Scott McClellan, perhaps the least distinguished of White House press secretaries in recent years, has now found himself the center of a media firestorm. It’s not unusual in this media culture for such mediocrities to gain such attention Usually when they do, they have something the media wants to sell or promote.
In most cases, their fame doesn’t last very long. I doubt that he has the staying power of a Paris Hilton or Madonna. Some people do find Hilton attractive while the latter has a passable singing voice and a talent for understanding the music industry and pop culture. McClellan, well, um, what qualities did he have? Um, Um. . . . .
Wait a second, how did he ever get this job in the first place?
Whatever the case, he has shown himself to be a person of incredibly low class, one who would sit silently by while supporting an Administration (which he now claims was) pushing propaganda and deception or as one who would sell out the man who gave him the job which put him in a position to achieve such prominence.
Last night on FoxNews’ Special Report with Brit Hume, Charles Krauthammer said as much (pretty much nailing it in my view):
Frances Townsend, who was the president’s terrorism advisor in the White House, said earlier today that there were lots of meetings in the White House among the advisors with lots of give and take and questioning, and pushing back, and that in these meetings Scott McClellan said nothing.
You also heard others have said — Ari Fleischer, who was his predecessor, and who was close to him, said that Scott McClellan never shared any of these misgivings in public or in private.
So you’ve got to ask yourself what kind of man collaborates on what he now says was deceptive propaganda to drag America into what he now calls an unnecessary war, and does it without ever privately or publicly saying anything, and without doing the obvious, which is to resign.
And the answer is one of two things — either he is the most dishonorable man in Washington, staying in a position and collaborating in what are essentially high crimes that he now asserts, or this is a guy, a young man, who sort of left under a cloud, who had one of the most undistinguished careers as a Press Secretary ever, who was legendary for his incoherence, and who doesn’t have a lot of big future on the side, is going to cash in on the one chance — the book — by telling stuff like the scurrilous stuff he has in the book about overhearing the president talking about alleged cocaine use in a telephone discussion.
That kind of stuff, I think, is — he knew that that would sell, and that’s why he did it.
Let me repeat, what kind of man collaborates in what he now claims is deceptive propaganda?
But, I don’t think at the time McClellan thought he was pushing propaganda. I don’t think he thought very much about what he was doing. He just did it. After he left the White House, he had a choice to spend the rest of his life in honorable oblivion or to spin his story to fit the narrative the media wanted and so become an instant celebrity. For fifteen minutes at least.
We’ve seen this all before. Four centuries ago, Christopher Marlowe wrote a pretty good play on a similar topic. As did Goethe just over two hundred years later.
