Clark Wars I: The Phantom Clenis

Well, they're already at it:

WHEN WILL Wesley Clark stop telling tall tales? In the current issue of Newsweek, Howard Fineman reports Clark told Colorado Gov. Bill Owens and University of Denver president Mark Holtzman that "I would have been a Republican if Karl Rove had returned my phone calls."

Unfortunately for Clark, the White House has logged every incoming phone call since the beginning of the Bush administration in January 2001. At the request of THE DAILY STANDARD, White House staffers went through the logs to check whether Clark had ever called White House political adviser Karl Rove. The general hadn't. What's more, Rove says he doesn't remember ever talking to Clark, either.

Unfortunately for Mr. Continetti, the blogosphere is all over this. As pretty much anyone who stops here to read no doubt knows already, Clark was joking. (Look at his stands on the issues. Yeah, Rove'd love Clark.) The claim that this was serious comes from Owens and Holtzman. So basically, the White House has proved that they have a problem with reality, not General Clark.

As other bloggers have noted, the real question here is when the administration started having a more open policy regarding White House information, given how much trouble the bloody GAO has had dragging paperwork out of Cheney regarding his (blatantly corrupt) "Energy Task Force" meetings. Rove's talking points are trying to leak out as "news," but his Keystone Korps of press agents are trampling them to death in their panic over Clark's strong showing. (Hint: Clark is already beating Bush in polls.

A couple of other quick rebuttals based on this "article's" accusations:

Last June, the latest Democratic candidate for president implied that he "got a call" on 9/11 from "people around the White House" asking the general to publicly link Saddam Hussein to the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

This sentence construction creates an outright lie. What Clark said was that "people around the White House" were spreading the false "Saddam was behind 9/11" meme, and he "got a call" from a Canadian think-tank that asked him to back that on CNN. Which Continetti knows the source of:

While it turns out Clark did receive a call "on either Sept. 12 or Sept. 13," the call wasn't from the White House. It was from Israeli-Canadian Middle East expert Thomas Hecht, who told the Toronto Star that he called to invite Clark to give a speech in Canada.

So Mr. Continetti's quote combination above is, basically, a deliberate lie. Or unimaginably incompetent, take your pick.

Finally, there's this gem of skilled reporting:

As for Clark's accusation that the White House tried to have him fired from CNN--well, the general admits he has no proof. "I've only heard rumors about it," he said.

Pretty damning, huh? Except he writes it so that the "admission" seems like it came later. Here's the full quote from the interview in question:

"The White House actually back in February apparently tried to get me knocked off CNN and they wanted to do this because they were afraid that I would raise issues with their conduct of the war," Clark told Newsradio 620 KTAR. "Apparently they called CNN. I don't have all the proof on this because they didn't call me. I've only heard rumors about it."

Shocking! That anyone could possibly accuse Resident Bush of such a thing!

Rick Blaine: How can you close me up? On what grounds?
Captain Louis Renault: I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!
[A croupier hands Renault a pile of money]
Croupier: Your winnings, sir.
Captain Louis Renault: [sotto voce] Oh, thank you very much. [aloud] Everybody out at once!

The attack dogs are after Clark already. Fortunately, they've started by biting each other.

(/) Roland X
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