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McClellan backs some of Obama’s agenda

NEW YORK (CNN) — Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, whose tell-all book blasts the Bush administration on issues including Hurricane Katrina, the election and the Iraq war, didn’t say Friday whether he still considers himself a Republican.

But he did say he supports parts of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama’s agenda.

Some of what Obama says, his overall message, is very similar to the one we ran on in 2000 about changing the way Washington works and what I had so much hope in, said McClellan, who became the White House press secretary in 2003 after serving as spokesman for President Bush when he was the governor of Texas.

But it’s a very difficult thing to do, and I hope some of the Obama staff will take a look at [McClellan’s book] and consider what they need to do if they become president.

McClellan also said he has a lot of respect for presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain.

In his 341-page book, What Happened, McClellan writes that Bush and his advisers favored a propaganda campaign to the truth in the days leading up to the Iraq invasion. Read excerpts from the book

McClellan also claims that key Bush aides intentionally misled him on major stories and that the administration’s botched handling of the Hurricane Katrina aftermath was the defining moment of Bush’s second term.

In an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, McClellan — who has faced withering criticism from the White House and other Bush allies since his book was released — declined to answer directly when asked if he still considers himself a Republican.

Well, you know, there are things I like about the Republicans, Republican ideas, and there are Democrat ideas I like, he said.

I’ve not made a decision in terms of the presidential election, he added. I’m someone who believes in centrist governing philosophy. And that’s what the president believed in as governor, but as president he moved too far to the right too often.

Earlier Friday, McClellan said he would be willing to comply with a possible congressional subpoena to discuss the administration’s handling of prewar intelligence, telling CNN’s Wolf Blitzer he’d be glad to share his views if asked to testify.

Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Florida, said Friday that McClellan, who left the White House in 2006, would be able to provide valuable insight into a number of issues under investigation by the House Judiciary Committee.

The committee is looking into the use of prewar intelligence, whether politics was behind the firing of eight U.S. attorneys in 2006 and the leaking of CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity, Wexler, a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, said.

In the book, McClellan says President Bush told him he had authorized the leaking of Plame’s identity to the press. Watch Wexler call for McClellan to testify

Facing a firestorm over his book, McClellan also confirmed reports Friday that he apologized to Richard Clarke for questioning his honesty after the former counterterrorism official published his own book critical of the White House.

I don’t expect we’ll have a conversation [with Bush] any time soon, he said. I don’t need to ask forgiveness from him. My comments are sincere and honest and absolutely the truth from my perspective.

Speaking with Cooper, McClellan responded to one of the harshest criticisms he faced this week, from former senator and Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole.

Dole reportedly sent McClellan an e-mail saying every presidential administration has miserable creatures like you … who don’t have the guts to speak up or quit if there are disagreements with the boss or colleagues.

The message accuses McClellan of reveling in the attention he received at the White House then cashing in with his book.

I have great respect for Sen. Dole — he’s a great public servant and someone who has served in the military as well and someone who actually did try to work across the aisle with Democratic leaders at times, back before things got so bitterly partisan in Washington, D.C., McClellan said.

But I would encourage him to see what I say in the book before he makes those comments.

found here.

McClellan backs some of Obama’s agenda

NEW YORK (CNN) — Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, whose tell-all book blasts the Bush administration on issues including Hurricane Katrina, the election and the Iraq war, didn’t say Friday whether he still considers himself a Republican.

But he did say he supports parts of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama’s agenda.

Some of what Obama says, his overall message, is very similar to the one we ran on in 2000 about changing the way Washington works and what I had so much hope in, said McClellan, who became the White House press secretary in 2003 after serving as spokesman for President Bush when he was the governor of Texas.

But it’s a very difficult thing to do, and I hope some of the Obama staff will take a look at [McClellan’s book] and consider what they need to do if they become president.

McClellan also said he has a lot of respect for presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain.

In his 341-page book, What Happened, McClellan writes that Bush and his advisers favored a propaganda campaign to the truth in the days leading up to the Iraq invasion. Read excerpts from the book

McClellan also claims that key Bush aides intentionally misled him on major stories and that the administration’s botched handling of the Hurricane Katrina aftermath was the defining moment of Bush’s second term.

