Scott McClellan's Integrity is Blowin' in the Wind (VIDEO)

George Bush's biggest former defender rolls over on his ex-boss, is it conscience or wisdom?

(SALEM, Ore.) - The meanest and most evasive White House Press Secretary in history, Scott McClellan, has rolled over on President George W. Bush, calling his performance at the time just exactly what it was... so much bull. But what happens next?

"Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan is lashing out at the Bush administration."

That is how FOX News begins their coverage on McClellan's surprise turnaround on Bush, the man he defiantly lied for very recently during what may easily end up being this country's most tumultuous presidency ever.

But watch this bought and paid for "news" network perform a similar 180 in their political convictions in the coming months just like McClellan. Nobody wants to be associated with a total loser as many always predicted Bush to ultimately be.

McClellan performed his job while offering the most demeaning tone toward reporters ever witnessed. Perhaps it was expected by some, but McClellan's surprise departure from the Bush policies he so completely and forcefully embraced is nothing but a reaction to the forces of nature.

Those forces that only allow someone like President Bush so much time to maintain a stranglehold on a nation, any nation, for so long. They also allow a man like McClellan to know he backed the wrong horse. Maybe jumping ship from the Bush Republicans who held him in trust was an act of McClellan's conscience, but it seems entirely likely that he is just putting distance between himself and a President who very likely could end up facing charges for highly disputed political decisions that McClellan announced to the world.

"The most powerful leader in the world had called upon me to speak on his behalf and help restore credibility he lost amid the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. So I stood at the White house briefing room podium in front of the glare of the klieg lights for the better part of two weeks and publicly exonerated two of the senior-most aides in the White House: Karl Rove and Scooter Libby.

I had unknowingly passed along false information. And five of the highest ranking officials in the administration were involved in my doing so: Rove, Libby, the vice President, the President's chief of staff, and the President himself."

It wasn't a good day for Dana Perino, the current White House Press Secretary who fills the shoes of McClellan and Tony Snow, a former FOX reporter. (see: Who is Dana Perino?)

She still has to stand there and sling hash for a lame duck President who has shed every sign of his brief, one-time popularity with this nation.

The White House Press Corps Secretary had this to say about the book, "the loaded charge, in the book is that the President and his senior advisers purposefully misled people into war, and that we sent our young men and women into war, knowing something that we weren't telling the American people. That is not true."

Really? It is true if you look at the facts, but we somehow need to step around those in order to accept the words of Perino, and McClellan and Snow. Scott McClellan is mean, he is rude to his elders like Helen Thomas who covered the White House when John F. Kennedy was the President.

Everything he did was calculated and pre-planned at the highest levels. Scott McClellan knew exactly what he was doing when he vied for the job with Bush and he knew everything was untrue as he said it. What kind of continuing fools does he take Americans to be?

McClellan has fully severed ties with the White House, and that leaves him in a bad light with Perino.

"When it comes from somebody like Scott, who was a close friend of many of us here at the White House, those of us who fully supported him before, during and after he was press secretary are disappointed by this and saddened by it."

With an approach to running a country like George Bush's, it is no wonder that loyalty is in short supply. Scott McClellan was for a long time, George W. Bush's most ardent supporter. His allegiances blow with the winds of public popularity.

In the story I mentioned McClellan not respecting his elders and while some may roll their eyes, others take that basic notion very seriously. In this clip called "Helen Thomas gives the White House Press Secretary a shellacking":

OK, lots of video goes with this one courtesy of YouTube. This clip is a report from ABC News's Chief Washington Correspondent George Stephanopoulos, former Communications Director under President Bill Clinton, on Scott McClellan's departure from the White House:

In the clip the Young Turks from Air America discuss the new revelations from McClellan:

Finally, here are Keith Olberman and Rachel Madow discussing the new development. The point out that McClellan has done something almost unheard of in our nation's history. He also did it while the President was still in office. Maybe McClellan deserves a break, but I still think that it is necessary for anyone like him to always be remembered for the years he stood up for Bush under such shaky, ethical conditions. Here is Countdown:

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Comments Leave a comment on this story.

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Stewart June 3, 2008 5:55 pm (Pacific time)

I just do not see where the below poster has any liability for a law suit.

Henry Ruark June 3, 2008 7:32 am (Pacific time)

M-H et al: Further "edification" re publishing ethics and possible legalities: Your key phrase is: "It really is nothing more than a story about a disgruntled ex-employee whose mother was slighted by the Republican party when she ran for governor in Texas during the last election. A big waste of money if you buy the book, and a big waste of time no matter what." That directly accuses the publisher of risking many, many thousands, even millions, on a book of very questionable value --in a public media statement. In effect it makes that publisher open to charges of "selling a defective product knowingly", if what you charge is legally provable. Can you defend that statement beyond your non-professional "opinion" ? If NOT, you put yourself at risk not only for critical judgment but also for possible legal recourse --with S-N perhaps cited as "accessory" since we are surely "public chnnel". Does that explain Editor Tim's concerns re Comments ? Some publishers make it a practice to file such charges against individuals, while ignoring them from established critics. I KNOW from experience, happily on both sides... It is entirely unrealistic to even consider action by any recognized, established publisher to put out the McClellan book without huge research and documentation for what he writes. Why would they put both their reputation and capital on the line without that ? If you've ever dealt with a publication attorney, you would know that small fact of media life. You better have solid documentation in hand for them, if you want to see your stuff on the printed page, and on sale. Shared-here simply for what it may be worth, some day, to some of you...

