The New York Times reports that Scott McClellan, Bush’s former White House press secretary, has written a memoir about his years where he managed the White House press as the Bush administration took steps to destory the world from July 2003 to April 2006. He is gentle on himself, noting that “I fell far short of living up to the kind of public servant I wanted to be.” Less gentle on others, the Times notes McClellan’s claims that
President Bush “convinces himself to believe what suits his needs at the moment,” and has engaged in “self-deception” to justify his political ends.
No way, Jose! How about that. Good thing he wrote this book so that we could know this sort of thing. Wonder how much he got paid for his book? Do you think he actually stayed in the job thinking, if I stick it out long enough, I can write a book? Or he was just blinded by… I don’t know, just having a job? Being part of the action? Enjoying widespread lying and spinning to the public?
Finally, after, like, three years of deceiving to the media, and working for an administration that systematically restricts access to (important, as well as seemingly mundane) information from the media, he
calls the news media “complicit enablers” in the White House’s “carefully orchestrated campaign to shape and manipulate sources of public approval” in the march to the Iraq war in 2002 and 2003.
Not that I think the media is that hot. Mr. McClellan just doesn’t seem like the best person to wax all philosophical on the problems with media. Since, you know, it was his job to mislead them.
Memoir is such an interesting literary form. I wonder how many of us write them to blame others…..