If not for Dana Priest’s piece we would never have learned about the problems at Walter Reed, and if not for journalists in Iraq, we would still think the insurgency was in its last throes.

When an administration is as secretive as this one has been, and has made as many serious mistakes, it is only human nature to try to get to the bottom of a mess like this. Though they are political appointees, USA’s are taught to be above politics and follow the evidence in a case. In firing them, this administration continued its pattern of rewarding abject loyalty, and punishing those with the integrity to resist political pressure.

Were the administration not so irrational about this, better people would be fully behind them — the press have not been an asset to this nation in the past several years, but a leftist liability. Bush’s administration “kremlim” (as Dean describes it) is perfectly in order when the journalists are simply troublemaking Mongols who want information only to misuse it aggressively (in a political way).

It’s the open defiance against reasonable demands for information that has raised normal people’s eyebrows. The “not under oath” business is a red flag.

Oddly, though, I think at some point I can see the President’s view. Executives do need to consult without feeling that every word will be broadcast on CNN. I guess it goes back to Buckley’s the responsibility of privilege. By misusing the privilege, the Pres invites suspicion and minute scrutiny.

Dean is a very peculiar guy. It seems to me he seeks the limelight more than he seeks intellectual clarity.