This is what is affectionately called “getting rhetorically thrown under the bus”:
News of the immunity deal caught State Department officials in Washington off guard.“If anyone gave such immunity it was done so without consulting senior leadership at State,” a senior State Department official initially told ABC News.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack would not comment directly on the immunity given to the security guards, but said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is determined to hold anybody guilty of wrongdoing accountable.
“Secretary Rice’s attitude is that if there are individuals who broke rules, laws or regulations they must be held to account,” McCormack told reporters. “Every action that she has taken during the course of the aftermath of this incident has been consistent with that approach.”
Given that the Bush Administration’s practice of “holding people accountable” for laws broken thus far consists of blaming the messenger and giving lip service to the problem whilst cutting off the lawbreaker from free refills of Diet Pepsi at the CPAC BBQ, it isn’t totally untrue. It’s all about nuance.
