In Defense of Scott McClellan

Right now Scott McClellan has no friends, and that's a shame. His former friends on the Republican side are trying to bury him. The rest of us are still skeptical of him and what he did when he was still in the Bush White House. And the press is trying to be tough on him specifically because he called them out for not being tough enough when he was press secretary.

So, we have this ironic situation that in a time when McClellan is finally being honest, he has no defenders. I'm afraid this is going to lead the public to the false impression that the world is united in thinking he is a calculating opportunist who is trying to make a buck by turning on his friends. When, in fact, the reality is that the man finally grew a conscience.

Throughout the book and his interviews, McClellan talks about how he grew uneasy throughout his time with Bush and finally his conscience got the better of him. I believe him. Why?

Would it have been better if he dramatically stepped to the podium one day while he was still White House press secretary and said, "We have been doing an organized propaganda campaign to deceive the American people and I resign!"? Yes, that would have been better. But 99 out of a 100 times that's not the way the real world works. You get caught up in whatever subculture you're in and it's hard to untangle yourself.

Have you ever been in a situation where you wound up doing something you were uncomfortable with because of societal pressure and then later wondered -- what the hell was I doing? I don't know about you, but I certainly have.

Now, this was no little thing. This was a gigantic mistake that eventually costs thousands of lives. And yes, I would have loved if he admitted his mistakes and pointed out the lies of the Bush administration without the publicity surrounding a book. Yes, I wish he had the courage to recognize this earlier (as some like Richard Clarke and Paul O'Neill did -- but remember, they too were pilloried anyway).

But right now, the bottom line is that McClellan is clearly telling the truth. Everything he says matches with what has been reported and suspected before. It is an amazing insider look at the deception that went on in the Bush White House. Even his explanation of how Bush convinces himself of his own lies rings so true. His details on how Cheney and Rumsfeld ran the White House while Condoleezza Rice bowed her head matches every report we have from within the administration.

And remember, he didn't have to be this harsh to sell books. A couple of juicy details would have done the job. This was personal. Not as in a personal attack against Bush and the others in the administration. More like an attempt at personal redemption.

As McClellan says throughout the book, he liked Bush and looked up to him, so he wanted to believe what he was saying. And in the end, after so much evidence piled up -- with the final coup de grace being Bush's own admission that he personally authorized the CIA leak -- he couldn't do it anymore. Once outside of the Washington bubble, he began to reflect on all of the transgressions, his and those of his cohorts, and realized he had to write a truly honest account of what happened. That should be commended, no matter what came before.

One final note. People should not overlook what McClellan said about the press. That's the real lesson to take away from this book. While the Bush administration was complaining loudly about the liberal media, they were internally snickering about how much they had intimidated them. That lesson should never be forgotten. The way the Bush administration cowed the press should be an everlasting shame on the media. I wonder if instead of reacting angrily to this, whether the press corps will take away anything from this when they step out of their bubble and come to terms with their own conscience.

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Comments

[96Bravo]

I agree McClellan should be given the benefit of the doubt by the media here. Lord knows he's going to get it (and IS getting it) from his old bosses, and the right-wing media. The difference between this guy and people like Richard Clarke or Paul O'Neil is McClellan was part of Bush's inner circle. Oh, maybe not as close as one or two others but he came to the White House with Bush from Texas. This HAS to be a difficult thing for McClellan to do.

Should he have spoken up sooner? Maybe. But not everyone has that sort of heroic nature. It's not as easy as we sometimes think. And what would speaking up earlier have accomplished anyway? He'd have been politically assassinated the moment Dick Cheney deemed him "difficult". Whispers of a "disgruntled" employee would leak all over circuit before McClellan's inevitable push-out. Basically, the same thing that has happened to others.

Instead, we have a former White House Press Secretary who appeared at the time to have stepped away from the job amicably. By speaking out now, it comes from someone who would seem LEAST likely to speak out against the Bush Administration, which makes it all the more powerful.

[Dogma]

McClellan is a minor hero in his own right.

I would disagree though, that he "grew a conscience". He always had it, but he just chose to look the other way for the sake of his job and (as he believed at the time) for his country.

Obama should give him back his old job.

[castlerider]

You're right, Cenk.
I totally agree.