Albert Marnell June 2, 2008 8:19 pm (Pacific time)

Who cares what the motives of McClellan are? People miss the main point. They need to be reminded that the U.S. is just one big corporation run by corporate criminals and military criminals. It is not a country and never was. Dream on with your jingoism. This is the land of the free... not before slavery, not after...not before women had the right to vote, not after.... not before inter-racial marriages were illegal.... not after.... not before the Patriot Act, certainly not after. What are you all thinking? WAKE UP! Don't forget those Eugenics laws from 1907 until at least the 1990's. Don't forget the governments right to experiment on it's own population. How about the Tuskegee study? President Clinton greets Joan Echtenkamp Klein. Photo courtesy of the White House. I went to high school with so many kids that exposed the fraud that is our corporation...how about Jane Akre? You all do not even know who these people are that changed history. If you do not want to change the U.S. for the better into a country with me and others....Love it or leave it! How about HAARP?...You-Tube Fulford vs. HAARP. If we had the atom bomb 60 years ago, what makes it so hard for people to believe that HAARP is used to created unnatural-natural disasters?

Henry Ruark June 2, 2008 7:37 pm (Pacific time)

To H. and T. et al: For your edification here's what those with feet on terra firma now agree re McClellan book. Can vouch for Borchgrave, long UPI top reporter, from contacts over the years. I "broke in" filing UPI wire in Boston, in early '40s !! He makes strong-point here in fact McClellan had direct duty to follow orders on content handled. That's what one does in that position, for any situation. When you can no longer stomach the stuff, you get out....which is why so many ownership changes in dailies are rapidly followed by editor exit. Have "been there, done that" on several levels from local to state and corporate, so can feel for McClellan. Do NOT ignore solid function of his book, now, to bring out chorus of similar reports from other insiders, and strong support from anyone who really knows how media is worked --including manipulation, distortion and perversion --even at Presidential level ! Here;s Borchgrave of UPI: Tower of Babble Rabble United Press International May 30, 2008 By Arnaud De Borchgrave "Former White House Press secretary Scott McClellan is excoriated for stating the obvious. The Iraq War, he writes in his memoirs titled "What Happened in the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception," was sold to the American people with a sophisticated "political propaganda campaign." This, in turn, was designed to "manipulate public opinion" in such a way as to downplay "the major reason for going to war." Disinformation was an integral part of the process. "How else does one explain that at one point 60 percent of Americans believed the palpably fraudulent nonsense that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was behind Sept. 11? A gullible, manipulated public also became convinced that Iraq was a mortal danger to the United States at a time when two no-fly zones over northern and southern Iraq, at a cost of $11 billion a year, kept Saddam confined to his dirty little sandbox. None of his neighbors was afraid of him. Nor were our European allies. But the neocons kept beating the drums of war on U.S. television networks with the fiction we were locked in an existential struggle with Iraq. (Much, much more...see website: www.freepress.org (Then comes "the kicker") "Scott McClellan's former White House colleagues feigned sadness rather than anger on the tube and asked why he didn't speak up when he was still on the government payroll. This lament studiously ignored the fact that McClellan was not a policymaker and was in no position to question what he was told to say at the daily White House press briefing. His job was to take orders, not question them." ----If anyone has ever worked information duty similar to McC's, you will recognize the inevitabilities he faced.

Tucker June 2, 2008 1:41 pm (Pacific time)

Yeah it really does look like this is all about a disgruntled employee angling for a big payday. It was Armitage of the State Department that outed Plame and since he was not prosecuted there can be no doubt that he did not break the law. It was a witch hunt that concluded with a perjury trap. My guess is that this McCellan has pretty much burned all of his bridges, so when those that are using him for his book are finished, he will be out in the bitter cold. Even a 1st year law student knows that had he any real info that he was privy too for prosecution, he would have been compelled to have come forward when the investigation was active so as not to be involved in conspiracy and Obstruction of Justice. Anyway, Bush is not running, so what's the big deal anyway?

Mike Hanson June 2, 2008 12:08 pm (Pacific time)

Considering the fact that a special prosecutor with a huge staff investigated all allegations regarding Plame via a Grand Jury, and that we already had someone from the State Department that outed Plame, and no criminal charges were filed, it appears that this is all about money and what some political hay can be made. It really is nothing more than a story about a disgruntled ex-employee whose mother was slighted by the Republican party when she ran for governor in Texas during the last election. A big waste of money if you buy the book, and a big waste of time no matter what.

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Scott McClellan's Integrity is Blowin' in the Wind (VIDEO)

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