http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-mcclellan29-2008may29%2C0%2C1577659.story
Political world abuzz over Scott McClellan's tell-all book
http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2008-05/39341536.jpg
Alex Wong / Getty Images
Copies of former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan's memoir
"What
Happened" is seen on display today at Politics and Prose bookstore in
Wa****ngton, D.C. McClellan called the war in Iraq unnecessary and wrote
that
President George W. Bush has misled the nation into the invasion in Iraq.
The former press secretary is derided for his disloyalty and lauded for
his
frankness in the memoir. Bush is said to be 'puzzled' by his longtime
aide's
account.
By James Gerstenzang and Richard B. Schmitt, Los Angeles Times Staff
Writers
May 29, 2008
WA****NGTON -- For years here and in Texas, Scott McClellan was the
consummate
loyalist, exhibiting faithful, unquestioning devotion to his boss, George
W.
Bush. As White House press secretary, he scrappily presented the
administration's talking points on everything from domestic policy to the
Iraq
war.
No longer.
* From Bush to books
Photos: From Bush to books
* McClellan cites book's "larger message"
Video: McClellan cites book's "larger message"
* Video: Rice comments on book
In a new memoir, McClellan has presented chapter after chapter of
accusations
that some of the administration's most senior officials regularly lied to
the
public, conducted a "permanent campaign" to advance Republican political
interests and managed the debate leading up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq
in a
way that "almost guaranteed that the use of force would become the only
feasible option."
Though criticism from a former official is not unheard of, such sharp
words
from someone like McClellan set the political world aswirl Wednesday,
stirred
outrage in the blogosphere and drew a tart but wounded brushoff from the
White
House. President Bush, however, maintained a public silence.
The title of McClellan's 323-page account said it all: "What Happened:
Inside
the Bush White House and Wa****ngton's Culture of Deception." And the
outcry
surrounding the disclosure of its contents went on and on.
Cable TV news shows competed to grab Bush allies and enemies to chatter
about
the McClellan they knew. On CNN, Dan Bartlett, Bush's former counselor who
worked with McClellan for nearly a decade, said the onetime spokesman gave
voice to "an outrageous accusation that mostly was coming from the left
wing
of the Democratic Party."
Former White House political strategist Karl Rove, reacting to an
assertion
that senior officials had misled McClellan on the legal problems of Vice
President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby,
told
Fox News:
"If he had these moral qualms, he should have spoken up about them. And,
frankly, I don't remember him speaking up about these things. I don't
remember
a single word."
"It's really disgusting," said one Texas Republican who has known
McClellan
for a decade -- and who spoke on the condition of anonymity because "I
don't
want to get down in the gutter with the guy."
"He was nothing before he was hired by Bush," the Texan said.
Others couldn't decide whether to give McClellan a verbal spanking for his
disloyalty or applaud him for expressing complaints that they too had
harbored.
As for the Democrats, Barack Obama's presidential campaign quickly found
material that fit its message, citing McClellan's re****t as yet another
reason
to ask: "Do we continue George Bush's failed policy in Iraq or do we
change
it?"
So just what was it about this end-of-an-administration tell-all that
turned
it into an instant topic for a TV talkathon?
"It is the drama of somebody who owed everything to the Bush
administration in
terms of his visibility and status in Wa****ngton" turning on his master,
said
Linda L. Fowler, a professor of government at Dartmouth College. "It is
more
about the political drama of the Bush White House slowly self-destructing"
than about the policies of that White House.
Dana Perino, Bush's current press secretary, offered a part-starchy,
part-sympathetic appraisal. In a statement delivered to re****ters in
Colorado,
where the president was about to speak at the U.S. Air Force Academy
commencement, she said: "Scott, we know, is disgruntled about his
experience
at the White House.
"For those of us who fully sup****ted him before, during and after he was
press
secretary, we are puzzled. It is sad -- this is not the Scott we knew,"
she
said.
Later, she said Bush was "puzzled" by McClellan's account. "He doesn't
recognize this as the Scott McClellan that he hired and confided in and
worked
with for so many years," Perino said, adding that Bush was "disappointed
that,
if he had these concerns and these thoughts, he never came to him or
anyone
else on the staff that we know of."
"It's just a sad situation," she said.
The White House had no official comment on the allegations themselves.
As for the man at the center of the storm -- the 40-year-old, moon-faced,
tennis-playing, Diet Coke-drinking McClellan -- there was silence when
confronted by a TV crew in his suburban Virginia neighborhood: He was
under
contract, he explained, to deliver exclusive comments today on a morning
TV
show.
* Single Page * | * 1 * | * 2 * | * Next »
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-mcclellan29-2008may29,0,1577659.story?page=2
2008 Los Angeles Times
|
