Free Republic

If you're going to accuse a president of lying and committing crimes, it might be nice to provide some particulars. But Frank Rich sees no need for any such niceties in his New York Times column of today. The column's putative topic is the McClellan book, but the real subject is Rich's abject Bush hatred. After referring to Pres. Bush as "the loathed lame duck," Rich writes: Americans don’t like being lied to by their leaders, especially if there are casualties involved and especially if there’s no accountability. We view it as a crime story, and we won’t be satisfied...

During the Civil War, when the issues of right and wrong were clear, one of President Lincoln’s appointees, General George McClelland, betrayed him.  The anti-war Democrats to whom McClelland pandered were called “Copperheads.”  They rallied around McClelland to defeat the president politically, when they could not defeat the armies of America militarily.  McClelland had a pretty high opinion of himself.  He knew what Lincoln did not:  That the war come not be won, that giving up and bringing the troops home was the only sensible answer, and that the president was not much of a leader. Democrats overwhelmingly supported this...

"But McClellan shouldn't profit off the role he played in our nation's largest foreign policy blunder,” the release reads. "After spending years defending the Bush administration and perpetuating the lies that led our country into war, Scott McClellan is poised to make bank — his tell-all book is a bestseller and he may make hundreds of thousands or millions,” MoveOn says. "Meanwhile, our troops are still dying in Iraq.” ...

An examination of published reports reveals that Scott McClellan's kiss-and-smell betrayal of George W. Bush is a far cry from the book McClellan started out to write and was shaped into an offensive tome by a publisher with close ties to George Soros. To understand how McClellan's literary knife-in-the-back evolved, one has to know something about the book industry.

Republican insiders see the bitter criticism in Scott McClellan's memoir, "What Happened," as a payback for his abrupt firing as White House press secretary in the spring of 2006. Continues... =============================================================== Scott McClellan stars in Ghost Writer With Scott McClellan's new book, left-wingers are now absolutely sure Obama will trounce Bush this November! No third term! The little darlings haven't figured out yet that Bush isn't on the ballot this time, so they're frantically putting out movies like "Recount," "Redacted," "Rendition," "Stop-loss," and publishing fiction like McClellan's book, which all liberals with advance copies are excitedly having someone literate read...

Nothing destroys a man like his betrayal of friends. The mortal wound is self-inflicted and he dies from the inside out, inviting neither compassion nor commiseration, only contempt, disdain and ultimately scorn. This is the hard lesson Scott McClellan is buying with his 30 pieces of silver. George W. Bush, flawed and maker of mistakes, finishes his presidency almost as unpopular as Harry S. Truman finished his, and who knows whether history will revise his presidential reputation.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan said Friday he would be willing to comply with a rumored congressional subpoena to discuss the administration’s handling of pre-war intelligence, telling CNN’s Wolf Blitzer he’d be “glad to share my views” if asked to testify. Facing a firestorm over his book, McClellan also confirmed reports that he had apologized to Richard Clarke for questioning his honesty after the former counterterrorism official published his own book critical of the White House. “That was part of our talking points at the time. I didn’t even read the book,” McClellan admitted Friday....

You called Scott McClellan last night. What did you ask him? ARI FLEISCHER, FORMER W.H. PRESS SECRETARY: Well, I did. Actually it was before the story broke about the book. So, it was a social call and Scott brought up the book. We talked about it and he told me he thought it was going to be an honest, brutal, I mean honest, blunt book — he didn't say brutal. And I'm not sure I thought it was going to be as bad as it sounds like it is. HEMMER: What do you mean? FLEISCHER: From what I'm hearing from...

First Lady Laura Bush traveled to New Orleans, Louisiana today and spoke at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art (Transcript) Museums and libraries preserve the heritage that makes us who we are. And by keeping us in dialogue with our past -- which books and works of art do -- artwork and artifacts can help us make a better future. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates attended the Shangri-La Dialogue Security Conference today in Singapore. There were no public events for President Bush today. Tomorrow he will travel to Greenville, South Carolina to deliver the commencement address at Furman University. Press...

Publisher Peter Osnos, who admits to personally working with former Bush White House press secretary Scott McClellan on his new book, What Happened, began his career as an assistant to I.F. Stone, the pro-communist "journalist" named as a Soviet agent of influence who was the uncle of Weather Underground communist terrorist Kathy Boudin. But the connections don't end there. Boudin's son Chesa was raised by Barack Obama associates Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, who were Boudin's comrades in the communist terrorist group, after Kathy Boudin went to prison for her involvement in an armed robbery and assault that took the...

