How Do I Lie? Let Me Count The Ways...

A brief sampling of Bush Administration lies over the past few days...

• Laura Bush sez many Iraqi refugees have been welcomed to the United States. If by "many," you mean less than 500 out of the nearly two million Iraqis who have fled their country.

• General David Petraeus completely focuses on Al Qaeda in Iraq as the source of the problems in Iraq, when they are maybe 3% of the overall insurgency. He's also claiming that the September date is not a deadline for a policy change, when it is to the Congress, who actually has the ability to make that determination and not some general.

• Former deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty just wasn't all that involved in the firing of US Attorneys or the hiring of replacements, or really anything in the Justice Department, so I'm not sure how he spent his time. Of course, the Attorney General has said that he relied on McNulty's advice in approving the firings.

• Tony Snow responded to the scandal of White House officials using RNC email accounts in violation of the Presidential Records Act by saying "Clinton did it too," which is, um, not true. It's so untrue, in fact, that then-staffer John Podesta wrote a specific memo stating that all email must be incorporated into the official records system.

To be fair, not every Bush Administration official lies. Some of them don't say anything at all.

John A. Rizzo, who has spent much of the past five years honing the CIA's interrogation policies, knows how to avoid answering questions under pressure -- at least in public. In nearly two hours of Senate testimony yesterday, his longest response by far was six sentences long.

For much of the session, Rizzo confined himself to "Yes, sir," "No, sir" and "I think I'd best address that in closed session." [...]

Asked if he approved of a Justice Department opinion that only pain resulting in "organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death" qualified as torture, Rizzo carefully said he "did not object." Perhaps it "did appear overbroad," he added, "but I can't say that I had any specific objections to any specific parts of it."

He may be the best Administration official yet, because he tries really really hard NOT to lie.