In an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, McClellan — who has faced withering criticism from the White House and other Bush allies since his book was released — declined to answer directly when asked if he still considers himself a Republican.

Well, you know, there are things I like about the Republicans, Republican ideas, and there are Democrat ideas I like, he said.

I’ve not made a decision in terms of the presidential election, he added. I’m someone who believes in centrist governing philosophy. And that’s what the president believed in as governor, but as president he moved too far to the right too often.

Earlier Friday, McClellan said he would be willing to comply with a possible congressional subpoena to discuss the administration’s handling of prewar intelligence, telling CNN’s Wolf Blitzer he’d be glad to share his views if asked to testify.

Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Florida, said Friday that McClellan, who left the White House in 2006, would be able to provide valuable insight into a number of issues under investigation by the House Judiciary Committee.

The committee is looking into the use of prewar intelligence, whether politics was behind the firing of eight U.S. attorneys in 2006 and the leaking of CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity, Wexler, a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, said.

In the book, McClellan says President Bush told him he had authorized the leaking of Plame’s identity to the press. Watch Wexler call for McClellan to testify

Facing a firestorm over his book, McClellan also confirmed reports Friday that he apologized to Richard Clarke for questioning his honesty after the former counterterrorism official published his own book critical of the White House.

I don’t expect we’ll have a conversation [with Bush] any time soon, he said. I don’t need to ask forgiveness from him. My comments are sincere and honest and absolutely the truth from my perspective.

Speaking with Cooper, McClellan responded to one of the harshest criticisms he faced this week, from former senator and Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole.

Dole reportedly sent McClellan an e-mail saying every presidential administration has miserable creatures like you … who don’t have the guts to speak up or quit if there are disagreements with the boss or colleagues.

The message accuses McClellan of reveling in the attention he received at the White House then cashing in with his book.

I have great respect for Sen. Dole — he’s a great public servant and someone who has served in the military as well and someone who actually did try to work across the aisle with Democratic leaders at times, back before things got so bitterly partisan in Washington, D.C., McClellan said.

But I would encourage him to see what I say in the book before he makes those comments.

found here.

Congressman wants McClellan to testify under oath

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Former Bush spokesman Scott McClellan should testify under oath on Capitol Hill about his explosive new book in which he sharply criticizes his old boss, a Democratic congressman said Friday.

Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Florida, said McClellan, who served as the president’s press secretary before leaving the White House in 2006, would be able to provide valuable insight into a number of issues that the House Judiciary Committee is investigating.

McClellan said Friday that he would be willing to testify.

The committee is looking into the use of prewar intelligence, whether politics was behind the firing of the firing of eight U.S. attorneys in 2006 and the leaking of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson’s identity, Wexler said.

The administration has always called for different kinds of privileges to avoid their officials testifying, but because Mr. McClellan has put all this information in a book, these privileges, I do not believe, would be available to the administration, so we would have a free flow of information, Wexler said. Watch Wexler call for McClellan to testify

Wexler is a senior member of the Judiciary Committee.

As White House spokesman, McClellan defended Bush’s policies during much of the war in Iraq, the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the scandal that followed the leak of Plame Wilson’s identity.

He said Thursday that the latter episode was a defining moment that caused me to become dismayed and disillusioned with the way things were going in Washington, D.C.

In the book, McClellan said he was specifically lied to about White House staff members’ involvement in the leaking of Plame Wilson’s identity, including former Bush adviser Karl Rove and Lewis Scooter Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff.

Libby was convicted of lying to investigators and a grand jury about his involvement in the CIA leak case. Bush commuted his sentence.

McClellan also wrote that Bush told him that he had authorized the leaking of Plame Wilson’s identity to the press.

McClellan said he would would be happy to appear before Congress about how the CIA operative’s identity was leaked.

I’m glad to share my views, McClellan said. I think I’ve made them very clear in the book. … Essentially everything I know on that leak episode is written in the book — what I was told by Karl Rove and Scooter Libby.

When I was knowingly misled but only learned that much later, that’s really when I started to become disillusioned at the White House.

