The White House press room is notorious for its shafting flippancy–but with a quasi-subtle “f**k you reporters because we’re the Teflon administration” touch to it–policy when it comes to being questioned about heated issues such as the current Karl Rove debacle. Shorter Press Secretary Scott McClellan: “Stop asking me questions about Karl Rove! You damn dirty reporters need to shut up about it already, and no one dare questions the White House!” To put it bluntly of course.
[…]Salon’s David Paul Kuhn was at the White House this morning, and he reports that the press once again grilled McClellan about Karl Rove’s involvement in the Plame case — and that McClellan, once again, refused to say anything of substance about it. When Rove’s name came up, McClellan “retreated immediately to the defensive, to his talking points, wiggling his back foot nervously behind the podium,” Kuhn tells War Room.[…]
And what could he say, really? When a reporter asked yesterday whether Bush continues to “have confidence in Mr. Rove,” McClellan’s response was a non sequitur return to his talking points: “Again, these are all questions coming up in the context of an ongoing criminal investigation. And you’ve heard my response on this.”
Poor McClellan seems to be a bit both perturbed and nervous when [barely] discussing the KR scandal. Reporters questioning him about it apparently annoys him–almost as if he believes the press core has no right to dare broach this issue at all. And here’s a little more concerning McClellan’s own “don’t ask, don’t tell” press room policy…
[…], Scott McClellan tried to argue that the sudden White House silence about the Valerie Plame case has nothing to do with the evidence implicating Karl Rove and everything to do with his claim that federal investigators asked him not to talk about the case when he testified before the grand jury in February 2004. “If you’ll remember back two years ago or almost two years ago, I did draw a line,” McClellan said. “I said we’re just not going to get into commenting on . . . an investigation that continues.”
There’s at least a little truth to McClellan’s argument; McClellan had much to say about the Plame case before he testified and has said little if anything of substance since.[…]
A look at the calendar reveals that, four days after McClellan appeared before the grand jury, George W. Bush told reporters in Chicago that he wanted to know if anyone in his administration had leaked Plame’s identity, and that “if the person has violated law, that person will be taken care of.” Five months later, at a June 10, 2004, press conference in Georgia, the president said he still intended to fire anyone found to have leaked Plame’s identity. And a few months after that, late in the summer of 2004, Karl Rove himself told CNN: “I didn’t know her name. I didn’t leak her name.”[…]
Nobody asked McClellan today why he can’t talk but everyone else around him can, but it probably doesn’t matter. He wouldn’t have answered anyway.
Anyone take a guess as to what kind of medal or perk Karl Rove could receive for this, because hey–Bush loves giving out medals and higher political offices to those who screw up (ie: George Tenet and the current Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice). I seriously doubt that there will be any “firing” within the future, no matter how much it is deserved. I just love it how this administration acts as if they should never have to be held culpable, be questioned, or take any responsibility for its mistakes–no matter how egregious.
