Um, Dana, Was There A Great Deal Of Poo-Flining When You Broke The News About Little Scottie To The Chimp?

Q I know that you said you weren’t going to be speaking anything more about McClellan, but could you give us a little sense of who told the President about it, when it occurred and any reaction he had?

MS. PERINO: Sure. Well, you will recall that it was last November, right before Thanksgiving when we first heard about the book, when the excerpt came out. I was with the President at the time and told him about it — we were at Camp David, right after an interview he had just finished.

And at that time, was led to believe that the excerpt was a little bit over-written and not necessarily representative of what the book would be like.

[snip]

So the President has been aware that it was going to come out. I talked to him a little bit yesterday — I can’t exactly remember where, but on the plane here — I guess it was on the plane; I don’t remember where we were on our way to, since we had three stops yesterday. And his reaction was similar to what I said this morning, which is he is puzzled, and he doesn’t recognize this as the Scott McClellan that he hired and confided in and worked with for so many years; and disappointed that if he had these concerns and these thoughts he never came to him or anyone else on the staff that we know of.

So I think it’s just a sad situation.

Q So you briefed him?

MS. PERINO: Yes, but I think I may not be the only one; we’ve known it’s been coming for a while, so I’m assuming that other members of senior staff had alerted him.

[snip]

Q I’m sorry if you said this, but was the President surprised?

MS. PERINO: I think you can fairly characterize it is as surprised, as well as he thinks it’s a sad situation and was disappointed, as I said just a moment ago.

Stay The Course!

Q I’m just kind of curious, in terms of the general — you’ve kind of portrayed this as a sad situation that you’re — you don’t quite understand this. But do you think this is causing any scrutiny on the White House as part of its own handling of the pre-war intelligence? I mean, is it causing any —

MS. PERINO: I think that horse has been beaten enough. And —

Q So the substance of what Scott is saying is not something that is causing any rethinking on the part of the White House?

MS. PERINO: I don’t see any reason for it to do so. As I said, the questions about the intelligence being wrong has been — have been asked an answered multiple times. And I think that I have had a good experience working both for Scott, for Tony Snow, and now heading up the press office, that I have good relationships with you all in the press corps, ones that are based on honesty and integrity. And I don’t think that it ever — I think that’s always been the case since I’ve been there. So I don’t see any reason for us to have to rethink anything at this point.

Dana Peroxide Says Little Scottie Is “Rewriting History”, But She Can’t Bring Herself To Call Him A Liar

Q The President often talks about, you know, history being the judge. And this is somebody who had a position where they could see more than, certainly, the public does. After some years of reflection, perhaps, looking back, thinking out of the limelight in private and everything, and coming up with his first version of history, isn’t it a concern that, for you, for the administration, that the conclusions he’s come to are the ones of your critics, essentially, rather than the supporters of the administration?

MS. PERINO: I think this is a unique situation. I don’t think that this is so much as writing history as rewriting history.

Dana Don’t Know!

Q If only to change the subject. Do you have anything on the vote on the cluster munitions?

MS. PERINO: The what?

Q The vote on the cluster munitions negotiations in Brussels, I think.

MS. PERINO: Where was — no, I’m sorry. Clearly, you can tell from my face I don’t know. I haven’t been informed about that.

Q Anything on —

MS. PERINO: Where was the vote?

Q What?

MS. PERINO: Where was the vote?

Q It was today, and it was in — I want to say Brussels, maybe The Hague.

MS. PERINO: Sorry, I don’t. I’ll have to refer you to DOD or State at the moment.