Mad Dan’s Noble Lie

The American Spectator ^ | 9-16-04 | George Neumayr

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Mad Dan’s Noble Lie

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Published 9/16/2004 12:09:28 AM

On The O'Reilly Factor not so long ago, Dan Rather spoke in defense of public figures who make stuff up. He called Bill Clinton an "honest man" even as he acknowledged Clinton's whoppers. "Who among us have not lied about somebody?" asked Rather. "I think at the core he's an honest person…I think you can be an honest person and lie about any number of things." You can be an honest person and lie about any number of things. This elastic philosophy of honesty must account for Rather's view of himself as a witness to "core truth" while peddling a forgery against the President. Rather sees a "core truth" wrapped in a forgery inside his CBS reporting, and he is outraged that his critics won't admit it. He is in effect saying: Didn't this forgery at least place me in the vicinity of truth? He lashes out at "people who for their own partisan, political agendas can't deny the core truth of this story…and want to change the subject and make the story about me rather than have the story be about the unanswered questions about President Bush's military service." The audacity here is surreal, though typical of the post-1960s ends-justify-the-means moral arrogance Rather imbibed as a Watergate reporter. Presidents can't lie to journalists, according to this ethos, but journalists can lie to presidents, and even demand that presidents answer for the journalist's lies. Perhaps only Dan Rather could get caught out in a forgery and proceed to demand that President Bush answer the questions the forgery raises. According to Rather's moral calculus, forged documents shed light not on his lack of credibility but on the credibility of the president they slander. In an interview with the New York Observer, Rather also uses the phrase "fundamental truth." This is 1960s babble that amounts to saying: I, as a liberal, can tell lies for the greater good; my surface dishonesty conveys a deeper truth. Rather is falling back on the Noble Lie -- the idea that the enlightened are entitled to heap fables upon the hoi polloi for the sake of preserving proper order. The transcendent truth that mitigates Rather's faked-up memos is apparently that Bush missed a physical examination over three decades ago -- not exactly the justification for the Noble Lie Plato envisioned in The Republic. Why allegations about a missed physical and truncated National Guard service trouble Rather so deeply when Bill Clinton's draft-dodging did not is another question Rather isn't likely to answer. If the Noble Lie defense fails, what else can Rather try? The New York Observer article suggests he will try the I'm-on-the-right-side-of-history defense: "I think over the long haul, this will be consistent with our history and our traditions and reputation…We took heat during the McCarthy time, during civil rights, during Watergate. We haven't always been right, but our record is damn good." . Rather sounds a bit like the habitual liar in Whit Stillman's movie Metropolitan who, after getting called out for inventing a story about his archenemy abusing a girl, says, "Okay, so that person wasn't real; she's a composite, like in New York magazine." He then defends his lie on the grounds that it contained a basic truth about his nemesis. On Wednesday night, Rather relied on Jerry Killian's secretary Marion Knox as his new document expert. Not because she defends the authenticity of his memos -- she says they are bogus -- but because she subscribes to his "core truth" rationalization: that the forgeries contain a kind of truth about Killian's view of Bush. Knox's view is that the forged documents "accurately reflect Killian's view of Lt. Bush," as CBS's correspondent put it. This use of Knox confirms that Rather will eventually admit that he hoaxed the American people with forgeries but will defend it as a happy hoax leading to the truth about the real liar -- George Bush, whose unpardonable sin some 33 years ago was serving five more years in the National Guard than Clinton ever did. Perhaps Dan Rather's liberal defenders who now accept "core truth" fables owe author Gary Aldrich an apology. Shouldn't they now say to him, "Your story about Bill Clinton taking women to the D.C. Marriott, which predated the country's introduction to Monica Lewinsky, wasn't technically true but it contained a basic truth about Clinton. He was doing that sort of thing with women"? And shouldn't they also apologize to Mark Fuhrman? "Sure, you may not have followed every collection technique properly, but that's okay. O.J. was guilty," they should now say. Perhaps Dan Rather, friend to the ACLU and Ann Richards (Rather attended a 1988 fundraiser for her, according to Liz Smith), could even advocate the admission of forgery into courts of law as long as it kicks loose a deeper truth about a guilty defendant. What Rather said about Clinton he will soon revise for himself: you can now be an honest journalist at CBS and lie about any number of things. George Neumayr is executive editor of The American Spectator.

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[Viet-Boat-Rider]

Thats COMMUNITS talk. No wonder Dan Blather equates so well with Kerry.

[Zebra]

What Rather said about Clinton he will soon revise for himself: you can now be an honest journalist at CBS and lie about any number of things.

