Wade Harkavy Reveals Truth About Doug Wead and The Tape Ploy

[DemBones DemBones]

Doug Wead, who selectively released furtively recorded conversations with George W. Bush, told me this morning that he has changed his mind and will turn over book profits to charity and the tapes to Bush.

Yesterday, in "The Zelig of the Religious Right," I wrote this about Wead's very selective release of only a small fraction of his tapes to the New York Times:
This latest "revelation" that George W. Bush is a flawed man of faith and prayer who is thoughtful is just more propaganda.

I said that Wead would never hurt Bush, that Wead "played" the Times. I can say this about Wead because I've written more about him than any other reporter on the planet. (See my 1992 stories about Wead's run for Congress in Arizona, two of which I posted Monday: "The Tangled Roots of Doug Wead" and "Doug Wead and the Bushes, Part II.")

more here:

http://www.villagevoice.com/blogs/bushbeat/archive/000736.php

[Cooley Hurd]

1. Letterman made a strange comment last night...

He said he heard "from a source in the WH" that the tape release was coordinated BY the WH. He didn't say or phrase it as a joke. Very strange...

[DemBones DemBones]

2. I'll be listening to Letterman later on Tivo so I'll keep an ear out for

that comment. He's been sticking in some real zingers here and there.

[cthrumatrix]

3. it was a WH "distraction" again...... Gannongate is tooooo close

[Demit]

4. It was always a ploy. Bush senior employed Wead...

to "study" his kids after he was elected. I got this bit from Amazon.com, from a review of Wead's last book:

" George W. Bush was warned in advance of the perils of being a president's son when his father was elected in 1988.

The elder Bush got aide Douglas Wead to study the pitfalls of being a White House child. The result was a 44-page report titled "All the President's Children."

The 2003 book was published on Presidents Day..."


It's a totally symbiotic relationship. Wead would never do anything to jeopardize his patrons. This is all theater.

[DemBones DemBones]

5. As Harkavy says

Let's stick to the tapes. If the tapes really caught George W. Bush "doing something right," that's fine. But what else is on the tapes, Doug? We'd love to hear the 90 percent that you haven't released. As I said before, the Times got played on this. But the Times often gets played these days. Look at Timeswoman Judith Miller's hype on WMD. (See Slate's Jack Shafer on that score, and go to this Bush Beat item from last March.)


Maybe a FEW people realized they'd voted for a former potsmoker/cokehead but most Bush** voters would have to be hit over the head to do so.