Leave him alone. He wrote a book. It is true or untrue, accurately reported or not. If not, this will no doubt be revealed. It is honestly meant and presented, or not. Look to the assertions, argue them, weigh and ponder. That's my first thought. When I finished the book I came out not admiring Mr. McClellan or liking him but, in terms of the larger arguments, believing him.

Rush Limbaugh dissects Scott McClellan's interview with Meredith Viera...

Bob Dole says Bob Dole is mad at Scott McClellan. The former Senate majority leader and 1996 Republican presidential candidate sent a nasty e-mail to McClellan calling him a "miserable creature" for his latest book blasting the Bush administration, FOX News has learned. In the e-mail, Dole basically describes the former White House press secretary as a traitor looking to cash in on the "liberal" media's distaste for President Bush. "There are miserable creatures like you in every administration who don't have the guts to speak up or quit if there are disagreements with the boss or colleagues," the five-term...

What goes around, comes around. In an encounter last night in the lobby of a New York hotel, former White House press secretary Scott McClellan apologized for denouncing a former White House colleague, Richard Clarke, the former counterterrorism adviser, after Clarke wrote a book highly critical of the Bush administration in 2004.

...Grievances against former White House colleagues animate much of "What Happened." Mr. McClellan's broader theme, about dysfunctional politics, fades away. He shows no interest in examining, say, the partisan underpinnings of Joe Wilson's public criticism of the Bush administration. And the former White House press secretary offers little meditation on whether the administration had a duty to expose Mr. Wilson's political motives – and, if not, what the White House might have done instead. Astonishingly, for someone who proclaims himself appalled by spin and the manipulation of information, Mr. McClellan offers his one bombshell – the suggestion that Mr. Rove...

Bob Dole unloads on McClellan Bob Dole yesterday sent a scalding email to Scott McClellan, excoriating the former White House spokesman as a "miserable creature" who greedily betrayed his former patron for a fast buck. In an extraordinary message obtained and authenticated by Politico, Dole uses his trademark biting wit to portray McClellan as a classic Washington opportunist. "There are miserable creatures like you in every administration who don’t have the guts to speak up or quit if there are disagreements with the boss or colleagues," Dole wrote in a message sent yesterday morning. "No, your type soaks up the...

There is only a little over a half a year left in Bush's presidency yet that hasn't kept Congressman Robert Wexler from continuing to screech for his impeachment. This time Wexler thinks he has found the key for the impeachment. It comes in the form of Scott McClellan's book, "What Happened?" which is short on actual facts but does include a passage where Scotty spotted Karl Rove and Scooter Libby walk into a private room together. CHIMPEACHMENT NOW!!! Of course, if McClellan eventually does testify before congress there will be nothing solid to be found which is why Rush...

One thing is certain about Scott McClellan’s book: he wouldn’t have sold many copies if it had been about how well President Bush had served his country. Friends and admirers of the President don’t need to read a book like that; only future students of history do. Friends and admirers well realize that, at enormous cost to himself in the nanny-state in which we now live, President Bush has kept us safe against all odds, he steered us through a recovery from the Clinton recession and then through the incredible collapse of the economy after 9/11, and all the while...

Sometimes the answers to our most perplexing questions can be found on the playground. Take Scott McClellan. Is he dishonest? Dishonorable? Disloyal? Is he telling the truth that the Bush administration conducted an organized propaganda campaign in order to lead the country to war? Did McClellan know it all along and, if so, why did he hang so long with those guys? Curious Americans want to know. At the White House, former colleagues wonder what happened to the Scott they thought they knew? What caused that sweet guy to betray his former boss and friends with a tell-all memoir --...

Of all the people to call for a "truce" on excessive partisanship . . . Interviewing Scott McClellan tonight, Keith Olbermann sanctimoniously suggested that a "truce" on partisanship "would be nice." But speaking with John Dean just minutes later, the Countdown host—he who has repeatedly called President Bush a liar and a fascist—reverted to form and regretted that it might be too late to impeach him. SCOTT MCCLELLAN: [The 1988] election was very much a turning-point election. I think that George Bush, George Bush 41, George Herbert Walker Bush, is a decent individual, and a man who really believes in...