It's Your Daily Funnies in convenient textual format! Today's topics: "Consensual gay sex...bigamy, incest, and adultery..."No, this isn't some recently uncovered report on the last Republican National Convention. The tip-off should've been that "kicking downed protesters in the back" wasn't included. No, the above was cut from today's White House Press Briefing, which (on a normal day) has to be some of the most humorous and revealing political information that one can find. You can find it at
www.whitehouse.gov/news/briefings/. I've found that it's made more enjoyable to imagine "Tea For Two" playing while reading Scott McClellan's responses to questions from the White House press pool.
A few selected snippets (italics and emphases mine):
The New York Times reported today that in the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, "as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush's public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war. But behind closed doors, the president was certain that war was inevitable. During a private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office on Jan. 31, 2003, he made clear to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain that
he was determined to invade Iraq without the second resolution, or even if international arms inspectors failed to find unconventional weapons, said a confidential memo about the meeting written by Mr. Blair's top foreign policy adviser and reviewed by The New York Times. "
Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning," David Manning, Mr. Blair's chief foreign policy adviser at the time, wrote in the memo that summarized the discussion between Mr. Bush, Mr. Blair and six of their top aides."
(snip)
"Without much elaboration, the memo also says
the president raised three possible ways of provoking a confrontation. Since they were first reported last month, neither the White House nor the British government has discussed them. "
The U.S. was thinking of flying U2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, painted in U.N. colours," the memo says, attributing the idea to Mr. Bush. "If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach." It also
described the president as saying, "The U.S. might be able to bring out a defector who could give a public presentation about Saddam's W.M.D," referring to weapons of mass destruction. A brief clause in the memo refers to
a third possibility, mentioned by Mr. Bush, a proposal to assassinate Saddam Hussein. The memo does not indicate how Mr. Blair responded to the idea.
Despite his optimism, Mr. Bush said he was aware that "there were uncertainties and risks," the memo says, and it goes on, "As far as destroying the oil wells were concerned, the U.S. was well equipped to repair them quickly, although this would be easier in the south of Iraq than in the north."
What? Could this true? Let's see how Mr. McClellan confirms or denies the contents of this memo: Q: Is this memo correct?
MR. McCLELLAN: I don't -- I haven't seen that memo, Helen.
Q: You haven't seen The New York Times' memo?
MR. McCLELLAN: I've seen The New York Times.
Q: Well, let me just follow on that. There's nothing in there that suggests that this is not an accurate reflection of a conversation that the President had with Prime Minister Blair, right?
MR. McCLELLAN:
Well, I think that our public and private comments are fully consistent.
Q:
And therefore the guts of this appears to be accurate?MR. McCLELLAN: I don't know what you're talking about "guts" of. Let's be specific in what we're talking about.
Q: Well, comments made about the inevitability of war, the President's feeling about that at one --
MR. McCLELLAN: Well, the President was making numerous public comments at the time, David. You covered those comments. The use of force was a last option, but we recognized that it was necessary --
Q: It was his mind frame, though.
MR. McCLELLAN: -- to prepare and plan, and that's what we were doing at the time. And if you go and look at the public comments at the time, going back to late in the fall and winter period of 2002, on into 2003, we were making it very clear what the regime needed to do. And if it didn't do it, we were prepared to enforce the Security Council Resolution 1441, which called for serious consequences.
Q:
It didn't call for going to war.Mercifully, someone shifts the topic to illegal immigration: Q: Scott, on the President's temporary guest worker program, in 2005, Mexican President Vicente Fox said, "
Mexicans take jobs not even black people want to do." And
today, Secretary -- HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson elaborated on the comment saying, "We did not like what Vicente Fox said, but it has merits to it -- many of the jobs that Mexicans take coming across the border are the jobs that blacks, whites and Asians don't want." Last year when Vicente Fox made his statement, the administration backed away from it, denounced it and everything.
Is the administration embracing that comment now, in light of the Cancun meeting? MR. McCLELLAN: April, I haven't seen what Secretary Jackson said. And we did speak to that issue at the time, I believe, as you just pointed out. What we're doing is as we go into the discussions in Cancun, we'll be talking about the importance of all of us meeting our responsibilities when it comes to addressing immigration issues -- and that means border security, as well. All of us have responsibilities to secure our borders and to address these issues. And the President has a good relationship with President Fox. He looks forward to talking with him about this issue, among others.
Q:
Those comments specifically?MR. McCLELLAN: I'm sorry?
Q: Those comments --
MR. McCLELLAN: Well, I think we addressed that at the time, April.
Q: No, but will the President -- because there's a cloud over it now.
The administration distanced itself from it, and here you have an African American department head embracing it.