Bush spokeswoman Dana Perino, however, said Friday that the White House says it could invoke executive privilege and prevent McClellan from testifying before the committee, but it has not decided whether to do so. Watch the White House slam McClellan’s book

The law would allow for that, Perino said, but by saying that I am not suggesting that’s what would happen or not.

We don’t have a formal request yet, she said. It’s not a decision we would make prior to getting a formal request.

But Wexler said that any White House claims of executive privilege would be invalid because McClellan had put much of the information in the public domain with book and multiple television appearances. Explore other insider accounts of the Bush White House

McClellan’s new memoir, What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception, is scheduled for publication Monday. In it he says the administration became mired in propaganda and political spin and played loose with the truth at times. Read excerpts from the book

McClellan will appear in CNN’s Situation Room at 6 p.m. Friday.

In his book, McClellan wrote that President Bush decided to go war with Iraq shortly after the September 11 attacks and then ordered his aides to make the arguments for it.

I think very early on, a few months after September 11, he made a decision that we’re going to confront Saddam Hussein, and if Hussein doesn’t come fully clean, then we’re going to go to war. There was really no flexibility in his approach, McClellan said on NBC’s Today show Thursday, referring to the former Iraqi dictator. Then it was put on the advisers: How do we go about implementing this; how do we go about doing this? Watch a former colleague challenge McClellan’s claims

found here.

Marietta college

Shades of Destin drains Rogers Home and Pool Service :

mike stoltz knocked in five runs to lead shades of destin in a 23-5 win outstanding rogers expert in and jackpot service in the men’s division iii softball league at morgan sports center in destin.stoltz was 4-in requital for-4 with a triple and three singles for five rbis.at the end of three innings, shades was up 15-5.jon creinin tripled and hit three singles for three rbis for shades.

National Get Outdoors Day: June 14

resident get outdoors light of day: june 14 the first-till doomsday national irk outdoors day is june 14 with strange events taking place in dozens of communities across the state to raise awareness all round the benefits of active later outdoors. to find alibi more about planned events, or to name a orientation inasmuch as an event, please affect www.getoutdoorsusa.org.

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DNA taken from FLDS ‘prophet’ in criminal probe

SAN ANGELO, Texas (CNN) — Texas authorities say they have collected DNA swabs from jailed polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs in connection with a criminal investigation involving spiritual marriages to girls as young as 12.

The samples were collected Thursday from Jeffs, the 52-year-old prophet of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said Jerry Strickland, spokesman for the Texas Attorney General’s Office.

A search warrant for the DNA alleges that Jeffs had so-called spiritual marriages with four girls, ages 12 to 15, The Associated Press reported.

The criminal investigation is separate from the ongoing custody case. Timeline

Earlier this week, photographs showing Jeffs with what appeared to be young girls surfaced as part of the custody case court file.

The Texas Supreme Court ruled Thursday that social workers overstepped their authority in rounding up more than 460 children from the Yearning for Zion ranch near Eldorado. A hearing in the custody case is scheduled later this afternoon.

Child Protective Services did not present sufficient evidence that children were being abused, the state’s highest court ruled, upholding a lower appeals court. We are not inclined to disturb the court of appeals’ decision, the high court said. On the record before us, removal of the children was not warranted.

The 6-3 ruling could clear the way for the children to be returned to their families.

Although it came in the case of 38 mothers who had appealed the removal of their children, attorneys in the case have said the reasoning can be applied to all the children taken in the April raid. Watch the sect’s spokesman demand the children back

It’s unlikely the children will be returned to their homes soon, because it’s unclear which child belongs to which parent. A DNA testing order by the district court is incomplete.

State officials have said the sect, with its polygamist beliefs, groomed young boys on the ranch to be abusers. FLDS members deny any sexual abuse at the ranch and claim that they are being persecuted because of their religion.

The district court said in its ruling that CPS did not demonstrate that all the children on the ranch faced imminent danger, as necessary for their removal.

CPS said it will work to reunite children covered under the ruling with their parents.

Jeffs, the sect’s 52-year-old prophet, is in a Utah prison, serving two consecutive terms of five years to life after being convicted on two charges of being an accomplice to rape in connection with a marriage he performed in 2001. He also faces trial in Arizona on eight charges, including sexual conduct with a minor, incest and conspiracy.

found here.