons figured prominently, was not supported by the evidence but the ends justified the means.