| I almost always agree with MoveOn... but not this time. I just received an e-mail from MoveOn.org stating: "Coming clean is admirable. But McClellan shouldn't profit off the role he played in our nation's largest foreign policy blunder."
The message explains that there are laws preventing criminals from profiting by selling their stories and argues that McClellan should, therefore, not make profits from his bestseller book exposing what went on inside the Bush administration. On this point, I disagree with MoveOn's position. We commonly grant immunity to criminals to testify against larger, more important criminals. Such is the case with McClellan’s book. I am perfectly willing to incentivize him to expose the illegal, incompetent, and dishonest actions of his bosses in the Whitehouse. I wish more “high-ranking underlings” would do the same. The more the public is educated about the Bush administration's lies, crimes, and incompetence, the better off we all will be—and hopefully, the less likely we, as a people, will be so led like lemmings by liars in the future. Whether McClellan was simply caught up in the current or actively complicit in the administration's blunders, I won't speculate but it's far better to have it all exposed than not. It is naive to believe that high-ranking officials will "come clean" and spend the time an energy necessary to so clearly document their story simply because its the right thing to do. Book royalties are a small price to pay. |