"They've Got a Secret -- Lots, Actually
By Dana Milbank | Washington Post
Tuesday, May 21, 2002; Page A15
Since President Bush took office, the press and members of Congress have complained about his administration's extraordinary secrecy -- and the American public has yawned.
But last week's flap, over what Bush was told in August about Osama bin Laden's designs to hijack American airplanes, may be different. Americans don't blame the president for doing too little to prevent an attack, but they are displeased that the White House sat on the information for eight months. In a USA Today/CNN poll, 68 percent said the administration should have disclosed this information earlier.
The guarding of the hijacking information for eight months -- and acknowledging it only after a leak -- brought predictable outrage from Democrats, who had been urged by the White House to postpone and restrict probes. "Why was it not provided to us, and why was it not shared with the general public for the last eight months?" Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) demanded.
Even allies were critical. Conservative columnist Robert Novak wrote that "in a sense, Bush and his team have themselves to blame" because of a "passion for secrecy." Had they agreed early on to a commission investigating Sept. 11, he wrote, it "might have revealed in orderly fashion what is being leaked piecemeal -- fueling conspiracy theories and aiding irresponsible Democratic members of Congress."
For the Bush White House, this has become a common tale. By declining to share information in public or with Congress, it gives the impression it is covering something up when the information inevitably dribbles out -- thus provoking congressional hostility and disproportionate media attention.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/05.22C.Milbank.Secret.htmBut, frankly, I'm done. Think what you want. I don't care if you think Dana Milbank is the equivalent of Ken Melhmen. It isn't true but it really doesn't matter to me.
edit to add - OK, I lied, I found one more and the end of it cracked me up so I thought I'd share it.
For News Hounds, TGIF
By Dana Milbank
Tuesday, February 24, 2004; Page A19
The White House is moving swiftly to establish the administration's place in history as the Friday Night Presidency.
Last Friday afternoon, President Bush announced that he was circumventing the Senate confirmation process and appointing controversial judicial nominee William H. Pryor Jr. to the federal bench. It was the second such recess appointment to be made late on a Friday, following last month's appointment of Charles W. Pickering Sr.
The Friday before the Pryor nomination, the White House had two other late-day announcements: word that Bush would testify privately to the 9/11 commission, and a 7 p.m. dump of hundreds of documents from Bush's National Guard files. Other Friday surprises in recent months include the Justice Department's approval of a Texas redistricting plan expected to give the GOP as many as seven House seats; a decision by the Environmental Protection Agency not to regulate dioxins in sewage sludge; and the news from the Commerce Department that household incomes had declined for three years in a row and 1.7 million people had fallen into poverty -- the first time such statistics were announced on a Friday.
It is an old political tradition to dump unpopular news on Friday, because fewer people are reading newspapers or watching television news over the weekend. But the Bush administration has been using the trick so routinely that it is losing effectiveness. "They're not as successful now in hiding these Friday stories," said Robert Lichter of the nonpartisan Center for Media and Public Affairs. "Everybody does it, but this administration has done it too much for their own good."
-snip-
Defined by What He Isn't
Who says politicians try to be all things to all people? Last Wednesday, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said the president, declining to commit to his economists' employment forecasts, declared: "I'm not a statistician. I'm not a predictor."
Such disavowals are not unique. In November 2001, Bush noted that "I'm not a forecaster," and the following month observed that "I'm not a statistician." Here, for those defining the president by process of elimination, are some of the other things Bush and his aides have said he is not:
"I'm not a lawyer." -- Dec. 14, 2000
"I'm not a member of the legislative branch." -- March, 19, 2001
"I'm not a numbers cruncher. I'm not one of these bean counters." -- March 25, 2002
"I'm not a stockbroker or a stock picker." -- July 29, 2002
"I'm not a very formal guy to begin with." -- June 9, 2003
"I'm not an Iraqi citizen." -- Dec. 22, 2003
"The president is not an economist." -- White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, March 13, 2001
"The president is not a rubber stamp for the Congress." -- Fleischer, July 10, 2002
"The president of the United States is not a fact-checker." -- a senior administration official, addressing reporters in the White House briefing room, July 18, 2003
Fog of War
"He volunteered to go to Vietnam."
-- Bush campaign chairman Marc Racicot, yesterday, on National Public Radio
"No, I didn't."
-- President Bush, Feb. 8, responding to a question on NBC's "Meet the Press" about whether he volunteered to go to Vietnam
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A491-2004Feb23¬Found=true