A smattering of links on Richard Clarke, both his testimony today and on the amusing attempts to discredit him.

Here is the transcript of his open testimony before the 9/11 Commission, starting on page 45. His opening statement was brief:

I welcome these hearings because of the opportunity that they provide to the American people to better understand why the tragedy of 9/11 happened and what we must do to prevent a reoccurance. I also welcome the hearings because it is finally a forum where I can apologize to the loved ones of the victims of 9/11. To them who are here in the room, to those who are watching on television, your government failed you, those entrusted with protecting you failed you and I failed you. We tried hard, but that doesn't matter because we failed. And for that failure, I would ask -- once all the facts are out -- for your understanding and for your forgiveness.

Here's the NYT recap of his testimony. Note that Judith "WMD" Miller has been kicked off the Clarke beat, with David Stout covering the testimony.

Next, Joe Conason interviews Clarke over at Salon. From the looks of his first response, regarding the nature of the administration's attacks against him since 60 Minutes, he knows what they're up to:

You said on "60 Minutes" that you expected "their dogs" to be set on you when your book was published, but did you think that the attacks would be so personal?

Oh yeah, absolutely, for two reasons. For one, the Bush White House assumes that everyone who works for them is part of a personal loyalty network, rather than part of the government. And that their first loyalty is to Bush rather than to the people. When you cross that line or violate that trust, they get very upset. That's the first reason. But the second reason is that I think they're trying to bait me -- and people who agree with me -- into talking about all the trivial little things that they are raising, rather than talking about the big issues in the book.

There's plenty more to read there, including that Clarke is a voting Republican (you can't register in Virginia) who voted for McCain in the 2000 primaries. He also addresses why the White House kept him on, takes down a McClellan strawman about 9/11, and provides some context to the now well-known "swatting flies" comment from Dubya:

Apparently on one occasion -- of all these many, many days when George Tenet mentioned the al-Qaida threat -- the president on one occasion said, "I want a strategy. I don't want to swat flies." Well, months or certainly weeks went by after that, and he didn't get his strategy because Condi Rice didn't hold the meeting necessary to approve it and give it to him. And yet George Bush appears not to have asked for it a second time.

Next, let's quickly deal with the Bushies' hail mary pass to try to discredit Clarke, in which they released a transcript of a background briefing from August 2002 in which Clarke appears to have fonder words for Bush's anti-terrorism strategy than he does in his book and his testimony, all 15-plus hours of it, counting his closed-door testimony. How do we deal with this? Initial reactions from the left blogosphere range from unfazed to concerned to quite disheartened. Well, let's go to the transcript! Starting bottom of page 55:

THOMPSON: Mr. Clarke, as we sit here this afternoon, we have your book and we have your press briefing of August 2002. Which is true?

CLARKE: Well, I think the question is a little misleading. The press briefing you're referring to comes in the following context: Time magazine had published a cover story article highlighting what your staff briefing talks about. They had learned that, as your staff briefing notes, that there was a strategy or a plan and a series of additional options that were presented to the national security adviser and the new Bush team when they came into office. Time magazine ran a somewhat sensational story that implied that the Bush administration hadn't worked on that plan. And this, of course, coming after 9/11 caused the Bush White House a great deal of concern. So I was asked by several people in senior levels of the Bush White House to do a press backgrounder to try to explain that set of facts in a way that minimized criticism of the administration. And so I did. Now, we can get into semantic games of whether it was a strategy, or whether it was a plan, or whether it was a series of options to be decided upon. I think the facts are as they were outlined in your staff briefing.

THOMPSON: Well, let's take a look, then, at your press briefing, because I don't want to engage in semantic games. You said, the Bush administration decided, then, you know, mid-January -- that's mid- January, 2001 -- to do 2 things: one, vigorously pursue the existing the policy -- that would be the Clinton policy -- including all of the lethal covert action findings which we've now made public to some extent. Is that so? Did they decide in January of 2001 to vigorously pursue the existing Clinton policy?


CLARKE: They decided that the existing covert action findings would remain in effect.

THOMPSON: OK. The second thing the administration decided to do is to initiate a process to look at those issues which had been on the table for a couple of years and get them decided. Now, that seems to indicate to me that proposals had been sitting on the table in the Clinton administration for a couple of years, but that the Bush administration was going to get them done. Is that a correct assumption?

CLARKE: Well, that was my hope at the time. It turned out not to be the case.

THOMPSON: Well, then why in August of 2002, over a year later, did you say that it was the case?

CLARKE: I was asked to make that case to the press. I was a special assistant to the president, and I made the case I was asked to make.

THOMPSON: Are you saying to be you were asked to make an untrue case to the press and the public, and that you went ahead and did it? MORE

CLARKE: No, sir. Not untrue. Not an untrue case. I was asked to highlight the positive aspects of what the administration had done and to minimize the negative aspects of what the administration had done. And as a special assistant to the president, one is frequently asked to do that kind of thing. I've done it for several presidents.

Sooooooo, how exactly does this damage Clarke's credibility in any way? He was working for the President, and the President asked him to give a briefing in a manner that would make the President's policies look good. If that doesn't pass your laugh test, then you're a damn hack. It's nearly incidental that Clarke was the one giving the briefing as opposed to Richard Armitage, Condi Rice, Hadley, whoever. (Yes, they have different roles in the White House, I know) Why doesn't it matter? Because since it was a "backgrounder" that means that they represent the White House views, and not necessarily those of Clarke. (thanks, Jonah!)

The short, simple version of all of this is that if one takes the view that every sound that emerges from Clarke's lips is applicable to whether or not he's a hypocrite, even if those words are spoken at the request of the Bush administration while he was a paid staff member within it being asked to spin, then congratulations, you got him. That seems somewhat similar to Ann Coulter's "direct quotes from within book reviews prove that the New York Times is anti-Semitic" theory as described in Franken's book.

Lastly, for a double-shot of reasons why Clarke should be believed, read these two Slate pieces from Fred Kaplan and Bill Saletan.

One parting comment: I've noticed that many of those the Bushies have sent out, "Fly monkeys fly!"-style, to attack Clarke's credibility and character (though not nearly as much his substance) have referred to him in the shortened form "Dick Clarke". Naturally, he's not this guy, and yes, Bush has a propensity for using nicknames for those that surround him. All that being said, is this some sort of subliminal campaign to subconsciously discredit Clarke in the eyes of the American people, by association? Eh...

UPDATE: Via Digby, there's this line from his testimony which I must have missed, due to the busy state of my house:

When asked in the hearings about whether it was moral to put the best face on an administration you work for when briefing the press, Clark said:

"I don't think it's a question of morality at all. I think it's a question of politics." [big applause]

Heh.