There's nothing terribly surprising about the revelations contained in Scott McClellan's memoir of his time in the White House--Bush displayed a "lack of inquisitiveness"; the administration operated in a "permanent campaign mode"; the Iraq war "was not necessary"--other than that McClellan's chosen to reveal them.
But is that even really that surprising? Put aside the fact that McClellan has ample personal reasons for writing a harsh book about the Bush White Hosue (two of those reasons are named Rove and Libby). Writing a harsh tell-all memoir of the Bush years is just good business sense at this point. You only need to look back at the anemic sales of Ari Fleischer's rosy, no-tell memoir of his White House years to realize that--and Fleischer's low-seller came out at a time when Bush's approval rating was higher than 28 percent.
So kudos to McClellan. His book displays a calculating mind that was never much in evidence in the White House press room.
P.S. More kudos to McClellan for his choice of title, What Happened. I've long maintained that Fred Willard's TV announcer in Best In Show was doing a spot-on impersonation of Chris Matthews. But now,thanks to McClellan, I realize that Willard's talent manager in A Mighty Wind is actually a thinly veiled send-up of our president.
--Jason Zengerle