Bob sees the light...

I wrote that I was looking forward to 60 Minutes this week to see the Woodward interview after the release of his latest book, State of Denial. It was good the hear the stuff being said on prime time TV but I remember thinking: I wonder how many people are hearing this stuff for the first time -- after all, it's hard to underestimate the viewing public -- because, except for the fact that Woodward was saying it and indicating that his sources in the White House were confirming it, there wasn't really anything new. Nothing I hadn't read on the blogs for years. So I didn't bother to write any follow up.

But not so Arianna. She was definitely underwhelmed and had a many apt, if caustic, observations on Bob's seeing the light.

Then there was the revelation, breathlessly delivered by Wallace in his intro, that after two years and more than 200 interviews, including "most of the top officials in the administration," Woodward has come to "a damning conclusion: That for the last three years, the White House has not been honest with the American public." Stop the presses, hold the front page! And burn all the copies of "Fiasco," "Cobra II," "The One Percent Doctrine," "Hubris" -- plus 99.9 percent of the blog posts on Iraq that have appeared on HuffPost since we launched -- that have previously come to exactly the same "damning conclusion." Why fork over $30 for much-older-than-yesterday's news?

[...]

To which I say: "Welcome to 2002, Bob." I can only hold my breath in anticipation of what headline grabbing insights "the best excavator of inside stories" will "unearth" for his next book: "Paris Hilton: Shallow Party Girl," or, perhaps, "Islamic Fundamentalism: Could be a Problem in the Future."

Sure, I suppose we should welcome the fact that Woodward has joined the rest of the sentient world in his appraisal of Bush. But without any expiation for -- and discussion of -- the role his earlier hagiographic renderings of the administration played in enabling all the behaviors he's now so aghast at, it's hard to take his Road to Damascus moment seriously. After all, if there's one thing you can say about Bush, it's that he is who he is.

Bush had that same religious certainty, lack of curiosity, impatience and disinclination to rethink things back in 2004, when Woodward published "Plan of Attack," or in 2002, when Woodward published "Bush at War."

[...]

Without some accounting in the new book about how Woodward himself could have been in a state of denial for the first five years of the Bush presidency, it's hard not to reach the "damning conclusion" that Woodward didn't write "State of Denial" because he suddenly realized Iraq was going to hell. He wrote it because he realized his reputation was going to hell.

Woodward, the classic Washington weathervane, knows, with his unerring weathervane instinct, that it's now okay to criticize Bush -- and that, indeed, anyone who wants a seat at the Big Persons' table after Bush leaves has to now admit Iraq has been a disaster. And Woodward definitely doesn't want to give up his special seat at the Big Persons' table.

His view of sources is like someone's who chooses a $70 entree because if it's that expensive, it must be good. Unlike his work uncovering Watergate, he now only orders up high-end sources. Which is why the most interesting thing about the new book is that it makes it clear the high-level crowd has turned on Bush. And, therefore, so has that crowd's official stenographer.

Yeah... what she said.

UPDATE: The Muckraker has a item that indicates that Woodward didn't first reveal the meeting between Rice, Tenet and Black but, rather, Time did in 2002 -- four years earlier.

UPDATE2: Brad Delong piles on with still more reasons why Woodward is not worthy of our respect. That's nicer than just saying he's a hack, while still being just as accurate.