Truth? What is truth?


They've apparently never practiced it. Wasn't this administration supposed to bring honor back to the White House? And they impeach a president over one lie about a little (censored)?

Note also that this article does not actually detail the farrago of bullshit that surrounded the "Mission Accomplished" banner. First, it was all the ship, honoring the president, and the White House had nothing to do with it. Then, it was just the ship, saying that their mission was accomplished. Finally, the admission that the White House put it up, but it didn't mean that the Mission was actually Accomplished, just that Major Fighting had ended, or had been accomplished for the crew of the carrier, or some other nonsense.

Yahoo! News - White House Changes Story on Bush Plane Incident:
Wed Dec 3, 4:44 PM ET
By Randall Mikkelsen

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In another White House correction, the Bush administration on Wednesday changed its story of a British Airways pilot's spotting of Air Force One during the president's stealth trip to Iraq (news - web sites) last week.

The original story -- which held that the airline's pilot had talked to Air Force One and that he kept the secret of President Bush (news - web sites)'s Thanksgiving Day flight to Baghdad -- had been told by White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett to reporters as he sought to portray the drama of Bush's trip.

But after British Airways denied such a conversation took place, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said on Wednesday the airline's pilot never contacted Air Force One. 'The conversation was between the British Airways plane and the London control tower,' McClellan said.

It was also the London control tower, not an Air Force One pilot as in the original story, that misidentified Air Force One as a much smaller 'Gulfstream 5' aircraft, McClellan said.

He said Air Force One pilots overheard the conversation while flying over the west coast of England, and the British Airways plane could be identified by its call sign when it spoke to the tower.

McClellan declined to say whether Air Force One had sent a false electronic identification or whether controllers were in on the deception.

British Airways said it could not confirm the new account.

(snip)
The White House has come under criticism for backtracking on its account of other high profile events.

In October it conceded it had helped with a large "Mission Accomplished" banner on an aircraft carrier where Bush announced in May that major fighting had ended in Iraq.

Bush had initially said his advance team did not put up the banner, whose message critics viewed as premature given continued attacks on occupying forces in Iraq.

Also, the White House had initially said Bush needed to fly to the carrier on a jet because the vessel would be hundreds of miles offshore. But the administration later acknowledged that Bush decided on flying by jet, even through the carrier had ended up within easy helicopter range, because he wanted to share in the pilots' experience.

British Airways said it could not confirm the White House's new version of the Air Force One story. "We've had no reports from any of our pilots with regard to Air Force One," airline spokeswoman Honor Verrier said.

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