Guess what Bush toad is advising Tiger Woods, MLB, Mark McGwire, Green Bay Packers ,etc.

[Are_grits_groceries]

Ari Fleischer's Empire State Of Mind
The former White House operative has a plan to make the sports world spin round

Last week's revelation that Fleischer would serve as one of the orchestrators of Tiger Woods's comeback had the ring of inevitability, though two days earlier, in a broad interview with SI, Fleischer declined to acknowledge any relationship with Woods. "If he comes out and wins tournaments, wins the Masters, he's back," Fleischer did say. "If he plays poorly, people are going to say, 'He's lost his game, he's lost his ferocity.' They're going to blame it on what he did."

When Fleischer—who cut a polarizing figure as the Bush administration's mouthpiece for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq— left the White House in 2003, he said, "I want to do something more relaxing, like dismantle live nuclear weapons." Shortly after his departure, he received a cold call from Sandy Montag, a media agent at IMG. There was a place in sports for a politically connected, battle-tested media consultant, they agreed, but it took time to convince sports' gatekeepers that Fleischer's skills translated. That changed, however, in 2005, when Congress held the steroids hearing during which McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Rafael Palmeiro famously stumbled and mumbled. Says Fleischer, "None of them were prepared, and their answers weren't good." The next day Fleischer was asked by Bud Selig, dismayed by the image hit his sport had taken, to come to Milwaukee for a meeting. Thus began a four-year contractual relationship as an MLB consultant.

By 2007 he'd established Ari Fleischer Sports Communications, a 50-50 partnership with IMG. In addition to MLB, the business has included such clients as the Green Bay Packers, a NASCAR team and the BCS. When McGwire and Fleischer agreed to work together, their first exercise was role-playing, Fleischer asking questions and McGwire answering, then Fleischer explaining the likely follow-up. Fleischer insisted on an interview with Bob Costas, on the MLB Network, a sometimes pressing exchange McGwire, contrary to popular belief, says went "wonderfully." Adds McGwire, "I can't thank Ari enough. And I hope I never need him again."

Did Fleischer regret McGwire's insistence that he used steroids only to recover from injury, not for performance enhancement? "Even if he said, 'I took steroids to aid performance,' he'd have had the same amount of criticism," Fleischer said in his interview with SI. "The bottom line was he came clean."
<snip>
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1167379/index.htm

That's why McGwire kept inanely insisting that steroids didn't help him except to recover from injury. Hey Ari, I think he sounded clueless and disingenuous.
So when I hear somebody say something, I will look for the mark of a cloven hoof. You can bet they will NEVER admit they did anything wrong.

[tanyev]

1. Ari loves to tell people to watch what they say, watch what they do.