January 19, 2006 by lonbud

If A Tree Falls In The Forest

Apparently, the White House has reached the denial phase of its 12 step journey toward a better place for us all.

Press Secretary Scott McClellan today professed a complete lack of knowledge of U.S. government-ordered and executed renditions of private citizens to places like Syria and Egypt — where the loosest standards of tortuous interrogation routinely apply.

Told by reporters that U.S. renditions to Syria had been “well publicized,” McClellan sneered, “What, by bloggers?”

In fact, stories about U.S. renditions to Syria have been published by the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Associated Press and the New Yorker. The president’s widely known eschewal of printed matter appears to have infected even his own liason to the press.

Among other liasons, embattled Republican Senator Rick Santorum, not long ago one of his party’s leading lights and most aggressive proslytizers for a new morality, came down with an epic case of amnesia this week when confronted with boastful things he once said about the now-disgraced Jack Abramoff and his personal backdoor route to Congress, “K Street.”

“I don’t know what you mean by Senate liaison to the quote, ‘K Street Project,'” Santorum told reporters Tuesday. “I’m not aware of any Senate liaison job that I do for the K Street Project.”

Mr. Santorum has been joined by droves of Republicans on Capitol Hill seekeing to wish memory of their dealings with Mr. Abramoff into the cornfield.

While the spin has been to try and describe Mr. Abramoff as an equal-opportunity fixer, he himself gave direct cash contributions exclusively to Republicans, and the entire body of his lobbying “work” was in service of Republican interests and Republican causes.

The stench of fear runs all the way to the carpeted hallways of the White House.

Asked last week if the Executive branch would be making available logs of Mr. Abramoff’s comings and goings in the White House, Mr. McClellan promised reporters a “thorough report.”

Released on Tuesday, the report was that during Mr. Bush’s tenure as the nation’s Chief Executive, Mr. Abramoff has attended two Hannuka parties and an unnamed number of “staff-level” meetings.

Mr. McClellan declined to address questions as to who else attended such meetings and what subjects were discussed, but he reassured the nation that “if you bring something to my attention … I’ll be glad to look into it. If you’ve got something specific, I’ll be glad to take a look into it.”

Asked pointedly if Mr. Abramoff had met with presidential cornerman Karl Rove, Mr. McClellan averred, “We don’t — we don’t ever tend to get into those staff-level meetings.”

My guess is the appropriate soundtrack for the moment could well be a song from the Rolling Stones’ album, Black and Blue:

“I’m on the run, I hear the Hounds
My luck is up, the chips are down
So good bye, baby, so long now
Wish me luck I’m gon’ need it child.”