Bush administration: "Mostly free of scandal"

David Gergen checks in from Mars.

Published March 8, 2007 1:58PM (EST)

Breaking news: Since January 2001, former presidential advisor and political pundit David Gergen has been living on another planet.

OK, so we don't have firsthand knowledge of that -- really, how could we? -- but we don't have any other way of explaining what Gergen said during a CNN segment on the Scooter Libby verdicts Wednesday. To wit: "This is an administration that has been mostly free of scandal over the last six years and now they have the taint that they cannot erase."

Maybe they don't have ducks on ponds or implements for shooting them wherever it is that Gergen has been residing of late. So as a little "welcome home" gift, we thought it would be nice to provide him a sort of cheat sheet to use the next time he addresses his fellow earthlings.

Where to begin? Oh, right, at the beginning:

The 2000 election. Katherine Harris. Bush v. Gore. Halliburton. The Aug. 6, 2001, presidential daily briefing. Jack Abramoff. David Safavian. Ken Tomlinson. The manipulation of terror alerts. The suppression of science on global warming. The case for war in Iraq. The Downing Street memo. Ohio in 2004. Voting machines. Claude Allen. Jeff Gannon. The lack of planning for "postwar" Iraq. Dusty Foggo. Katrina. Michael Brown. Enron. Wiretaps. Bank records surveillance. The $8.8 billion that went missing in Iraq. The neglect of wounded soldiers. The politicization of the Justice Department.

We're just getting warmed up here, but there are only so many hours in Earth's day. Please add your own contributions in the comments section below. We know that you're busy too, but our man Gergen plainly needs all the help we can spare.


By Tim Grieve

Tim Grieve is a senior writer and the author of Salon's War Room blog.

MORE FROM Tim Grieve


Related Topics ------------------------------------------

War Room