Gonzo’s apparent lie explained
The White House has tortured themselves with this explanation.
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From RS:
The Bush administration has responded to a Republican senator’s request for information about Alberto Gonzales’s conflicting testimony on a secret surveillance program but not by a 12 p.m. Tuesday deadline, CNN reported.
Sen. Arlen Specter, the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, still is waiting for a requested response from Gonzales himself, which had yet to be delivered Tuesday night, he told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer in an interview Tuesday afternoon.
The letter Specter received from Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell seeks to clarify earlier testimony from Gonzales in which he said there was not “serious disagreement” among administration officials over a classified National Security Agency surveillance program. (more…)
The longer the Bush Administration is able to string out this Gonzo stuff, the longer it is before the Democrats and the press set their sights on the next target. Gonzales is dead in the water with no remaining credibility. None. But he is still in office, bleeding. As long is there is one wounded shark in the water, people are going to feed on him with all of their attention. There isn’t any further cost to the Bush Administration, and there is only benefit, by slow-playing this one.
Gotta agree with desertbug on this one - though, unfortunately, I think we do need to keep at Gonzo until he’s gone. He may be a distraction, but he’s a distraction that can screw up too many important things - worse than he already has.
I loved Olbermann’s take on this one, though - that basically the administration is claiming that Gonzo didn’t lie because they’re talking about the Terrorist Surveillance Program and at the time of the incident in question, it wasn’t yet called that. Same program, different name. Yeah, that makes all the difference, isn’t it?
Feh!