Scott McClellan and the Cases for Resignation or Betrayal

There are two schools of thought forming inside regarding Scott McClellan's bombshell book: Either he should have resigned then, or he's been coopted by nefarious forces (read: liberal publishers).

The first school of thought is explicated by my U.S. News colleague John Mashek in his blog today. Mashek runs through the list of people who have resigned in protest over the years, starting with Elliot Richardson and William Ruckelshaus during Watergate (he forgot Tony Lake resigning from that administration over invading Cambodia) and running right up through Peter Edelman quitting Clinton over the welfare overhaul.

Resignation certainly has a distinguished history and a powerful case. But ... while I'm only about 50 pages into the volume, I actually find McClellan's story -- that the tone of the book evolved in the writing and as he decompressed from his White House experience -- entirely plausible. Have you ever been in a situation where you behave in a certain way and then, with the passage of both time and the pressures of the moment, you look back and wonder at your choices? Looking back budding problems are clear but you just didn't see them, acknowledge them, what have you?

Hindsight is, as they say, 20-20 and while it might have been laudable for McClellan to quit, that he has now written a book acknowledging the administration's tragic blunders doesn't mean that he had the same frame of mind then. (I can tell you from personal experience that tones, ideas and whole books can change as they go.)

In fact to say that McClellan can't have changed his mind between now and then is to insist that he be as mentally unswerving as Bush.

As for the White House's "That doesn't sound like the Scott we know..." talking points -- with the implication being that his book was commandeered by a liberal ghostwriter or editor, McClellan's critics miss the point: Whose name is on the book? Whether the former White House press secretary personally crafted each phrase is less relevant than that they are his ideas, that he has put his one name on it and that he stands behind them. (In that regard, the situation is much the same as with speechwriters.)

Comments

[robert234]

what people are just beginning to understand is the infallible fact that statism&theism (aka state&church; religion&g­overnment) were flawed and eventually evil at their genesis. this was unavoidable because that is the way Darwinian evolution works. solutions and errors are made through natural selection, and, over time, are corrected. this is now slowly happening as god&government are reaching evolutionary meltdown and will be replaced by science and technology integrated with free markerts.-­-------pra­y to god and plead with washington to your hearts content; for me it"s fun to watch . yet as Galileo is purported to have said, "it does'nt change a damn thing!

[ProudLiberalDan]

I agree that McLellan should have resigned back when it could have made a difference in policy, but I'm glad he is telling the truth now.

I think we need to go back and remember the following...

The media didn't do their job during the runup to the war, preferring to be deferential to the White House in order to keep their "access"...

The Congressional Democrats were utterly weak and ineffectual, almost hiding under their desks, and at the time were "triangulating against the base" and "finessing" the votes on the Iraq War and tax cuts for the wealthy. At the time, much of the Congressional Democratic leadership saw the anti-war voices as a "nuissance" to be avoided rather than a constituency to be represented.

McLellan was a Press Secretary. However, Bush/Cheney and the neocons willingly sought to destroy the career and reputation of repsected Generals who dared to disagree with their rosy assumptions. If they could do that to respected Generals and out Valarie Palme, what wouldn't they do to him?

In short, without the press doing their job and with the Congressional Democrats hiding and triangulating, just where would McClellan have turned to for support should have made such a courageous move back then? Granted, he could have come to us. However, his career would have been destroyed.

It would be a nice, amends-making gesture if he donated the profits from the book to the wounded veterans and the fallen soldier's and civilian's families.

[RickO]

I can understand McClellan if indeed he's had a sort of come-to-Jesus moment. I used to be a republican, a result of reaching voting age in the military, about the same time Reagan was elected, but I can't even entertain a republican thought now, a complete 180. In fact, I cringe in self-disgust and quiet embarassment remembering some of the things I thought and said during those years.

McClellan is at a crossroads at this moment and the things he does in the months to come will shape peoples' opinion of him forever. Does he collect his book royalties, fade into the backgound but vote for McCain anyway, or perhaps he becomes more of a crusader against the ideals he has just criticized, and then vote for Obama to make that point more salient. Does he go to congress and set the record straight or does he become a Fox News pundit, a Colmes to Rove's Hannity? We'll see.

[hopeless277]

Why appear naked before my enemies if truth is not on my side? HE KNEW what they would do to him. And he did it anyway. And he's talking and talking and talking. This is not a disgruntled former employee, this is a person whose concience has literally forced him to come clean. If only Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid had conciences.

[apoyo]

It's hard to be objective when you are enmeshed as part of the collective.

[burnt]

I believe you've fallen into the trap that CheneyOilCo set. The questions that we should all be asking should not revolve around Scott's reasons for disclosure. That is the line of chatter that the weasel chorus of stonewallers want you to take. At this point in time... who knows with absolute certainty what the motivation is? Why dwell on it?

The line of questioning we should all focus upon, centers around the validity of the core evidence he offers us. To most who have followed the course of events for the last 7+ years, what he presents is almost exclusively mere reinforcement for what we have known or suspected, based for the most part on circumstantial evidence... very little of his disclosure is news, but its value is based upon the fact that it comes from the inside.

That it backs up the claims of a few other insiders, should give us enough incentive to put aside questions of "loyalty" or disingenuity that are really tools used to discredit him and instead, start compiling real evidence for Congressional action on war crimes and MSM reform. We should also show the degree of support for Scott, needed to encourage others to come forward with supporting evidence.

Let's use this opportunity wisely. See it as a gift. It will only have value if we don't buy the weasel chorus spin... and instead, attend to a constructive agenda.

[AuntSam]

I agree. Let's not kill the messenger, but demand facts from the indicted. Does anyone believe that the Bush WH atmosphere portrayed in this tomb is not reality?
We need to blast those Bush surrogates who are denigrating McClellan and start the process to discover the truth for once and ever. Until then, let's just be respectful to McClellan and I'll go so far as to say, Thanks, because this might be the catalyst that will not only give us the path to the facts, but also serve as a reminder to the next administration that we deserve better, because we will demand better!

[fairwitness]

"That doesn't sound like the Scott we know..." talking points...

That sounds exactly like the White House we know. And, I vote with those who say there is absolutely no excuse for McClellan to NOT have quit the first day he knew (and be asured it was very early on, if not in Texas way before the Bush plague hit Washington) of the lies and mendacities of Bush, Cheney, Rove, et al. No excuse. As they contunually said, you are either "with them or against them"...and to be "with them" is to BE them, in all their corruption. And McClellan was their SPOKESMAN! Covering for them, lying for them, pretending they were good, assuming we were morons for not seeing it. (But we DID see.)

No lower creature possible.