Daily Kos :: Political Analysis and other daily rants on the state of the nation.

Daily Kos :: Political Analysis and other daily rants on the state of the nation.:
"At a White House press briefing Monday, Press Secretary Scott McClellan, pressed by reporters and with Afghan President Karzai in disagreement, retreated on claims that Newsweek's retracted story on Koran abuse cost lives in Afghanistan.
He also claimed that he had never said it did, even though a check of transcripts disputes that. On May 16, for example, he said, 'people have lost their lives.' On May 17, he said, 'People did lose their lives,' and, 'People lost their lives' due to the Newsweek report.
McClellan also stated, 'As I said last week, and as President Karzai said today, and as General Myers had said previously, the protest may well have been pre-staged.'
In other words, Scott, and the White House, have had to back down on their charges against Newsweek because the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, as well as the Afghani President, have stated that the charges are essentially wrong. The White House knew that the charges were lies, but made them anyway."