BOB WOODWARD'S WAR STORIES

New York Post ^ | 4/20/04

[kattracks]

April 20, 2004 -- The chattering class is focused firmly on a new book by Bob "Watergate" Woodward, which purports to be a behind-the-scenes look at how - and why - America went to war in Iraq. "Plan of Attack" has won major publicity via carefully leaked tidbits and anecdotes. Careful readings of the book itself had to wait, since it wasn't widely available until yesterday.

[DustyMoment]

Woodward's book is little more than unsubstantiated innuendo by a leftist journalist whos previous national best seller led to Nixon's resignation. Woodward pulled the same stunt in that book, relying an a (still) unidentified source (Deep Throat) for the bulk of his "information. In this current book, Woodward identifies only 1 source out of the 75 he claims to have identified.

IMO, this book, like Richard Clarke's, lack credibility and doesn't deserve the leftist press fawning over it as they have done. IOW, there is no "here" here.

[DustyMoment]

My bad.

whos = whose

2nd use of "identified" = interviewed.

Where's my coffee?

[devolve]

Beltway media rumors are floating around now that Bob Woodward's "un-named sources" and claims that certain high WH persons and staff said certain things are going to blow up in Woodward's face and cast more new doubt on the Watergate "reporting methods" and book and movie that followed.

Bob Woodward will keep embellishing his tales "GW physically grabbed Rumsfield by the collar" and such infantile blather to Mike Wallace and King and others until he is way over his head attempting to pump up his new book sales until it all gets dumped on him and his writing and WP career will be in the dumper and he, Bernstein, and the WP will be shown up to be biased lying political hacks.

Another notable was his conversation with Mike Wallace about GW not being "an intellectual" (GW was known at college as "Data Boy" for his memory and recall.) or "an elite".

I don't see Bob Woodward or Mike Wallace on the MENSA membership list, just like Slick, Hillary, and Kerry are also missing.....

The lib DC/NYC attitude really turns off the "hick flyover" Americans.

Well, thanks to a few people at Gannett, that is a little something to watch.

There are more than a few journalists that are fed up with the Woodward style of print reporting with no footnotes used in priming and creating and pumping and selling fiction novels and waiting for Bob to fall from grace.

By the bye, Woodward's increasingly hesitant mental and vocal style beats much similiarity to one with medical problem such as stroke and diminished mental capacity; the theatrical flourishes can be done by any Bowery wino or druggie.

Bad habits take their terrible toll eventually.

The neurons just ain't gettin' it anymore.

It's check out time for Bob Woodward.

Nixon's revenge.



The bio on Bob will be a killer.

[jammer]

Obviously you weren't of age during the Watergate years. Your other assertions aside, Woodward and Bernstein wrote articles in the Washington post almost daily, but there was no book until later. The revelations leading to the resignation were newspaper articles.

[Hillarys Gate Cult]

So now Kerry's campaign is only running off of excerpts from Bob Woodward's book. It really pathetic.

-Rush Limbagh from yesterday's show.

[DustyMoment]

Obviously you weren't of age during the Watergate years.

Thanks so much for the compliment. Not only was I of age, I actually knew what was going on. I am well aware of W&B's columns, but the article is about W's book and that's what I limited my comments to. That way I get to compare apples to . . . well, apples!

[jammer]

Okay, I was just challenging that "All the President's Men" led to the resignation. It could be argued that it did--it was published in June before the August hearings (I believe). What I remember was the steady drip, drip, drip over almost two years that eroded support and led to the hearings.

Ironically, Woodward was, as I recall, a Republican, a RINO, I'm sure, but then that was typical of the Rockefeller establishment Republicans, with only the Goldwater/Reagan right about to blossom; looked at in most any way, Nixon was a statist liberal.

[Balata]

In other words, the war in Iraq - like the military campaign that ousted the Taliban from power in Afghanistan as a direct response to 9/11 - was grounded in a consistent U.S. policy enunciated by presidents of both parties.