MR. McCLELLAN:
I haven't seen what he said today. Q:
Well, I have the statements if you would like to hear them. MR. McCLELLAN: Well, you can share that with me, and I'll take a look at it later.
Back to Iraq: Q: Scott, on Iraq, the Manning Memo also alleges that in this private meeting, the President told Prime Minister Blair that one option was to assassinate Saddam Hussein.
Did the President really contemplate that as an option since it would be breaking U.S. law?MR. McCLELLAN: Ed, this was a meeting that took place back in January of 2003.
Even if I knew exactly what was said in that meeting, I wouldn't get into discussing private conversations between world leaders like this. Again, I reiterate to you, the comments that we were making publicly and privately are fully consistent with one another.Q: Is the President concerned that the explosion today in Tal Afar --
that's one of the places he highlighted last week where things were turning around, there were bright spots, some of the good news --MR. McCLELLAN: Well, you're asking me to make some sort of attack near Tal Afar --
Q:
Yes, it's at least 30 people dead, 30 more wounded outside a recruitment center. MR. McCLELLAN:
I don't have all the facts surrounding that. I would also encourage you to -- if such an attack did take place there, look at what the motivations are. We know that the terrorists try to grab headlines, and that they target progress to try to gain attention and to try derail the transition to democracy. But I can't speak to this specific incident that just took place today. I don't know all the facts regarding that. I think that's best to direct to our military forces in Iraq. Go ahead.
DID THE PRESIDENT SAY THOSE THINGS ATTRIBUTED IN THE MEMO TO HIM, OR NOT, FER CRYIN' OUT LOUD?? Q:
Scott, had the President decided on the 31st of January to go to war with Iraq regardless of whether there was a second U.N. resolution, and regardless of whether weapons of mass destruction were found?MR. McCLELLAN: We were preparing in case it was going to be necessary, but we were continuing to pursue a diplomatic solution in that 2003 time period. And all the -- there was a lot of public comments made at the time, leading up to the decision to go in and use force, and remember, even 48 hours before we began Operation Iraqi Freedom, Saddam Hussein and his sons were given one final opportunity to leave the country and avoid serious consequences.
Q:
So would you dispute what's in this memo, which says that, in fact, that decision had been made by January the 31st, and say that the President had not decided to go to war?MR. McCLELLAN: Well, I think I was asked that earlier, and I think I addressed that when I just said we were continuing to pursue a diplomatic course. You can go back and look at all the public comments at the time. The President made numerous public comments. You can look at other officials in the administration and what we were saying, but Saddam Hussein -- that's why I pointed back to -- remember,
there's a December report, or interim report by the weapons inspector, the United Nations weapons inspector, and it showed that the regime was not coming clean. We said that they were continuing their pattern of non-cooperation at the time. And we also made it very clear that war was the last option, but
if the regime was not going to come clean, then we were prepared to move forward and use force.Q:
Did the President talk about several ways to provoke a confrontation with Iraq?MR. McCLELLAN: I think I addressed that question when Ed asked his question. Go ahead.
Ummm...so what's the timeline for a war with Iran? Q: Scott, a two-part. I'd be very grateful if you could give us a clarification of the President's statement in Cleveland, "I made it clear, I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally, Israel." And my question:
This does not mean that we will withhold such military might until after Israel is nuclear-bombed, does it?MR. McCLELLAN: Well, Les, I think that if you're bringing up the issue relating to Iran and its pursuit of nuclear weapons, we are pursuing a diplomatic solution to that matter. I think you're jumping way ahead of things at this point --
Q: No, the clarification --
we will protect Israel, we won't wait until after they're bombed.MR. McCLELLAN: I don't think there's anything to clarify. The President has made that very clear before. They are a great friend and good ally, and the President --
Q:
So it will be before they are bombed. MR. McCLELLAN: -- has publicly expressed that view before.
Finally: The Naughty Bits. Q: Two months before the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6 to 3 in the case of Lawrence vs. Texas, laws against sodomy are unconstitutional,
Senator Rick Santorum told the AP, if the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual gay sex in your home, then you have the right to bigamy, incest, and adultery, you have the right to anything. And my question:
Does the President disagree with this Republican Senator and will he ask the Justice Department to oppose the pro-polygamy lawsuit, Bronson vs. Swenson, or not? MR. McCLELLAN: Les, you might want to check with the Justice Department on what involvement they may have in any particular case. I don't know about --
Q:
I want to know what the President -- does he agree with Santorum? MR. McCLELLAN: I think you've heard the President's views.
(Following these exchanges are about two pages of immigration reform discussion that I'll attempt to make sense of tomorrow. I'm tired. Happy reading! Remember:
All is well.)
