One of our most common targets over the last two years has be White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan. Our position is that he has crossed the line from being a conduit of information into the realm of attacking and accusing critical journalists. His lies and misinformation on behalf of the administration are one thing, but smearing reporters with charges of anti-Americanism place him at odds with propriety. Despite his record, he remains personally popular with reporters assigned to the White House, (probably because he’s half a step less loathsome than was his predecessor Ari Fleischer) but that hardly explains this exchange:

Howard Kurtz: John Roberts, do you believe that Scott McClellan owes the press and the public an apology for his what turned out to be misleading denial in the CIA leak case?

John Roberts, CBS WH correspondent: Well, you know, Howie, I may be one of the people in the minority, but I think that he’s getting a really rough deal on this. You know, he doesn’t go out and freelance this stuff. He is given his talking points every morning. He is given his walking papers. And he goes out there and he tries to faithfully articulate whatever it is that the White House tells him.

Obviously in October of 2003, he got some pretty bad information. Is it his fault that he conveyed that information? I don’t think so. I think the people who are at fault are the ones at fault are the ones who gave him what now appears to be bad information.

Now, of course, McClellan could do what some people be might think to be the honorable thing and say, I’m not going to take this any more, I’m going to quit, but he has got a pretty good job by and large. He has got a mortgage, he has got a wife, probably a family coming down the road at some point, and I don’t think he wants to give up a lucrative job like that.

So I think that Scott — you know, I have known him for a number of years now. I have got a pretty good working relationship with him. I think that he is a truth-teller. I think he is a stand-up guy. And I just think that he was just told to carry somebody else’s water, and it just turned out that that water was foul.

Now, McClellan may well have been out of the loop with respect to Karl Rove and Scooter Libby‘s roles in the CIA leak case. Clinton press secretary Mike McCurry was famously left out of discussions concerning Monica Lewinsky, others have been more involved. Even if McClellan had no knowledge of any actions, he for years used his briefings to lead the press in one direction and on a dime, shifted to a strategy of “no comment.” With that, his credibility, already damaged by an endless stream of provable falsehoods, shed its last remaining fig leaf.

If McClellan was lied to, he should have enough pride walk away. Roberts’ excuses about mortgage, family, and salary are concerns to be sure, but McClellan doesn’t work at the White House in the most stressful job there because it pays well. He could easily make five times his salary in the private sector, and even if he couldn’t, he’s still living a lie. And if the latest chapter doesn’t prove it, nothing ever will.

During the October 31st White House press briefing, NBC‘s David Gregory made the following statement:

Whether there’s a question of legality, we know for a fact that there was involvement. We know that Karl Rove, based on what he and his lawyer have said, did have a conversation about somebody who Patrick Fitzgerald said was a covert officer of the Central Intelligence Agency. We know that Scooter Libby also had conversations.

McClellan’s response? Well, that depends on whether one is reading or watching.

The video of the briefing (as of this writing) is still hosted on the White House site (approx 5:30 in) and clearly, beyond any doubt, shows McClellan saying “That’s accurate” in response to Gregory. Yet the transcript reads:

MR. McCLELLAN: I don’t think that’s accurate.

Now McClellan might speak 50,000 words in any given week, and given that workload can certainly be excused a misstatement from time to time. But despite incontrovertible video evidence hosted on their own servers, McClellan refuses to avail himself of the option of claiming he misspoke and ending the controversy. On the contrary, his own spokesperson launched an offensive:

When asked about the fact that the White House version contradicts video accounts of the briefing, [White House press office spokeswoman Dana] Perino added, “the White House stenographer was in the room and I was in the room” and they heard McClellan say “I don’t think that’s accurate’.”

In addition, the White House Press Office has been pressuring transcript providers Congressional Quarterly and Federal News Service to change their versions, both of which agree with the video. McClellan’s silence is tantamount to a lie, and makes his resignation all the more necessary. He simply doesn’t possess the credibility needed to draw a federal government salary and speak (even for this) President.