McClellan denies Bush "returned early" to escape criticism

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

Bush originally was to return to the White House on Friday, after spending more than four weeks operating from his ranch. But after getting updates on the devastation, he decided to fly back to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to personally oversee a massive federal emergency assistance program.

"The president's preference is to manage the response efforts from Washington, and that's why he made the decision to return," said White House press secretary Scott McClellan.

Returning to Washington ahead of schedule also could insulate the president from criticism that he was on vacation during the crisis, and the return could be seen as a symbolic gesture to hurricane victims.

"I don't think that's necessarily the way to look at it," McClellan told reporters. "The devastation is enormous. The destruction and loss of life is very sobering. Our focus remains on saving lives and making sure that we're prioritizing the relief efforts to get assistance to those who are most in need right now."

http://www.salon.com/wire/ap/archive.html?wire=D8CAKQ1G1.html

[Richard Steele]

1. What can I say?

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Kurovski]

8. That may well be true, but without some clear proof,

documentation, photos, blueprints and folks turning states witness, your post is somewhat like the cyber equivalent of a street corner ranter.

Respectfully I say to you that just as with Al Capone, we will have to get BushCo on tax evasion instead of murder.

Just an analogy.

[LunaSea]

3. and then his pants burst into flame.....

liar...


Now...lisson to this chord...

[Kurovski]

4. Tough shit. Either way there's still plenty comin' at him.

[ET Awful]

5. Hey Scotty - here's a clue for you . . . he WAS on vacation.

That makes TWICE that your beloved Chimp was off doing publicity stunts (such as lying to old people about Medicare or reading books to kids) while major disasters were affecting huge chunks of the population.

The first time, the disaster happened because he abjectly failed at his duty to protect the nation, that's become obvious.

The second, he KNEW for a fact that there was a major disater in the works, instead of taking decisive action to protect the people who he knew would be affected and minimize the tragedy, he went to make political speeches to old people to try and gain support for his failed policies.

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. Then maybe Dimson should have returned to DC

on Sunday afternoon if he wanted to help manage the situation? Instead he went AWOL and was last seen partying with his new guitar in CA.

[Kurovski]

9. Can't you just see George serenading Jeff Gannon with that new guitar?

Forgive me, I'm a hopeless romantic.

[Maine-ah]

7. two days early does not equal cutting your vacation short

when you have taken a whole fucking month off.