No. Before RatherGate you could be "an honest journalist and lie about a number of things." At CBS anyway. Those days are history, at least as far as Dan Rather is concerned. His career is over. We are watching it end. It is only a question of when he resigns.

[dila813]

this story nails it.

[mylife]

Ahhh

The party of moral equivalency

[Deb]

I know everyone has his own favorite Dan Rather moment and I cling tightly to mine.

It was Bill Clinton's first term and it happened in the Oval Office during a Rather/Clinton White House interview. Dan's tiny nipples hardened as he looked up into Bubba's cornflower blue eyes and gushed..."I hear you read 400 books a year."
A shy and bashful Bill, dug his Elvis-like toe into the suspiciously soggy Oval Office rug and admitted, "It's true."

Dan was clearly overcome with admiration and appeared to gasp in awe. Never-mind that Bill was claiming to read more than a book a day while he ran the World's only super-power and kept the typing pool content. Dan Rather never questioned the impossibiity of the claim...he had found his idol.

A true Dan Rather moment.

[Travis McGee]

Best explanation of Rather's behavior I've seen yet.

[Libertina]

Another good one from the spectator.

[spyone]

My God!
It's been a week, but I must admit I am stunned by the ego of this freak. He has NOTHING, and has risked everything! Brought himself, his employer, his colleauges down to the depths over his ideology. And for what? This story is chickenshit! Clinton ducks out, lies about it, and its no story for 8 years...Kerry has 200 co-workers who hate his guts and its no story....Bush is RUMOURED to have been a bit of a slack ass at 20 years of age and he decides to be a hero for the "good" of the country....facts be damned.

[spyone]

Thanks for posting this great article by the way!

[68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub]

My Favorite post for dims and trolls
who slither in here each day.
And the Lame Stream media
who find the real news on Free Republic,
then rewrite and spin the truth.

JOHN KERRY
CLICK HERE TO SIGN FORM 180

BUSH SIGNED FORM 180

WHAT ARE YOU HIDING?
WHAT IS YOUR SECRET?
WHAT DON'T YOU WANT
AMERICA AND THE PRESS TO KNOW?

E-Mail this story AND links to the media today.

John Kerry directly contributed to the lies of the anti war movement AND caused deaths and injuries
to US Military serving in Vietnam AND
directly caused deaths from injuries at home AND countless suicides because of his false testimony.

John Kerry is not fit to be elected dog catcher let alone President of the United States.
ANYONE who votes for Kerry AFTER knowing this data
is guilty of covering up John Kerry's war crimes!

John Kerry, director of the Vietnam Veterans against the War,
testified before special session the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
April 22, 1971

KERRY GAVE TESTIMONY BASED UPON FALSE INFORMATION
THAT KERRY KNEW AHEAD OF TIME TO BE FALSE!



September 6, 2004 -- **BREAKING** In Yesterday's Lies: Steve Pitkin and the Winter Soldiers, Scott Swett tells the story of a former VVAW member and participant in the Winter Soldier Investigation who states that John Kerry and others pressured him to give false testimony about American atrocities in Vietnam. After more than 33 years, Pitkin is the first Winter Soldier "witness" to file a legal affadavit regarding that event...

My name is Steve Pitkin, age 20, from Baltimore. I served with the 9th Division from May of '69 until I was airvaced in July of '69. I'll testify about the beating of civilians and enemy personnel, destruction of villages, indiscriminate use of artillery, the general racism and the attitude of the American GI toward the Vietnamese. I will also talk about some of the problems of the GIs toward one another and the hassle with officers.

-- Steve Pitkin, Winter Soldier Investigation, February 1, 1971.

E-Mail and/or fax these url's to EVERYONE ASAP! Kerry MUST be exposed NOW!
PUT PRESSURE ON THE MEDIA TO COVER THIS BEFORE NOV 2nd

Steve Pitkin Story

http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/staticpages/index.php?page=YesterdaysLies1

Steve Pitkin Affadavit, August 31, 2004

http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/staticpages/index.php?page=PitkinAff

Steve Pitkin DD-214

http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/graphics/PitkinDD214.jpg

Steve Pitkin WSI testimony

http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/staticpages/index.php?page=PitkinWSI

Steve Pitkin WSI video clips -- February 1, 1971 (4:16, 1.6MB)

http://www.wintersoldier.com/video/pitkin2.wmv

John F. Kerry
Timeline of a traitor.
Click Here

http://www.archive-news.net/Kerry/JK_timeline.html

Guide to Local Media
Locate media in your zip code, gives you links to YOUR local media with phone, e-mail etc info.

