I'll let Josh Marshall do the heavy lifting on today's Scott McLellan bullshit-flinging contest:

QUESTION: What's your response to those who suspect that Speaker Hastert is secretly --

QUESTION: Why did they --

McCLELLAN: Helen, I just pointed out the chairman of the commission and his comments. Why isn't that being reported?

QUESTION: But there are other members --

McCLELLAN: Go ahead, Mark. Mark was finishing up.

QUESTION: What's your response to those who say Speaker Hastert is secretly doing the White House bidding in refusing to bring up a two-month extension for the commission?

McCLELLAN: Silly, silly idea. I mean, the President supports extension -- supports the extension that the commission has requested. We've made that view known publicly and privately.

QUESTION: Can I follow on that --

QUESTION: Can you answer Mark's question. Can you answer what Mark asked about the one-hour limit --

McCLELLAN: I said, no. I said -- I confirmed that.

QUESTION: And can I just clarify that ...

McCLELLAN: You were thinking about service, I know, when I mentioned that.

QUESTION: What the commission is asking for in that one hour is the entire commission, not just the chair and vice chair. Are you not agreeing to that --

McCLELLAN: The request came from the chairman and vice chairman, and the President looks forward to meeting privately with --

QUESTION: I know. But they followed up by saying that they want --

McCLELLAN: -- looks forward to meeting privately with the chairman and vice chairman to provide them with the necessary information.

QUESTION: Why not all of them? What's the problem?

McCLELLAN: Helen, we have great confidence that the chairman and vice chairman can share all that information with the rest of the commission.

QUESTION: Why do they have to share it? The others have ears.

[Helen Thomas rules. -ed]

McCLELLAN: They're going to have a public report. I talked about how this is extraordinary for a President to sit down with a legislative body such as the 9/11 Commission.

QUESTION: What's the President's problem, really, with meeting all of them?

QUESTION: It's a legislative body? I'm sorry.

McCLELLAN: There are lots of ways -- one, I have always said that there are lots of ways -- it's legislatively created, that's what I'm referring to. There are lots of ways to provide the commission with the information they need to do their work. And we have worked -- we have bent over backwards to provide unprecedented cooperation to the commission.

QUESTION: Not from what we hear.

In short, we should be happy the Prazdent is giving two members of the 9/11 commission A WHOLE HOUR, because it's a legislative commission and there is also unprecedented cooperation and blah blah blah. Also, that dern Denny Hastert just won't extend the deadline for the 9/11 commission, even though we begged him!

In related news, at the Repug national convention in New York, this year, look for:

“Or, and this is a real possibility, we could see President Bush giving his acceptance speech at Ground Zero,” he added. “It’s clearly a venue they’re considering.”

Repugnant.