McClellan was unconvincing under fire when he was at that White House podium — not unlike Barack Obama in debate (remember those? It’s been awhile). McClellan is prone to gaffes — again, like the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. McClellan doesn’t say a heck of a lot, so he makes it easy to use him — whether as a symbol of Bush-administration incompetence, as the media took him then, or as a freed prisoner, as Keith Olbermann, who says he is “impressed” by the book, uses him now.
And so Keith Olbermann projected, Thursday night, onto What Happened. He invited McClellan on and wrote the narrative, led the Bush-and-Cheney-bashing dance, to which McClellan — whose book doesn’t say all that much, just enough to be easily used by those who actually have an ideological agenda — happily followed. Perhaps nowhere was this clearer than when Olbermann asserted that the administration misled Americans about the September 11 attacks, to which McClellan had absolutely nothing to add.
It’s like McClellan handed a press conference over to David Gregory. (Come to think of it, he did that too!)
Scott McClellan does a lot of empty whining about “the Washington game” in his book, and on his media tour thus far. Ironically, Scott McClellan is what’s wrong with Washington: people in power who don’t believe in anything. People who’ve been elected or nominated or appointed who won’t fight for anything. Officials who are content being in power, period. This is why Scott McClellan didn’t do anything if he thought “Bush lied, people died” while McClellan was serving in the White House.
McClellan is wrong to attack partisanship: We should bring on the ideology. Bring on the partisanship. Bring on actual principled fights. (Have a fight about the farm bill! Have a fight about cap and trade next week! Who needs three presidential candidates who all support an expensive, harmful non-solution?)
Had a with-it Scott McClellan voiced concerns – again, if he actually had them — about the war effort, maybe he could have made a contribution. Isn’t that why one goes to Washington? It is, if you’re there for the right reasons.