Jeff Gannon, former White House reporter, believes the following statement released yesterday from former White House spokesman Scott McClellan was “cherry-picked” by his publisher, and could prove to be misleading: “I had unknowingly passed along false information. And five of the highest ranking officials in the administration were involved in my doing so: Rove, Libby, the vice President, the President’s chief of staff, and the president himself.”

“This tantalizing bit seemed to have the intended effect judging from the volume and trajectory of spittle emanating from the mouth of MSNBC’s Chris Matthews,” writes Gannon today. “Visions of the Fitzmas that never came surely danced in the heads of David Shuster and Keith Olbermann. Democratic Sen. Chris Dodd predictably recited the Watergate mantra, calling on the new Attorney General to launch an investigation to determine the extent of any cover up and ‘what the President knew and when he knew it.’”

Gannon brings up a March 6, 2007 Larry King interview with McClellan to bolster his claim:

KING: Scott, were you lied to?

MCCLELLAN: Well, Larry, I said what I believed to be true at the time. It was also what the president believed to be true at the time based on assurances that we were both given.

The prevailing judgment from Gannon is that unless McClellan’s tune has somehow dramatically changed since March, the statement released yesterday would appear to be a lot of hot air.