“Scandal fatigue” can be common under the circumstances. After seven-and-a-half years of legal, moral, ethical, and political outrages, many of the scandals of the Bush/Cheney years start to blur together. Some are even forgotten, swept aside to make room for new, more offensive controversies.

It’s only natural, then, to shift the focus away from the White House and towards the campaign to pick the next president. I’m afraid, however, now isn’t a good time to stop watching the Bush gang — some of their bigger scandals are managing to look even worse.

The Bush administration today unveiled a set of novel and controversial legal arguments in refusing to disclose key details about Vice President Dick Cheney’s role in the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity.

In two letters released Wednesday, the Justice Department revealed that, upon the recommendation of Attorney General Michael Mukasey, President Bush had invoked executive privilege rather than turn over to Congress a never-released FBI report (known as a “302″) recounting a confidential 2004 interview with Cheney about his knowledge of the Plame affair.

The White House move effectively closes the door on the last chance for the public to learn answers to a swirl of questions that have surrounded Cheney’s actions from the outset of the Plame case.

Last year, Patrick Fitzgerald, pointing to Cheney’s conduct, told a jury, “[T]here is a cloud over what the vice president did.”

And yesterday, the White House and the Attorney General decided it’s better to keep that cloud in place than to cooperate with a congressional investigation and add facts to the public record.

Just how “novel and controversial” were the new legal arguments? Let’s put it this way: the Justice Department created privilege claims, out of thin air, that no one’s ever heard of before.

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John McCain hasn’t spent much time talking about Afghanistan during the presidential campaign, but now that “other” war is deteriorating, the Republican candidate has discovered his new-found interest in the conflict.

Republican John McCain said Tuesday he knows “how to win wars” and that the strategy of increasing troop levels in Iraq should also be applied to Afghanistan. […]

McCain has described Obama’s call for withdrawal from Iraq as tantamount to declaring defeat and points to the lower levels of violence in Iraq as evidence that sending additional U.S. troops there has been a successful strategy.

“Sen. Obama will tell you we can’t win in Afghanistan without losing in Iraq. In fact, he has it exactly backwards,” McCain told a town hall meeting. “It is precisely the success of the surge in Iraq that shows us the way to succeed in Afghanistan.”

In other words, McCain’s new policy on Afghanistan — I say “new” because up until now, he hasn’t actually articulated a policy on Afghanistan — can be summarized this way: “Just do what we’ve been doing in Iraq.” Seriously. That’s the policy.

This, of course, doesn’t make any sense. The wars are entirely different. The causes of violence are completely different. The competing factions are completely different. Oh, and by the way, Iraq hasn’t gone especially well.

McCain seemed particularly fond of this line from his speech: “I know how to win wars.” Now, with all due respect to the senator’s military service, what is it, exactly, that leads McCain to think he has this knowledge? McCain hasn’t, you know, actually won any wars.

My suspicion is, McCain means he endorsed the surge, the surge led to victory in Iraq, and if he can just bring more surges to more countries, American would keep winning. In other words, when McCain says he knows “how to win wars,” he means he’s concluded, “Surges = Victories.”

It simply never occurred to me that the Republican Party would nominate another presidential candidate as sophomoric and confused as George W. Bush. It just didn’t seem possible.

And yet, here we are.

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Tuesday, John McCain delivered a high-profile speech on his Afghanistan policy, and unfortunately for his campaign, it didn’t go well. He went from opposing more troops in Afghanistan, to supporting more troops, to saying the troops shouldn’t come from the U.S., to saying some of the troops should come from the U.S. Ultimately, McCain ended up supporting the same policy Barack Obama has been articulating for months.

Yesterday, the Obama campaign kept the pressure on.

Building on Tuesday’s news cycle, when the campaigns’ respective speeches on Afghanistan dominated headlines, the Obama camp organized an early morning conference call on Wednesday. Senior foreign policy adviser Dr. Susan Rice and communications strategist Robert Gibbs were offered up to reporters. Dr. Rice opened the proceedings by calling McCain’s Tuesday speech “surreal” because of the candidate’s newfound emphasis on the need for more U.S. troops in Afghanistan. (Later in the afternoon on Tuesday, after his speech, McCain appeared to be trying to take some of that back, when he noted that an increased troop level could potentially be achieved by using NATO forces.)

“Up until a few days ago, his view was that we hadn’t diverted any effort and attention from Afghanistan to deal with Iraq. That there was no need for additional American forces in Afghanistan. That all, in effect, was going well,” Dr. Rice said Wednesday, adding: “Yesterday, he woke up and came to the sudden conclusion that indeed Afghanistan merited more strategic focus — something the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has been saying for months — and that we would therefore be willing to put in additional combat brigades. But then he got confused again, as to whether those needed to be American or NATO [troops] or some combination thereof.” [emphasis added]

Apparently, conservatives are offended by the frequent use of the word "confused." But if the shoe fits....

