Maybe we should all chip in and get TV preacher Pat Robertson a gift basket or something, because his uncontrollable popping off on CNN Tuesday night threw the Bush gang wildly off message yesterday. (Insert Nelson Muntz’s “ha, ha” here)
It was a golden opportunity that the Kerry campaign was quick to seize on.
Mike McCurry, adviser to the Kerry campaign, said: “We believe President Bush should get the benefit of the doubt here, but he needs to come forward and answer a very simple question — was Pat Robertson telling the truth when he said he didn’t think there’d be any casualties or is Pat Robertson lying?”
It didn’t take long for reporters to start wondering the same thing. All three of Bush’s top spokespersons didn’t hesitate to throw Robertson aside and brand him a liar.
* Karen Hughes: “I don’t believe that happened. He must have misunderstood or misheard it.”
* Scott McClellan: “Of course, the president never made such a comment.”
* Karl Rove said, “I was right there” for Bush’s Feb. 10, 2003 meeting with Robertson, but that the televangelist was incorrect in his recollection.
The truly hilarious part was seeing Robertson release a statement on the controversy in which he refused to back down.
In a statement yesterday, Robertson did not back away from his comments about Bush and said, “I emphatically stated that I believe ‘the blessing of heaven is upon him,’ and I am persuaded that he will win this election and prevail on the war against terror.”
That’s fascinating, Pat, but in case you hadn’t noticed, that’s not the point of the controversy.
The national press was, thankfully, all over this, with every major daily running a story about the controversy today. It might be a challenge to get yet another day out of this, but there’s still one more question an enterprising political reporter might ask.
Yesterday confirmed that Bush and Robertson did meet on Feb. 10 and their discussion did, apparently, include discussion of Iraq. With this in mind, here’s the question someone should ask McClellan/Hughes/Rove: Why was the president meeting with a crazed TV preacher and discussing a military invasion strategy a month before the U.S. went to war?