NYT: White House Reacts Angrily to Former Aide’s Book

[seafan]

White House Reacts Angrily to Former Aide’s Book

By ELISABETH BUMILLER and ANAHAD O’CONNOR
Published: May 29, 2008

The White House reacted angrily today to scathing criticisms of President Bush and members of his inner circle that appear in a new memoir written by Scott McClellan, the former White House press secretary who was forced out in 2006 after three tumultuous years.

In excerpts from the book, set to be published next week, Mr. McClellan writes that President Bush “convinces himself to believe what suits his needs at the moment,” and has engaged in “self-deception” to justify his political ends. He calls the decision to invade Iraq a “serious strategic blunder,” and says that the biggest mistake the Bush White House made was “a decision to turn away from candor and honesty when those qualities were most needed.”

But Dana Perino, the current White House press secretary, had harsh words for Mr. McClellan, calling him “sad” and suggesting that he mischaracterized his years in the West Wing to sell books.

“Scott, we now know, is disgruntled about his experience at the White House,” she said. “For those of us who fully supported him, before, during and after he was press secretary, we are puzzled. It is sad. This is not the Scott we knew.”

.....

But Karl Rove, a principal target of many of Mr. McClellan’s charges and the former deputy chief of staff for President Bush, reacted immediately on Tuesday night. Speaking on Fox News, where he is now a commentator, Mr. Rove said Mr. McClellan was not even present at many of the meetings he describes and suggested that he was not writing truthfully.

“First of all, this doesn’t sound like Scott. It really doesn’t,” he 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.

“If he had these moral qualms,” he added, “he should have spoken up about them.

.....

Mr. McClellan writes that top White House officials deceived him about the administration’s involvement in the leaking of the identity of a C.I.A. operative, Valerie Wilson. He says he did not know for almost two years that his statements from the press room that Karl Rove and I. Lewis Libby Jr. were not involved in the leak were a lie.

“Neither, I believe, did President Bush,” Mr. McClellan writes. “He too had been deceived, and therefore became unwittingly involved in deceiving me. But the top White House officials who knew the truth — including Rove, Libby, and possibly Vice President Cheney — allowed me, even encouraged me, to repeat a lie.”

.....

\

He is harsh about the administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina, saying it “spent most of the first week in a state of denial” and “allowed our institutional response to go on autopilot.” Mr. McClellan blames Mr. Rove for one of the more damaging images after the hurricane: Mr. Bush’s flyover of the devastation of New Orleans. When Mr. Rove brought up the idea, Mr. McClellan writes, he and Dan Bartlett, a top communications adviser, told Mr. Bush it was a bad idea because he would appear detached and out of touch. But Mr. Rove won out, Mr. McClellan writes.

A theme in the book is that the White House suffered from a “permanent campaign” mentality, and that policy decisions were inextricably interwoven with politics.

He is critical of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice for her role as the “sometimes too accommodating” first term national security adviser, and what he calls her deftness at protecting her reputation.

“No matter what went wrong, she was somehow able to keep her hands clean,” Mr. McClellan writes, adding that “she knew how to adapt to potential trouble, dismiss brooding problems, and come out looking like a star.”

Mr. McClellan does not exempt himself from failings — “I fell far short of living up to the kind of public servant I wanted to be” — and calls the news media “complicit enablers” in the White House’s “carefully orchestrated campaign to shape and manipulate sources of public approval” in the march to the Iraq war in 2002 and 2003.

When arrests begin, the pictured individuals above should be first priority.

[redhed67]

1. ANOTHER BUSH MAFIA TANTRUM... *yawn*

What else is new?? It hates being called out on its B.S.

Well, when you're dishonest like they are, it's bound to reveal itself eventually.

[Bluebear]

2. Welcome to DU!

[MrScorpio]

6. Welcome to DU

Stick around

[Vickers]

11. Independent?

Choose a side, ya wishy-washy ladybug.

[WilliamPitt]

3. Wakka wakka wakka.

Who'd have thought the dumbest kid in the classroom could toss such a large brick through the window?

Sorry. Second-dumbest.

[gratuitous]

4. Elisabeth Bumiller still works at the NYT?

My goodness, I've missed her weekly mash notes to the Bush administration and its manly, swaggering personification of swaggering manliness. I wonder if any of the journalistic titans who were pimped so badly will actually interview guests who, you know, have been telling them for the last seven years exactly what McClellan wrote in his book?

Dear Times, Post, NBC, CBS, ABC and all cable shows: Drop the shock, it's insulting. We. Fucking. Told. You. So.

[malaise]

5. Where the fugg did you find those pix

Graphic warning needed. :rofl:

[MrScorpio]

7. Methinks they doth protest too much

Gotta be true

[Synnical]

8. NYT has changed the article - Now it's "Negatively"

I was wondering how being "puzzled" translated to "Angrily".

[seafan]

10. From "puzzled" to "reacts angrily" to "reacts negatively". Like bright lights scatter cockroaches..

Google: White House Reacts Angrily to Former Aide’s Book

Top Stories Auto-generated 28 May at 19:32 GMT


New York Times
White House Reacts Angrily to Former Aide’s Book
New York Times - 1 hour ago
By ELISABETH BUMILLER and ANAHAD O’CONNOR The White House reacted angrily today to scathing criticisms of President Bush and members of his inner circle that appear in a new memoir written by Scott McClellan, the former White House press secretary who ...
White House 'puzzled' by ex-spokesman's book bashing Bush CNN
Bush says country must not lose its nerve in Iraq The Associated Press
MSNBC - Bloomberg - USA Today - Los Angeles Times
all 1,471 news articles »

CNN: White House 'puzzled' by ex-spokesman's book bashing Bush

[VWolf]

9. Arrrrgghh!!! Damn you! Please post a warning re the pictures!!!

I just lost my lunch here.