Make no mistake: The diminished visibility of the Iraqi-bioweapons story in the news today has a lot to do with the aggressive strategy that the White House adopted in response. Of course, it helped that the story was demolished by bloggers before it even hit newsstands, but we’re always doing that. The vocal defense from the White House really made the difference.

The White House countered so strongly that it prompted a follow-up from the Washington Post in which the reporter, Joby Warrick, backed off from his earlier insinuations that President Bush lied about the Iraqi trailers, confessed an inability to answer the most important question his story raised, and remained silent on the revelation that Judy Miller of the New York Times already reported this story three years ago.

The White House can’t afford to stonewall the press anymore. McClellan needs to think like a blogger, get out there every morning and debunk these false reports as soon as they hit the Web.