From Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo, via Helpful Reader Eric:
The week before last I wrote a post questioning the wisdom of something President Bush said when he addressed the Australian parliament."We," said the president, "see a China that is stable and prosperous, a nation that respects the peace of its neighbors and works to secure the freedom of its own people."
The statement and its rather odd implication were reported around the world. But then a few days later I got an email from a reader who had followed the link I'd provided to the White House's transcript of the speech and asked if maybe I'd gotten it wrong.
A few days ago (10/23), you quoted Bush as speaking to the Australian Parliament and saying that he "sees" a China that is free, etc. At the time, I didn't go back to the White House press release, but if you look at it now you will see that it says he "seeks" a free China. Did you misread it, or have they been massaging the record after the fact? I don't know how to go about looking for a cached version of the page, but maybe it's worth pursuing.Well, I'm not sure I'd know how to go about getting the cached version either. But luckily that's not necessary, since I made a PDF version of the original White House transcript as it appeared on the day in question. (Call me suspicious.) You can see it right here. If you scroll down to the big, clumsily-drawn red circle you'll see that the word was 'see' not 'seek'. Then compare it to the current version now at the White House website.
At some later point, they (i.e., someone in the White House press operation) simply changed the word and thus utterly changed the meaning.
And from Marshall’s follow up:
According to a trusted source, the prepared remarks the White House handed out at the time did indeed include the word ‘seek.’But when the president delivered the speech he pretty clearly said ‘see’, thus changing the meaning of the statement and creating a small international hubbub. (Listen to the audio feed here.)
The White House released the transcript of the president’s speech saying ‘see.’ The official record of the Australian parliament records it as ‘see.’ Perhaps most revealing, when asked about it by members of the press, administration officials traveling with the president in Asia defended the ‘see’ statement and made no mention of the president’s having meant something different from what he said.
At some point people at the White House realized that the president had just committed a gaffe. He said ‘see’ but they had told him to say ‘seek’. And the folks at the White House seem to have reasoned, ‘hey, why are we defending this line when it’s not what he was supposed to have said in the first place?’ So they just changed the transcript to say what the president was supposed to have said rather than what he did say.
Now, is this a federal case or the end of the world? Of course not. But this White House does have a bit of a record of massaging transcripts. And at the end of the day there’s something to be said for the transcripts actually saying what the president said rather than what he was supposed to say.
Call me old-fashioned ...
Altering the transcript is just one of the worrying things about the see/seek business. Even more disturbing is that the obvious gap between the words coming out of Bush’s mouth and their actual meaning. It suggests the work of an actor, not a leader - and not a very good actor, at that.
