Great Scott! GOP Press Secretary and Democratic Committee Chairman — Best Friends Forever

Quick — switch off your HBO, ESPN, The Food Network, Animal Planet or any “Andy Griffith” episodes you might be watching and click over to the greatest show of the day: C-SPAN 3.

If you don’t happen to get C-SPAN 3, make a note to complain to your cable or satellite provider and find C-SPAN Radio on XM, or find this hearing online. The “great” day has arrived.

Former presidential press secretary Scott McClellan is front and center at a jam-packed House Judiciary Committee room at this hour talking about the Valerie Plame leak, the Scooter Libby pardon, the build-up to the Iraq war and much more.

As readers of my stuff know, I have my own gigantic problems with this administration on many, many levels, including the trumped-up intelligence about going to war and the lack of an intelligent occupation plan going in.

So, on some levels I am quite interested in what McClellan has to say. But I find it a bit unsavory that his new BFF is John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), chairman of the Judiciary panel.

McClellan’s book is called What Happened?. Fine. $75,000-dollar advance for the book. Small percentage from each book sold. All fine, I guess. It’s a free country.

But I am sitting here wondering why I am so captivated by a relatively low-level White House staffer who is obviously bitter about being lied to, not being in the loop, then getting canned.

Don’t get me wrong. I love flacks and hacks. And I love the inside “games” they play doing their jobs.

Hacks literally have to hack away to get “at” the truth from the outside looking in. And the insider flacks are paid to begrudgingly and selectively mete out information that presents their bosses only in the most favorable light. Just the rules of the game.

But I don’t think this town would operate at all if the new rules allowed for the “insiders” to be always on the prowl for tell-all book opportunities and being “insiders” for that sole purpose.

Oh well, back to the show. Feel free to use this space if anything from the hearing catches your attention. The committee has taken a brief break for some floor action, so feel free to squeeze in another episode of “Andy Griffith.” Just don’t stray too far from C-SPAN 3.