This book, this incident, will go a lot deeper into the consciousness of Americans and leave an imprint that will have its own whirlwind effects over a longer period of time then what I believe people are expecting.
Why?
Because it says so much more not only about this administration, but what is happenning in America right now. With televisions and a manipulated media, Americans have been kept more and more stupid over the years. Look at how we already went through much of this with Nam, and then we were foolish enough to repeat it! All ocer again..... All of a sudden, Americans are not so easy to dumb down and make stupid anymore... There is level of intelligence, an electricity in the air that is an awakening of people's coresponded conceptions. What is that? It's the internet.
Scott may suffer a certain amount from his delay to come clean, but with the way the wind is blowing, there is no way he could have held on and expected to truly remain historically relevant.

[iratior]

By now, only a noisy minority (not even the Bush administration) continues to contend that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction when Iraq was invaded, or that he was complicit in the 9/11 attacks. However, there is a problem with discussing ad nauseam (as it sounds as though Mr. McClellan's book does) whether the Bush administration made these contentions knowing full well they were false. The problem is that there is no space left to go over so many other deplorable things about the war in Iraq, such as 1) refusal to acknowledge and address the needs of disabled veterans, 2) the falsity of the pronouncement that the government of Iraq is a "democracy", 3) the continuing humanitarian crisis and the large number of civilian deaths, 4) the plight of non-Shiites, being treated as second-class citizens at best, and victims of ethnic cleansing otherwise, 5) the astronomical cost of the war, and 6) the changed face of the war -- no pretending it's a defense any more; it's a conquest.

[Fairfloss]

In April 2003 it was believed to be true, not just by the Bush administration, but by Tony Blair, the United Nations, a dozen other European leaders and former President Clinton.

Many of Saddam's generals believed it as well. Short term memory lose has become an epidemic among the far left.

What if Richard Armitage had admitted he was the one who leaked Valarie Plame's name at the time, think about the tax payers dollars that could have been saved and all that phony baloney drama, not to mention people's reputations. Think out side of the lefty box people.

What if the new President Bush had put in place, his own head of the CIA, instead of hanging on to President Clinton's old guy, George Tenet?
You whoa-is-me people would have to find something else to complain about. It would have kept you busy for another four years.

[iratior]

Are we to interpret your comment as an opinion that there would have been no Iraq war had George Tenet not stayed on as CIA director? That's rather speculative on your part, isn't it? Reminds me of a writer who once insisted that the Roman Empire fell only because its conversion to Christianity took place too late. It was as if he thought he had the capability of visiting other universes where Rome endured because it converted to Christianity early ehough.

[jazzman]

Loyalty is linked with trust. Trust is related to the belief that the person you are loyal to will also be loyal to you. Bush, Rove, and Cheney all lied to McClellan, used him, and betrayed him. Once you've been betrayed and have been used, the hurt and pain grows until anger arises. Once anger arises your loyalty snaps and then telling the truth becomes paramount. McClellan has reached that stage. We should all listen carefully. He has something to tell us. He especially has something to tell our propagandistic media.

[Dap]

Dear Brother Cenk,

That's why I heart ya, you have a heart of gold, I too believe in forgiveness and it is healing. Yet, I'm not picking that up from ol'Scotty, it's like he's semi-sincere, and there is surely no doubt that he does not fully understand the great harm that he is and has been directly responsible for, no he's not coming fully clean, he's still finding others to blame and mincing his words.

I've made allot of bad choices myself, and done many things I'm not proud of, but none of them ever injured anyone to the point of losing life or limb. ol'Scotty was in for too long, and road the wave, made his bed and was a focal part of the coup d' atet perpetrated on our beloved *Constitutional* Republic.

Sorry, Cenk I just can't agree with you on this one, especially see the ruin left in the wake of what he has been a party to, not now, maybe later. Agape.

[research]

McClellan deserves our praise and protection as a whistle blower!

[Dap]

When he tells his *WHOLE* story under Oath, then you get back to me.

[Canukistani]

While McClellan certainly played his part in deflecting and distracting the press from doing their jobs, I think there's also certainly enough reason to believe that the press wasn't all that unwilling to be led astray.

The press corps has had a cozy relationship with a lot of the insiders and many so-called journalists would rather not rock the boat. Heaven forbid, they might lose access to the people they should have been reporting on. Heaven forbid that they should have to work for their stories. The video of David Gregory dancing to Rove's tune comes readily to mind.

McClellan's obfuscations no doubt gave the Bush regime cover for a number of their insidious plots and I think he deserves criticism for that, but the press corps must be considered accomplices. The MSM coverage has been, unsurprisingly scant on this angle of the story so I'm happy to see that you've taken notice of that too.

[research]

Hear Hear!

Thank You McClellan!

[ProudLiberalDan]

I'm a believer in removing the log in your own eye before removing the speck in someone else's.

