The Liberal Patriot

Dissecting McClellan Speak – Press Conference May 26, 2004

J.G. Schwam May 30, 2004

It’s been said that facts are stupid things. They need no explanation. They stand alone un- confounded in their simplicity. But aha, they are dangerous things. They open doors, they represent a chance at truth. That is their danger. But unlike facts, questions unanswered do not stand alone. They are often confounded by the skillful. The master at the art of confounding even the simplest, gutsiest straightforward question, the ones that just bleed for answers is White House spokesman Scott McClellan. Dissected however McClellan’s answers or so called facts end up as a what the, or a huh?

White House Press Briefing May 26, 2004

Q: Scott, I'd like to ask a question on a different subject. The New York Times says that the prison abuses have been much more widespread than acknowledged by this government -- 37 deaths of inmates. I want to know why the President doesn't give a worldwide order to all of our military prisons that we should abide by the Geneva Accords. And I have a follow-up.

A: MR. McCLELLAN: Well, first of all, the President made it very clear that the Geneva Conventions do apply in Iraq

You mean Bush has had an epiphany? He has decided that humanity towards men is more Christian than torture? Wow, perhaps he should explain this to his lawyer and one time Supreme Court nominee Alberto Gonzalez. In January 2002 Gonzalez presented his boss with a memo that advocated determining that the USA should withdraw from the world court treaty because deciding to opt out of respecting the Geneva conventions in Guantanamo, a policy later applied Iraq would expose US officials, including the president to war crimes trials.

In the memo the White House lawyer focused on a little known 1996 law passed by Congress, known as the War Crimes Act, that banned any Americans from committing war crimes—defined in part as "grave breaches" of the Geneva Conventions. Noting that the law applies to "U.S. officials" and that punishments for violators "include the death penalty," Gonzales told Bush that "it was difficult to predict with confidence" how Justice Department prosecutors might apply the law in the future. This was especially the case given that some of the language in the Geneva Conventions—such as that outlawing "outrages upon personal dignity" and "inhuman treatment" of prisoners—was "undefined."

Oh darn that’s why the president decided torture is bad? The threat of execution in The Hague, and you thought he may have remembered the part in the bible about thou shalt not kill. Perhaps the president should read the words of the prolific Christian theologian Francis M. Klug

“God is The Creator and The Judge. Men do not have the right to kill another human being, whether it be to take his life, his will, his dignity, his skill, his mind, his hope, his trust, his integrity. Men can be depleted of physical energy, emotional control and spiritual strength by another man's lack of self-discipline, emotional instability, greed, hate, lust, anger, lack of charity. To kill is to rob man of the great privilege reserved for God alone. Only God has the right to judge when the physical must end."

Lest we forget, on January 28, 2002 in the White Press breifing of this day two days after Gonzalez’s memo was released Ari Fleisher said, and they're being treated well, because that's what Americans do, referring to the prisoners at Guantanamo.

Q Scott, since you're not raising the terror alert, should we assume that the threat is not as serious as it has been in the past when you have raised the alert?

In the same May 26, 2004 press briefing Mc Clellan said, which I think the Attorney General will talk about here shortly -- put a task force in place to look at this serious threat period and take steps to make sure that we are coordinating our efforts to stop something from happening in the first place. A task force Scott, isn’t a bit late for that?

Ashcroft later that same day said, the terrorists intend "to hit the United States hard." Ashcroft also said “the FBI has created a 2004 threat task force "to focus on this developing threat over this summer and fall period”. In other words the American people are supposed to find these terrorist suspects buying Marlboro’s in a 7-11 while they study the problem. We thought we had an FBI or god forbid a competent military intelligence organization to help us with that?

McClellan said, we are ramping up efforts in the homeland to prevent attacks from happening. This begs the question what in the name of great Caesar’s ghost have you been doing for the last three years, ramping up?

In the absence of honesty and when protection of the guilty is all that is left to retain power there is always Scott MClellen, on the front lines, to defend the Bush administration’s circular obfuscatory rhetoric.

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