The first political memoir I ever read, way back in the dim, dark days of 1984, was Jody Powell's The Other Side Of The Story. Powell was Jimmy Carter's press secretary, as well as one of the architects (along with Hamilton Jordan) of his amazing come-from-nowhere primary victory. I well remember the chapter in which Powell discusses the botched hostage rescue attempt, and his frustration that he was, in contemporary parlance, "out of the loop", only getting word on the details of the event a few minutes before having to face reporters. He argues that, had he been "in the know", he might have been more effective in dealing with overlapping questions coming from a press corps eager to find out why Carter had killed all those Marines.
Since then, political memoirs have become a favorite of Washington insiders. A version of Hollywood kiss-and-tell, they are usually score-setting accounts of the backbiting machinations of the powerful and not-as-great-as-you-think. Former Bush press secretary Scott McClellan has done what many before him have done, and in the process ginned up the right-wing smear machine to the point of screeching overload. Not having read McClellan's book, and not planning to, I can watch the contretemps with a bit of detachment, chuckling at the way the right is managing to make McClellan and his book far more important than might otherwise have been. This post at Think Progress has a good run-down on the latest attempts to kick Scott McClellan under the bus and hold him there is it runs back and forth over his already bruised body. The problem with this attempt to smear McClellan by smearing his publisher is kind of silly, should one stop and think (something either those chattering do not do, or they hope those listening do not do). Obviously, McClellan is trying to sell books. Duh. Obviously, the publisher of the book, via the editor in charge of the project worked with McClellan to get information that would spice up the tale, and therefore drive sales. Obviously, the publisher in question is willing to publish and market books by all sorts of persons, left and right, to make money from them.
Arguing this way is so silly. Since there is no way to deny that McClellan is speaking publicly available facts - despite selling crap on a daily basis while still in his old job - the only way to smear the guy is to shout, "Oh, my God! He's trying to make money! So is his publisher!" I, for one, am not impressed with McClellan's mea culpa for being a mouthpiece for the hoodlums and fools in charge. It is a bit late in the game for him to come forward and say, "So sorry." At the same time, it is nice that the right has a chance to kick around someone other than Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton. As they attempt to eat one of their own, or disappear him from the pages of recent events, or dismiss him as a disgruntled, attention-seeking crank, we can sit back and remember that, in the end, all that matters is that everyone hates George Bush, and we are in the last throes of this long national nightmare.
UPDATE: I have been remiss in my commentary by ignoring, or forgetting, the simple fact that part of the hubbub around McClellan's little tome has been created by a hyper-defensive Washington press corps that McClellan spanked for not doing their job (although, had they done their job, McClellan, either in real time or in retrospect would be equally scathing, one supposes). Tristero and dday at Hullabaloo, and Glenn Greenwald in two consecutive posts give some details. One of those reporters speaking out, Jessica Yellin, has already started to backtrack, knowing (as dday notes clearly) that she is now marked like Ashleigh Banfield and Phil Donahue. These kinds of things are normal, and Yellin, by going public without naming names, has put herself in an awkward position indeed, putting the onus right back upon her own shoulders to provide specifics of her claims that she received both editorial and corporate pressure to alter stories to fit "the patriotic fever" (I was inoculated as a child, so I didn't catch that particular bug). Yet, even should she not do so (and her current "clarification" shows she won't), her refusal should be evidence enough; why would anyone want to go public with the kind of information that would make one unemployable, a professional leper. Naming names is nothing less than a death sentence, as anyone in the mob or government could tell you.
