The rhetoric/truthiness, 2003:
Scott McClellan:
White House spokesman Scott McClellan told CNN that in preparing for the speech, Navy officials on the carrier told Bush aides they wanted a "Mission Accomplished" banner, and the White House agreed to create it.
"We took care of the production of it," McClellan said. "We have people to do those things. But the Navy actually put it up."
George W. Bush:
"I know it was attributed somehow to some ingenious advance man** from my staff -- they weren't that ingenious, by the way," the president said Tuesday.
The reality/truth, 2007:
Dan Bartlett:
Me personally, [I regret] the "Mission Accomplished" banner. I wish I could have back the decision to sign off on that. I think the intent behind it to this day holds true. "Mission Accomplished" was the motto of the aircraft carrier that had just spent ten months in a war zone both in Afghanistan and Iraq, and we wanted to celebrate what they had done.
More reading on the mythical advance men of the Bush Administration here.