John McCain sat down with the New York Times the other day for a wide-ranging interview that covered quite a bit of ground. The NYT brought up a culture-war subject that we haven’t heard too much about lately.

Q: President Bush believes that gay couples should not be permitted to adopt children. Do you agree with that?

McCain: I think that we’ve proven that both parents are important in the success of a family so, no I don’t believe in gay adoption.

Q: Even if the alternative is the kid staying in an orphanage, or not having parents.

McCain: I encourage adoption and I encourage the opportunities for people to adopt children I encourage the process being less complicated so they can adopt as quickly as possible. And Cindy and I are proud of being adoptive parents.

Q: But your concern would be that the couple should [be] a traditional couple–

McCain: Yes.

Now we’ve known for a while that when it comes to opposition to gay rights, McCain is pretty extreme. He not only campaigned in support of an Arizona anti-gay measure a couple of years ago, McCain is even on record opposing civil unions at the state level. Hell, McCain is so far out there, he’d even remove well-trained U.S. troops from the military — in the midst of two wars, when the Armed Forces are severely stretched — if they’re gay, calling them an “intolerable risk.”

But to say that a child would be better off in an orphanage than a stable household with gay parents is surprisingly callous. It’s not even premised on reality — McCain said “we’ve proven that both parents are important in the success of a family.” It’s not clear who “we” are, but the evidence actually points in the opposite direction.

Today, the McCain campaign reversed course, arguing that McCain didn’t mean what he said.

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For a while, Republicans were defending their call for coastal drilling by claiming that the Chinese were drilling in Cuban waters. This proved to be false (though many on the right repeat the claim anyway).

So, conservatives have moved onto a new talking point: coastal drilling is safe for the environment, because recent hurricanes didn’t lead to oil spills. It leads to rhetoric like this from Nancy Pfotenhauer, John McCain’s senior energy adviser, who appeared on MSNBC the other day.

John McCain made the same claim a month ago: “As for offshore drilling, it’s safe enough these days that not even Hurricanes Katrina and Rita could cause significant spillage from the battered rigs off the coasts of New Orleans and Houston.”

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ken.) said the same thing over the weekend: “I think people are reassured that not a drop of oil was spilled during Katrina or Rita. Those rigs in the Gulf, there was not a single incident of spillage that anyone reported.”

Bill O’Reilly is sticking to the Republican script, telling his radio audience the other day, “Remember when Katrina hit, none of the oil rigs spilled in Louisiana.”

Even Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R), who presumably would know better, told Fox News a couple of weeks ago, “[T]hat’s one of the great unwritten success stories, after Katrina and Rita, these awful storms, no major spills.”

George Will, Dick Morris, Robert Samuelson, and the Wall Street Journal editorial page have all repeated the claim.

And they’re all wrong.

About a month ago, Bush, McCain, and congressional Republicans were without any real ideas about energy policy. Pressed on what to do about gas prices, the president told reporters, “[T]here is no magic wand to wave right now.” In fact, the president repeated the line three times, as if to say, “Don’t ask me; I just work here.”

But that was before the GOP settled on coastal drilling as the answer to all of our problems. Never mind that we wouldn’t actually see that oil for at least a decade, and never mind that it would only fuel (pun intended) the addiction we’re supposed to break, Republicans were ready to do something, whether it made any sense or not.

Oddly enough, on June 18, Bush demanded that Congress lift the ban on coastal drilling. The president could have just overturned the executive order on the policy, but “he said he wouldn’t do that because he wanted Congress to act first.”

Today, Bush changed his mind.

Putting pressure on congressional Democrats to back more exploration for oil, President Bush Monday called on Congress to join him in lifting a ban on offshore drilling that has stood since his father was president.

There are two prohibitions on offshore drilling, one imposed by Congress and another by executive order signed by the first President Bush in 1990. The current president, trying to ease market tensions and boost supply, called last month for Congress to lift its prohibition before he did so himself.

“The only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil resources is action from the U.S. Congress,” Bush said in a statement in the Rose Garden. “Now the ball is squarely in Congress’ court.”

Bush added that “Americans are paying at the pump” because Congress hasn’t approved the White House’s drilling plan. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ken.) added, “Now the only thing standing between consumers at the pump and the increased American energy they are demanding is the Democrat leadership in Congress.”

I’ve long since given up trying to figure out whether these guys actually believe their own nonsense, but either way, this is just mind-numbing.

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In recent weeks, as the McCain campaign has become more reckless in its attacks, the presumptive Republican nominee and his allies have begun going after Barack Obama’s integrity. McCain’s campaign has said Obama should not be “taken at his word,” and his “word cannot be trusted.” McCain was asked directly whether he questioned Obama’s patriotism, and McCain wouldn’t give a straight answer.

