If nobody will put Baby in a corner, then Scott McClellan, who spent 2003-06 lying to the press for President Bush, certainly won't be seated there.
The man who watched his hairline gradually recede on live television is back from the shadows with a new book, What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception, where he spells out how the Bush administration has screwed up everything it could get its hands on. Which is everything.
Handy bullet points from Politico, which eschewed the publisher's press embargo and bought its copy from a store, include:
• McClellan charges that Bush relied on “propaganda” to sell the war.
• He says the White House press corps was too easy on the administration during the run-up to the war.
• He admits that some of his own assertions from the briefing room podium turned out to be “badly misguided.”
• The longtime Bush loyalist also suggests that two top aides held a secret West Wing meeting to get their story straight about the CIA leak case at a time when federal prosecutors were after them — and McClellan was continuing to defend them despite mounting evidence they had not given him all the facts.
• McClellan asserts that the aides — Karl Rove, the president’s senior adviser, and I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, the vice president’s chief of staff — “had at best misled” him about their role in the disclosure of former CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity.
All of which leaves us with just one question: He's charging only $27.95 for this masterpiece? We would not see Sex and the City three times for just one crack at this doozy.
A White House statement about the New York Times' editorial slamming President Bush for not supporting the G.I. Bill: "Once again, the New York Times Editorial Board doesn't let the facts get in the way of expressing its vitriolic opinions - no matter how misleading they may be."
Responds editorial page editor Andy Rosenthal: "We said Bush opposes the Webb bill. He opposes the Webb bill. I don't understand what's misleading about it."
Because the non-scandal surrounding Richard Engel's George Bush interview for NBC News doesn't seem to be quieting down anytime soon, let's re-examine the argument that White House counsel Ed Gillespie is making — that NBC edited the interview to push its lefty politics or something.
Notes WaPo's Dan Froomkin: "If Bush had actually explained what he thought Engel got wrong, then the editing might have come in for legitimate criticism. But all Bush did was vaguely and confusingly suggest that what he was calling appeasement was not taking the words [of enemies like Iran -- or Hitler --] seriously.' By no accepted definition does that amount to appeasement. But regardless, Bush's point was dutifully noted in what NBC aired."
So then what the hell was Gillespie complaining about? CONTINUED »
[Update: NBC responds. Below.]
Did NBC News "deceptively" edit an interview with President Bush to make it sound like the commander in chief was fingering Barack Obama when he was talking about negotiating peace with Iran (and how doing so amounted to "appeasement")?
That's what White House counsel Ed Gillespie is alleging in a scathing letter sent to NBC News' Steve Capus, demanding the network air the president's "actual answer" to the question. [The Hill]
"NBC's selective editing of the President's response is clearly intended to give viewers the impression that he agreed with Engel's characterization of his remarks when he explicitly challenged it," reads the letter. "Furthermore, it omitted the references to al Qaeda, Hezbollah and Hamas and ignored the clarifying point in the President's follow-up response that U.S. policy is to require Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment program before coming to the table, not that "negotiating with Iran is pointless" and amounts to 'appeasement.' This deceitful editing to further a media-manufactured storyline is utterly misleading and irresponsible and I hereby request in the interest of fairness and accuracy that the network air the President's responses to both initial questions in full on the two programs that used the excerpts."
So what type of editing did NBC, allegedly, perform? CONTINUED »
Last night, Keith Olbermann devoted a full twelve minutes to attacking President Bush over his decision … to give up golf. [HP]
The White House released a few photos of Jenna Bush's Saturday wedding to Henry Hager, son of the chairman of Republican Party in Virginia. Guests were treated to commemorative mugs, which they could take home and put next to their George H.W. Bush commemorative plates.
JOB WELL DONE It is official. George W. Bush is the most unpopular president in modern history, or at least since we’ve been taking approval polls. A whopping 71 percent of Americans think Bush sucks. Just 71 percent? CONTINUED »
On last night's Deal or No Deal, George Bush made a surprise appearance: "Come to think of it, I’m thrilled to be anywhere with high ratings these days." He then asked contestant Joe Kobes, an Army captain who served three tours in Iraq, to volunteer his winnings to that little Social Security problem. Video after the jump.
CONTINUED »
The reason NBC didn't interrupt its broadcast yesterday to air President Bush's press conference isn't because the GE-owned network has some sort of bias against our commander in chief, but rather because doing so allows cable spawn MSNBC to become "the place to go for NBC News," says unit SVP Phil Griffin. ABC and CBS, meanwhile, both hit the Big Red Button and cut in. But also, they don't have their own cable channels. [USA Today]
This just in: The NYC medical examiner's autopsy report is in. What's it say? Not much. The results are inconclusive, which means they don't know what killed him. More tests are being ordered.
The Bush administration, however, reached a more rigid conclusion on its own. So distraught was our commander in chief, he postponed a promotional event for an ad campaign battling prescription drug abuse. Well, Bush wasn't exactly distraught, but concerned the media might jump on the chance to accuse the White House of linking the two events in bad taste. Because that's suddenly a concern.