This is not a defense of McClellan's failure to come forward before now, but...

Since the corporate-owned media didn't do their job (wishing to preserve their "access" or whatever); and

Since the most powerful Democrats in Congress at that time were still "triangulating against the base" and "finessing" the votes on the Iraq War and Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy instead of standing up to Bush/Cheney and the neocons as they misled the nation into war under false pretenses against the wrong country, then...

How can we expect a someone like McClellan to turn on his boss? He wanted to believe his hero was a hero and not a monster. Much of the Democratic Party leadership saw the anti-war voices as a nuisance. Where would McClellan have turned to for support for such a courageous and dangerous action?

Not an excuse, but I can understand from a human nature perspective why it took so long.

McClellan did not act (or rather 'not act') in a vaccuum. Not around here, but in DC there was plenty of complicty and cowardice to go around.

[Enzo]

Very well said, Cenk.

[bknott]

Your last paragraph was excellent, and thank you for pointing that out specifically. However, I'm not going to give McClellan too much credit for refusing to come clean until he needed to sell some books.

[ProgressiveBum]

Bravo Cenk, what a truly succinct analysis! Instead of attacking McClellan, that he should have come out when it mattered, we should use him as an integral part of impeachment proceedings of the whole sorry lot in the White House.

[riona]

Right on.

McClellan didn't have to do what he did to make a few bucks and gain some publicity. This was a confession.

If Congress would ever get going on impeachment proceedings - and that is unlikely, but just in case, he would, no doubt, be noticed to testify early on. It really should make us all scared that we live in a society where the government has gotten away with high crimes and treason and everyone knows it, but no one is doing anything about it.

[ProudLiberalDan]

I'm very glad he finally told the truth, but I would be more impressed if he donated most of the profits from the book to the families of soldiers and civilians who needlessly died or lost limbs because Bush misled the nation into war under false pretenses against the wrong country and got away with it.

It may be a confession, but I think he should take the next step and donate the profits. That's doing more than making an apology or confessing. That's actually trying to make an amends.

[army193]

The problem we have in America that we hear day in and out that if you’re not loyal to the President then you’re a traitor, disloyal or disgruntled employee. Remember the testimony on the AG firing that one of them said they swore there oath to the President...The oath is to the United States of America and must hold those that hold any Federal Office position to be held accountable.

[naschkatze]

Thank you. The mood of the country was not ready for McClellan's revelations before this, and even now, the MSM, the enablers, are ganging up on McClellan along with the Bush administration. He never would have got to first base if he had done this earlier. Look at Paul O'Neill, Bush's first Secretary of the Treasury. Early on, very early on in fact, he saw the lie of the land over Iraq during cabinet meetings he attended. He quite, wrote a book, but did anyone pay attention? McClellan would have been destroyed earlier, at least figuratively if not literally.

[BMBTHC]

I happened to see David Gregory on Hardball last night. [Strange that the guest of one show is just the host of the preceding show.] Gregory clearly took McClellan's criticisms of the press personally. He went on and on about how McClellan was not a decider of policy and how that makes him an unreliable source. By that logic the only reliable source would be "the decider" himself. If this is any indication of the press' response to McClellan, then I would not hold my breath waiting for a moment of self reflection. It's a bit like Colbert's attack on the "stenographers" when he hosted the correspondence dinner. This bunch of cowards will never change. They are lazy and serve their masters whether they are aware of it or not. Cenk is more likely to hit upon some truth than this bunch of obsequious ninnies.

[oafishcad]

David Gregory was Rove's back up dancer at the Press Corp dinner. Does more need to be said?

[VegasDem]

The media (which considers itself more intelligent than any other group in the world) is ashamed and defensive because they were outsmarted and intimidated by the likes of George W Bush and his pals Dickie and Karl. None of them have the guts to stand up and take any blame or admit that they failed. Funny enough, that's exactly what they criticize most politicians and public figures for, not standing up and admitting your mistakes.

[ProudLiberalDan]

Great point. Remove the log from one's own eye before attempting to remove the speck from someone else's.

[gregjones]

Unfortunately, some still don't get it. The media is just trying to use the same weak excuse that the regime used for the Invasion....they got 'bad information'. THAT IS A LIE !!!!!! The media is lock-step in deceiving and manipulating the American people.....for The Regime......and now it's starting to come out....so they're scrambling.....CYA style. DON'T BE FOOLED ANYMORE AMERICA. The rest of the world knows the truth !!!!!!!!!!!!!!