This is a whole truckload of crazy.

The White House has almost never consulted with the FDA during a drug approval process, but the Center for Reproductive Rights has found out about some shady business concerning Plan B and the Bush administration.

Yesterday, Bonnie Jones, an attorney for the reproductive rights group, told federal Magistrate Viktor Pohorelsky: "It has come to our attention that Mark McClellan at some point had a meeting with someone from the White House about Plan B." McClellan, now administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, worked as senior policy director for health care in the Bush White House in 2001 and 2002.

A copy of McClellan's appointment calendar while he was FDA commissioner contains an April 21, 2003 entry: "Conference call w/Jay Lefkowitz re: Plan B submis." The entry appears to refer to an application for non-prescription sales submitted to the FDA a few days earlier by Women's Capital Corp., which then owned Plan B. Barr Laboratories of Pomona, N.Y., later bought the company.

Lefkowitz, popular with conservative groups, is the former deputy assistant to the president for domestic policy and now serves as special envoy on human rights in North Korea.

Jones was in court trying to recover deleted FDA emails and permission to depose five FDA officials; Assistant U.S. Attorney Franklin Amanat asked Pohorelsky to block Jones’ request. Lester Crawford has also refused to be deposed--his lawyer says he plans to invoke his Fifth Amendment rights.

This is a pretty big deal. So why are we only seeing this story in New York Newsday?