Power Line has an excellent post on the non-scandal "scandals" of the Bush administration.
The catalyst for the post is Eleanor Clift's "column" (she's such a hack these days it's impossible to put her writing in the same category with regular columnists), in which she says:
With an unpopular war, scandals consuming the White House and a two-party system paralyzed by partisanship, voters are looking for an outsider, somebody who’s not tainted by politics as usual.
But as John points out, there are scandals and "scandals," and virtually everything liberals think are scandals are actually "scandals."
The only thing in the Bush administration that has come close to being a real scandal was the Scooter Libby trial, and even that is questionable, given that no law was broken. Everything else falls into the "scandal" category, which really means mud-slinging by Democrats that they hope will stick.
--Firing eight--eight!--presidential appointments! How mind-boggling!
--The lionizing of Jessica Lynch: It turns out that this isn't so much a White House scandal as a media scandal. Transforming Lynch into Rambo was more the fault of the Congressional delegation of West Virginia (completely Democrat but for one) than some sort of sham from the president.
--Pat Tillman: The initial report from the ground stated Tillman was killed by an enemy combatant, but, as has been stated in many places, initial reports are notoriously unreliable. The mistake was corrected and the family informed of the truth in a month. That's not a coverup. That's about as fast as any mistake gets corrected.
John goes on to explain that these "scandals" are designed to do nothing but sully the Bush reputation.
These "scandals" obviously have no legs, but that isn't the point. Waxman has already moved on to a new one, issuing subpoenas to Condoleezza Rice and George Tenet to testify about Saddam's efforts to obtain uranium. And so it goes. Waxman hasn't even gotten to 2005 yet; he can keep this going through the rest of the Bush administration, and his committee is only one of many.
The purpose of these faux "investigations" of faux "scandals" is to further sully the image of President Bush, and to allow liberal reporters and pundits like Eleanor Clift to write that the White House is "consumed by scandals." The fact that there isn't a genuine scandal in the bunch goes unremarked.
Why point out the truth if you are a liberal? The truth doesn't help you.
|