You might think the only thing going in Washington is a lame (duck) President and disgraced Senators. But you’d be wrong!
Yesterday, the House passed the journalist shield law 398 to 21. The law would allow journalists to protect the confidentially of sources in most federal cases. As non-journalists, this law wouldn't really affect us. But we'd still like it to pass for the drama.
In a total departure from their usual stance toward journalists, the White House is against the law and has threatened a veto. It still has to get past the Senate before Bush will get a chance to play his “threat to national security" card.
[AP]
When seeking out a journalist to discuss race relations with, who else would Bush want but the guy who listened intently to Bill O’Reilly’s realization that black restaurant patrons were polite?
The White House offered a Bush interview with NPR’s senior correspondent and sometimes Fox News contributor, Juan Williams. NPR wasn’t interested in having Williams do the piece; Bush was only interested in speaking with Williams. So NPR, which never had an exclusive with Bush, let the piece pass.
Bush still got his Williams interview—on Fox news. Along with talking about race, Bush got to opine about the 2008 election and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
While Fox may play softball with the President, they threw a curveball at NPR. A Fox spokeswoman said, "NPR's lack of news judgment is astonishing, and their treatment of a respected journalist like Juan Williams is appalling."
Though to be fair, Fox’s sense of news judgment and idea of who is a respected journalist are insane.
• Although the rest of the band knows that Axl Rose is a huge douche, Guns N' Roses are still upset with the Swedish police. [NME]
• Break out the champage! Lil' Kim is being released from prison. She'll head into 30 days of house arrest, or as we like to call it, another season of her reality show. [Billboard]
• Black Eyed Peas – aka the least intimidating group of rappers since Will Smith – actually got into a brawl. You've got no idea what this will do to their street cred. [R&M]
• Pretty much the most bizarre thing we've heard all day: President Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in Graceland, singing Elvis songs. Nope, no sleep for us tonight. [AP]
• Was Jennifer Lopez' wedding video really worth that much? And what about her ex-husband's tell-all book? [MuchMusic, TMZ]
We watched President Bush's press conference today with an actual note of interest. After he complimented NBC's David Gregory on his pocket square (though, to be fair, Bush called it a "scarf"), he challenged the Miami Herald's Peter Wallstein on his decision to wear sunglasses among the press corps. Oh, faux pas: Wallstein is legally blind.
From today's New York Times:
But did they mean it this way:
.. or this way?:
Behind Bush's Address Lies a Deep History [Elisabeth Bumiller, NYT]
It's been much talked about. Widely mocked. Thoroughly dissected. And, in the end, pretty damn annoying. It's Stephen Colbert's speech at the White House Correspondents Dinner, where many have pointed out he was able to turn President Bush into a quivering-lipped sourpuss. Our take: President Bush is a quivering-lipped sourpuss. But we want your take, so we're handing you copies of the entire speech so you can witness the comedic ups and downs of a Comedy Central vet taking the stage he'll never be invited back to.
The second part of the clip, after the jump.
CONTINUED »
• While we thought Dave Chappelle was having a mental breakdown, it turns out that all he wanted to do was to trash white people a little more than usual. But damn those caucasian bosses, they wouldn't have any of it. [AP]
• Nerve goes to the gossip columnists for sex advice and, somehow, we were included. [Nerve]
• Kate White spends 10 hours a month perfecting the craft of the perfect Cosmopolitan cover line. With two million newsstand sales, it's 10 hours well spent. [Forbes]
• More Paid $ix fallout: News Corp. is denying, on Richard Johnson's behalf, deceased landlord-slash-media powerplayer Lou Rudin ever gave the Page Six editor a rent-controlled Upper West Side flat, though former NYTer Blake Fleetwood stands by the story. [Daily Politics]
• Meanwhile, Jared Paul Stern will answer Gawker's questions, but not ours. It's nice to know he's still got kind words for Page Six, the institution. [Gawker]
• Egads! Sometimes the Washington Post news desk and editorial board don't match up. [Washington City Paper]
• Meanwhile, President Bush wants WaPo to apologize for its "reckless reporting" regarding White House intelligence. [E&P]
• Leaks don't only come from the White House; they arrive from the taping of Will & Grace's series finale, too. (Spoiler warning.) [MNH]
And we're speaking from experience here: When in doubt, always blame Tara.
Bush Blames Reid for Immigration Meltdown [Jennifer Loven, AP]
• Guarenteed the "who wants to fight with Bill O’Reilly?" website gets so many hits, it goes down faster than a Dirty Colin. [NYDN]
• No, shit. It's really all those celebrity scandal covers that sell tabloids? [WWD]
• Somehow we missed this fab article in NewYork magazine yesterday. Maybe we’ve been trying to wipe Jon Friedman from our brains so hard, that poor Kurt Andersen went right out with him. [NYM]
• What does the president of Iran undersand that George Bush doesn't? Make friends with the media. They've got the power. [CNN]
• Business Week fake interviews an editor from Business Week about Martha Stewart’s new magazine. We don't get it either. [BW]
Editorial Director