Free Internet Fax Service
Free E-Mail to Fax from your computer, just fill in form on page , they do the rest.
Make sure you enter fax # like this 12025551212 (no spaces or -)

Is the number you want them to SEND FREE FAX covered?

Complete list of areas they SEND FREE FAXES to

Kerry's disrespect in 1971 to USA Symbols Video

Windows Media .......... Real Player .......... Quick Time .......... AOL

Ramsey Clark to Join Panel for Saddam’s Defense
arabnews press release 25 August 2004
NOTE :
Ramsey Clark is pictured below with Kerry and
Vietnam phony vet Al Hubbard
Who was head of the
Vietnam Veterans Against the War movement.


Al Hubbard Sgt., 22 Troop Carrier Squadron Aug. ’65-June ’66
- Al Hubbard, proven fraud who never set foot in Viet Nam.
The only Vietnamese he ever met was
when he was collaborating with the North Vietnamese in Paris
on the American Communist Party's nickel.

John Kerry's explanation:
"He (Hubbard) simply exaggarated his particular position.
But nobody knew it at the time. And those things happen."

Free online version of
Kerry's "The New Soldier"
You can read it online right now.

Kerry hopes everyone
in the USA gets this book!

NEW:
“Without question,
we were held captive longer
because of the anti-war people,
the Kerrys, the Fondas and Haydens,
the names we knew over there -
they encouraged the enemy to hang on.”
Excerpt from “Stolen Honor” website
- Leo Thorsness
Former Vietnam POW
CLICK HERE

Jane Fonda tells the student audience at the Michigan State University in 1969:

"I would think that if you understood what communism was, you would hope,
you would pray on your knees, that we would someday become communist."


Joe Moore, Can Tho Airfield 550th Signal Company

Copy and paste the links to everyone you know.

Steve Pitkin Affadavit, August 31, 2004

http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/staticpages/index.php?page=PitkinAff

John F. Kerry Timeline of a traitor

http://www.archive-news.net/Kerry/JK_timeline.html

Kerry's disrespect in 1971
to USA Symbols Video

Windows Media
http://swift3.he.net/~swift3/medals.wmv

Real Player
http://swift3.he.net/~swift3/medals.rm

Quick Time
http://swift3.he.net/~swift3/medals.mov

AOL
http://swift3.he.net/~swift3/medals.mpg

Send this url for the online "The New Soldier" version

http://ejsmithweb.com/fr/newsoldier/

Send this url for the Stolen Honor website

http://www.stolenhonor.com/

[Ciexyz]

Fundamental truth...transcendental truth...core truth....Sheesh, this is getting deep.

Whatever happened to the olde journalistic ethos, "Provide light and the people will find their own way"???

[mylife]

It time to Take out the trash

Kerry,Rather, Jesse Jackson..the never ending list of folks who would shame america to make a point.

This country has wallowed through decades of shame at the hands of these cretins.

I say Enough!

[Tom_Busch]

bump

[BlessedByLiberty]

Wonderful article, thanks for posting it.

I hope Brit Hume assigns it to Juan Williams for homework this weekend.

[nickcarraway]

George Neumayr Ping

[McGavin999]

Didn't Kerry also get an early out? Seems to me he was supposed to finish out his time as an aide to an Admiral or something, and he opted out early too. Where is the info on that?

[Lancey Howard]

hope,
Thanks for posting the George Neumayr columns.
They are always great!

nickcarraway,
As always, thanks for the ping.
I do not want to miss anything written by George.

Regards,
LH

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for the ping.

This paragraph sums up the left wing mediots who were around during the days of Nam and Watergate:

"The audacity here is surreal, though typical of the post-1960s ends-justify-the-means moral arrogance Rather imbibed as a Watergate reporter. Presidents can't lie to journalists, according to this ethos, but journalists can lie to presidents, and even demand that presidents answer for the journalist's lies. Perhaps only Dan Rather could get caught out in a forgery and proceed to demand that President Bush answer the questions the forgery raises. According to Rather's moral calculus, forged documents shed light not on his lack of credibility but on the credibility of the president they slander."

Lets add one more dimension to these lying mediots. First they lie about our president. Then, they demand the president to respond to their lies. Then when he doesn't respond, they demand that he apologize to them and America for not responding to their lies. There is a left wing mediot who trolls on FR often yelling that GW never apologized for not answering their lies. Then we have embedden trolls who scream and demand that GW apologize for not responding nor apologizing to these mediot liars.

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for posting this excellent article where history is used to demostrate why we see this weird behavior from lunatic lefty mediots, like Blather.