I had a couple of rapid thoughts when I saw this revolting story. The first was remembering how that line in the title above was one of my father’s favorite mordantly humorous slogans, along with “He was right, dead right, as he sped along, but he’s just as dead as if he were wrong!” and the tale about feeling sad and hopeless, hearing a little voice saying, “Cheer up, things could be worse!” and then, sure enough, things got worse. The second was realizing that I occasionally, very rarely but still occasionally, miss important information by refusing to watch Fox News. A third was deciding that I had mistakenly judged Leon Panetta to be an honorable and trustworthy public servant.
In an interview with Bret Baier on Fox News, Panetta, who was Bill Clinton’s Swiss Army knife aide and Cabinet member notably as head of the CIA, was asked by Baier if he had any regrets about signing the infamous open letter from 51 former intelligence officials using their influence and presumed expertise to advance the cover-up scheme declaring the Hunter Biden laptop as Russian disinformation.
In a head-exploding display of chutzpah, Panetta announced that he had no regrets at all, and that he has seen no evidence that would make him change his mind. Gobsmacked, Baier said, “You don’t think it was real?” Panetta responded “I think disinformation is involved here.”
Wow. The evidence that it is real includes Hunter Biden admitting that it was his, the information on the laptop being authenticated by the FBI, the emails on the laptop being authenticated by their senders, recipients, and the news media (the latter after the election, of course, and after Joe Biden was able to deny what the laptop contents proved during his debate with Donald Trump), and the revelation that the Biden campaign and Democrats coordinated the creation of the diversionary letter Panetta signed.
Never mind. Panetta claims that what now all the evidence indicates is true is not true, and still endorses the partisan lie that he facilitated to help ensure Joe Biden’s election. In this he becomes another Democratic wielder of the “It isn’t what it is” rationalization that has become a party trademark in the last decade or so and is the favorite gaslighting tool of the spectacularly unethical Biden administration. (The border is secure, and the economy is great.)
This marks Panetta as a brazenly dishonest political hack. I don’t know why I’m so surprised that an official marinated in the Clintons’ culture of defaulting to “deny,deny, deny” when caught red-handed would behave this way, but that is my explanation. Jonathan Turley, in a horrified post about Panetta’s interview, has a kinder, Jack Nicholsonish explanation: poor Leon just can’t handle the truth. Turley writes,
…in order to admit to these facts, Panetta would have had to admit that he was a willing or unwitting dupe of the campaign. It is easier to simply continue to claim that this could all be the invention of the Russians. Yet, Panetta is still sought for his advice on other intelligence matters as he continues to repeat disproven claims because the truth is simply too costly on a personal level to acknowledge.
More “costly” than revealing himself to be a loyal Machiavellian tool of the desperate Democratic disinformation campaign? Balderdash. Panetta knows he’s lying now, just as he almost surely knew he was deceiving the voting public in the service of Biden’s campaign when he signed the letter. The letter worked, thanks to the news media refusing to investigate the laptop or report on its contents until Biden was safely in the White House.
In this case, my father’s slogan is too forgiving. Panetta’s mind is made up all right: he’s made up his mind that the pubic can be convinced of anything if it’s repeated enough times.
Ethics Alarms 
Good to know. I used to give him the benefit of the doubt but he destroyed that trust with this revelation.
This is simply an application of the Dems’ fairly new default talking point which is, “There’s no proof,” which they’ve loosed upon the world as if it were a virus in response to all the evidence of Joe Biden’s accepting fairly substantial bribes from foreign entities. We see this all the time. The media and the Dems simply say, “There’s no proof.” Leon’s simply wheeled this pathetic talking point out.
And people really object to anyone saying there’s a Deep State? I’m beginning to think it’s safe to assume anyone accepting a federal paycheck is a malefactor.
The professor also trots out the “Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt” line.
OB
Your last paragraph is why the size of our government and debt continues to grow. I doubt many federal government employees or contractors vote for candidates whose campaigns promise deficit / debt reduction..
There is a damn good reason why Maryland and Northern Virginia are so wealthy yet produce relatively few durable goods. That reason is a government employer that can print money at will.
There is definitely that aspect as well, CM. Wasn’t it AOC who literally said various programs could simply be funded by “printing more money.”
I guess anyone who’s spent their entire adult working life in electoral politics is suspect.
My uncle thinks all government officials should spend one month on prison for each year of public office. He is not wrong.
jvb
This was the biggest mistake Trump made as well. He thought that some of the mid-high level government employees could be trusted. He found out he was wrong. I haven’t seen any evidence in the last 6-7 years that ANY of them can be trusted, they are all corrupt.
Either he knew it was fake and his statement was a lie.
Or, he believed it and would have to admit that, despite being the head of the intelligence agency, he got outsmarted.
Neither option is good for people in intelligence. They don’t want to admit that lying is part of their job and getting filled is evidence of incompetence.
So, he rejects that option and doubles down on the lie because, well, it’s part of the job.
-Jut
There is also the option that he helped create it and he is still trying to sell it. He knows there are enough true believers out there who will listen to him and he has to keep them on the line.
You may think this is preposterous but, Cenk Uygur is running for president despite being a naturalized American citizen. He told his followers the Supreme Court ruled (Schneider v. Rusk) unconstitutional the Constitutional requirement of being born a US citizen to be president. People are still donating money to his campaign.
I actually thought he had a streak of Independence when he spoke in the last couple of years of the Obama administration. He only spoke out because Obama was basically done and had basically given up the ghost. There is still some hope for Biden to get a second term, so he’s falling right into line. Personally, I would look with greater favor upon the Democratic Party if more of them would step forward and say what we know to be true, that Biden is simply no longer up to the job if ever he was and has to go.