EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt testified before two different House Committees today. Here’s a good use of an agency head’s time:

The administrator had spent most of the past week rehearsing answers aimed at deflecting some of the most serious allegations about his ethics and management decisions. Several staffers said he huddled privately with his closest aides, outlining plans to blame others for some decisions, such as the large pay raises given two staffers who moved with him from Oklahoma to Washington.

Pruitt seems to be a classic “Kiss up kick down” sort of manager, doesn’t he?

Testifying before the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on environment for more than three hours, Pruitt repeatedly blamed his staff for spending decisions that have drawn intense criticism in recent months and denied that he had reassigned or demoted anyone who questioned those expenditures.

Is anyone surprised that this weasel blames his subordinates, probably particularly career civil servants rather than political appointees he brought in to the Agency, for his failings? Whether Trump still likes him or not, this seems particularly dysfunctional:

Inside the White House, the EPA chief has lost the backing of many senior aides, including Chief of Staff John F. Kelly, and communications officials, lawyers and Cabinet affairs officials, whose calls he ignores. He is not interested in “turning the page,” as one senior administration official put it Wednesday.

Pruitt, for his part, believes the White House is leaking damaging details about him and is “out to get him,” in the words of a Pruitt ally.

You know, if I thought “the White House” was out to get me, I think I’d discover a family with whom I’d like to spend more time, and I’d do it PDQ in order to avoid further humiliation. We can only hope.