November 28, 2005

Guess The Source

Here's the first in an occasional On Call series....

Guess the source.

We want your opinion: who burbles up these juicy quotes, and why? For the comments section, informed, polite speculation preferred, please. Anonymous, insider guesses can be sent directly to your editor.

Today's entry comes from one of the most well-connected reporters in Washington, The New York Daily News' bureau chief Tom DeFrank, whose access to the inner circles of President Bush's senior staff is almost legendary.

On Sunday, DeFrank and Ken Bazinet co-bylined a piece asserting that West Wing aides were victims of bunker mentalities.

"'We're just plodding along,' admitted a senior Bush aide from deep within the West Wing bunker. 'It's up to the President to turn things around now.'

"For the moment, Bush has dismissed discreetly offered advice from friends and loyalists to fire Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and bring back longtime confidant Karen Hughes from the State Department to shore up his personal White House staff."

"'He thinks that would be an admission he's screwed up, and he can't bring himself to do that,' a former senior staffer lamented."

"A card-carrying member of the Washington GOP establishment with close ties to the White House recently encountered several senior presidential aides at a dinner and came away shaking his head at their' no problems here' mentality."

"'There is just no introspection there at all,' he said in exasperation. "It is everybody else's fault - the press, gutless Republicans on the Hill. They're still in denial."

Posted at 09:18 AM

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