Yesterday, the McCain campaign kicked things up a notch, arguing that Obama and Democrats want to see the U.S. fail in Iraq in order to benefit politically.

The new accusation was unveiled on a McCain campaign conference call [this morning], with top McCain surrogates making this charge in tandem.

Sen. Lindsey Graham said that a “turning point” was when Harry Reid declared the war “lost” over a year ago, and brought up an old quote from Chuck Schumer predicting that discontent with the war would lead to further Democratic gains. “The Democratic Party built a political strategy around us losing the war in Iraq,” Graham said.

McCain adviser Randy Scheunemann joined in: “Senator Obama seems to think losing a war will help him win an election.”

Now, none of McCain’s surrogates or aides literally used the word “treason,” but their comments were pointed in that direction. After all, Americans who actively want to see U.S. troops die in a war and “lose” on the battlefield are, necessarily, anti-American. Anyone who would look forward to American defeat for political gain is, by any reasonable definition, a traitor.

I vaguely recall McCain’s promise to run a “respectful” and “civil” campaign. Like most of McCain’s promises, this one didn’t last long.

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This is almost certainly going to sound nitpicky, if not actually petty, but bear with me. It’s not unreasonable to note that John McCain continues to make references to a country that doesn’t exist.

At a press conference in Phoenix today, for example, McCain referenced Czechoslovakia. Again.

“I was concerned about a couple of steps that the Russian government took in the last several days. One was reducing the energy supplies to Czechoslovakia. Apparently that is in reaction to the Czech’s agreement with us concerning missile defense, and again some of the Russian now announcement they are now retargeting new targets, something they abandoned at the end of the Cold War, is also a concern. So we see the tensions between Russia and their neighbors, as well as Russia and the United States are somewhat increasing.”

On first blush, this sounds like more antagonistic rhetoric towards Russia — which McCain wants to kick out of the G8 — which isn’t especially helpful.

But more importantly, Russia can’t “reduce energy supplies to Czechoslovakia.” Czechoslovakia, of course, doesn’t exist. It split into two countries more than 15 years ago. McCain has actually been to the Czech Republic and Slovakia since they became independent countries, and he’s met with their leaders.

So, McCain slipped up. He’s 71 and this is going to happen from time to time, right? Well, there’s a little more to it than that.

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Paul Krugman had an interesting item in early June on the media’s coverage of the presidential campaign as the dominant story shifts from a heated primary race to the general election. When the focus was on Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, it was in the media’s interest to exaggerate differences between two candidates who agree on almost everything. With the focus shifting to Obama and John McCain, it should make the media’s job easier — there are, as Krugman noted, “stark differences on issues between the candidates.”

There’s no way to argue that Obama and McCain — a classic story of contrasts — offer similar ideas and solutions. Krugman noted that eight years ago, news outlets ran far too many stories downplaying the differences between Bush and Al Gore — stories that look comically ridiculous in hindsight — and wondered whether journalists might try a similar tack this year.

It seems unlikely, doesn’t it? Obama and McCain are so different — personally, ideologically, professionally, temperamentally — the media just can’t screw this up.

But they’re going to try. The LAT had a front-page item over the weekend downplaying the enormous differences between the two major-party candidates.

Stem-cell research and nuclear weapons are just two examples of a surprising but little-noticed aspect of the 2008 campaign: Democrat Obama and Republican McCain agree on a range of issues that have divided the parties under Bush.

On immigration, faith-based social services, expanded government wiretapping, global warming and more, Obama and McCain have arrived at similar stances — even as they have spent weeks trying to amplify the differences between them on other issues, such as healthcare and taxes…. Even on Iraq, a signature issue for both candidates, McCain and Obama have edged toward each other.

First, much of this is factually wrong. Second, I can’t imagine why news outlets are trying to downplay the differences between these candidates in the first place.

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Since the start of the campaign, John McCain's personal controversies have been off limits in the media, but there have been a few cracks in the ice. There was, for example, this report in the UK’s Daily Mail last month about John McCain’s first wife. It was quite a painful story, involving physical difficulties, infidelity, and divorce. “My marriage ended because John McCain didn’t want to be 40, he wanted to be 25,” Carol McCain said.

The first substantive report about this in the U.S. media appeared this morning, in the LA Times.

McCain, who is about to become the GOP nominee, has made several statements about how he divorced Carol and married Hensley that conflict with the public record.

In his 2002 memoir, “Worth the Fighting For,” McCain wrote that he had separated from Carol before he began dating Hensley. “I spent as much time with Cindy in Washington and Arizona as our jobs would allow,” McCain wrote. “I was separated from Carol, but our divorce would not become final until February of 1980.”

An examination of court documents tells a different story.

Yes, McCain committed adultery — and then was far from truthful about it.

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