This is a message that needs to get out to the voters. I'm sure it doesn't set too well with the liberal media, though.

[GailA]

bobby boy has had a problem with telling the truth in his books in the past. click here

[sirchtruth]

C. Powell is denying all the B.S. from Woodward's fantasy writing. And furthermore Bush encouraged Powell to speak to Woodward.

So Woodward takes these "quotes" and completly misinterprets there meanings to try and make the Bush adm look bad...This book will be in the heap before it's even released!

[MoralSense]

I reviewed Woodward's last book, "Bush at War," and I don't remember a thing about his remarkable "access" revealing any of this stuff. Remarkable, isn't it? Supposedly he was right there at the time that the Bush administration was already planning to attack Iraq -- during the campaign against the Taliban -- and he wrote nothing about it.

[iopscusa]

Woodward is a hack has been and never more than a compulsive liar as most of his Leftist brethan. The Cosmic justice is that the more seen of this type the more everyone sees exactly their agenda. Their day of reckoning approaches.

[DustyMoment]

Well, we agree that the two years of non-stop assault out of W&B did not help preserve Nixon's position. By the same token, Nixon wasn't helping himself, either. He did too much stonewalling and had an ongoing battle with the press, who detested him more than any previous Republican president in memory. IMO, Nixon's domestic policies were a disaster and only his foreign policies in partnership with Kissinger did anything to salvage even a portion of his presidency with voters - but he did nothing to endear himself to them.

That, Watergate and W&B all combined to doom whatever hopes he had left of leaving the WH with his reputation intact. However, to his credit, Nixon was able to overcome a lot of the damage done to his reputation by Watergate, etc., and was laid to rest being thopught of relatively well as an elder statesman.

[devolve]

Woodward is living 30 years in the distant past.

He has walked into a swamp this time; with the internet and talk radio and endless archives available to anyone on the web he is now subject to instant fact checking and exposure.

The topper was the idiotic prattle between Woodward and Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes with Wallace playing the dancing monkey as Woodward cranked the music out of his organ for the liberal "street".

"GW is not an intellectual!"

"GW is not an elite!"

It was a mutual porn act between them.

And aren't we tired of self-proclaimed and self-annointed "Philosopher-Kings" who know all and expect to rule all.

Time will forget those insignificant fools quickly.

Miss Cleo has more credibility!

Don't call us Bob, we'll call you......

[OESY]

Woodward has a rather bad track record for credibility, as others have pointed out, stemming from his "composite" Deep Throat (I won't reveal my source until I die?) or Bill Casey, Director of Central Intelligence, who allegedly revealed embarrassing secrets to Woodward on his deathbed when he was not able to talk to anyone else (or refute what Woodward wrote). There have already been too many denials by the principals in his latest book, but Woodward will never change. He is too well protected by a liberal media that never holds him to account.

[Spotsy]

Woodward's increasingly hesitant mental and vocal style beats much similarity to one with medical problem such as stroke and diminished mental capacity; the theatrical flourishes can be done by any Bowery wino or druggie.

I vote diminished mental capacity.

Woodward doesn't know that Bush was making fun of him with the "you travel in elite circles." LOL!! Ol' Bob thought Bush was complimenting him.

I liked the Rummy-collaring story too. No doubt this is intended to corroborate Clarke's "Bush manhandled me and pushed into a little room" story to give the impression that all of these books are telling their readers the absolute truth.

[TUX]

This is a new front in the leftist propaganda war. The leftist TV and print media are suffering from loss of credibility, circulation, ratings, and most importantly profits(the word lefty's loath). So the new twist is write a book then publicize the smear parts. Gives the propagandist arms length plausible denial of the lies. The only problem is that many of the books are funded by the same companies as media pushing them. Great technique if the straight media and John Q public will let them get away with it.

[jammer]

Agree with everything you say.

[PhilDragoo]