How's this for a plan? We pull the plug on ABC till somebody in authority comes forward and explains, "We told these lies because--"

You may recall that I was speculating a few days ago about how ABC's 9/11 mockumentary, after fabricating events designed to slime the Clinton administration, would "dramatize" the later failure of the Bush administration to heed the departing Clintonites' dire warnings about Al Qaeda, not to mention the Bushbrains' subsequent seemingly pathological refusal to give the tiniest attention to the threat.

Well, it turns out that the gang of committed far-right-wing propagandists ABC hired for this job did what they do best: They put their tiny Bush-licking brains together and lied for all they're worth.

Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus watched the whole bloody thing--brave soul!--and reports:

While it finds time to make up incidents involving Clinton administration officials, the docudrama leaves out the departing administration's repeated warnings to the Bush folks about the al-Qaeda threat.

Meanwhile, Bush is portrayed--without any factual basis--as responding aggressively to the famous "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." presidential daily briefing. "As a result of the August 6 Presidential Daily Briefing, the president is tired of swatting flies," then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice is shown telling senior administration officials just before the Sept. 11 attacks: "He believes al-Qaeda is a real threat, and he wants to consider real action. He specifically asked about the armed Predator."
In fact, the commission found, "The President told us the August 6 report was historical in nature"; it reported no significant response by Bush nor any inquiry about the Predator drones.

Now I haven't worked out all the legal technicalities, but then the Bush administration never seems to worry about legal technicalities, or laws in general, at least laws that it doesn't like. It strikes me, thought, that if you or I tried to get away with a stunt like this, we would be made to come clean somehow. I'm just saying ABC should have its plug pulled till somebody in authority steps forward and says, "We told these lies because--"

I don't think I'm suggesting anything unreasonable. I'm not asking the ABC people responsible for putting this cynically dishonest crap on the air to account for every single lie and misrepresentation. I'm not even going to be so prissy as to insist on a satisfactory or even wholly believable excuse. I'm just asking someone to make that simple statement: "We told these lies because--"

Far be it from me to put words in their mouth. I'm just speculating here, off the top of my head:

• "because it's what we do."

• "because Disney, our parent company, has a multitude of corporate interests that stand to profit (in the most literal sense) hugely from a friendly White House."

• "because we figured we could get away with it." (This raises the possibility that we might need some sort of referee or panel of judges--to make sure that the "answer" actually provides some sort of answer to the question of why they did it. In this case, for example, wouldn't they have to provide some explanation of why they wanted to get away with it?)

• "because George W. Bush has the most beautiful eyes we've ever seen."

• "because God told us to."

• "because Vice President Cheney told us to."

• "because it's what (the famously right-wing) Walt Disney would have wanted us to do."

• "because it's what Scrooge McDuck would have wanted us to do."

• "because it's what Mickey Mouse would have done."

• "because, being really not very bright, we allowed ourselves to be manipulated by a gang of cunning ideologues, and we had no idea--in fact we still don't have a clue."

By the way, Ruth Marcus provides the interesting reminder that ABC already has on its payroll the person who probably has the most comprehensive first-hand knowledge of both the Clinton and the Bush administration responses to the terrorist threat. Former counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke--in both administrations--is a consultant to ABC News. Not only was his expertise not tapped; his protests against the misrepresentations he became aware of were pointedly ignored, and he was in fact slimed himself in the production.

I'm just saying, the bastards should have to offer some kind of explanation.