Posted on 09/15/2004 7:06:18 PM PDT by KStorm
Edited on 09/15/2004 7:13:48 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
DRUDGE SIREN:
CBS Guard Documents Traced to Texas Kinko's...
WASH POST: Documents allegedly written by deceased officer that raised questions about Bush's service with Texas National Guard bore markings showing they had been faxed to CBS News from a Kinko's copy shop in Abilene, Texas... Developing...
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
We at CBS have discovered evidence that the memo's may not be real. We cannot any longer validate their authenticity. However, we stick by the overall "essence" of the story based on our other research.
Never been to the Kinko's here, but once. I assume they just use a fax machine, not a computer with a fax modem to fax things.
Just a reminder to all that if you like freerepublic and want to contribute you can go to this link:
https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/
Check the dumpster for dog earred copy of AFM 35-13....
Nets Promote Burkett’s Charges Without
Noting Animosity to Bush
On Friday morning, as they had done on Thursday night, network stories and interview segments continued to feature book author James Moore and former Texas National Guard Lt. Colonel Bill Burkett, without bothering to note how Moore’s book has a definite anti-Bush agenda on the Iraq war, how a Friday Boston Globe story undermined Burkett’s claim that he witnessed efforts to “cleanse” Bush’s National Guard records and how Burkett is a member of a left-wing group, Veterans for Peace, and last year wrote a disgruntled screed blaming George W. Bush for his health problems.
As reported in the February 13 CyberAlert, CBS’s John Roberts devoted nearly an entire story on Thursday night to how “in a six-year-old letter to Texas lawmakers obtained by CBS News, and in the new book, Bush’s War for Reelection, former Guard officer Bill Burkett claims that in 1997, Guard commanders purged Mr. Bush’s records to 'make sure nothing will embarrass the Governor during his re-election campaign or if he runs for President.’” Roberts failed to note that the author is a left-wing Bush-basher whose book sets out to prove the illegitimacy of the Bush presidency and Iraq war.
Burkett also appeared Thursday night on MSNBC’s Hardball and together with Moore on CNN’s Paula Zhan Now.
For more about the CBS story and Moore’s agenda: www.mediaresearch.org
See other items in the same CyberAlert for coverage elsewhere.
The Moore/Burkett duo were also showcased Friday morning on CNN’s American Morning, where they were interviewed by Bill Hemmer, and Friday night on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher. In addition, stories on CBS’s Early Show and NBC’s Today featured Burkett’s allegation.
In none of these venues was Burkett’s political agenda recounted and only NBC’s Today, only after giving a full airing to Burkett’s claim, noted how the Boston Globe found a witness who contradicts him. “Doubts raised on Bush accuser: Key witness disputes charge by Guard retiree that files were purged,” read the Friday morning Boston Globe headline over a story which did not attract network interest. An excerpt from the February 13 article by Michael Rezendes:
For at least six years, a retired Texas National Guard officer has maintained that President Bush's record as a member of the Guard was purged of potentially embarrassing material at the behest of high-ranking Bush aides laying the groundwork for Bush's 2000 run for the presidency.
Retired Lieutenant Colonel Bill Burkett, who has been pressing his charges in the national news media this week, says he even heard one high-ranking officer issue a 1997 order to sanitize the Bush file, and later saw another officer poring over the records and discovered that some had been discarded.
But a key witness to some of the events described by Burkett has told the Globe that the central elements of his story are false.
George O. Conn, a former chief warrant officer with the Guard and a friend of Burkett's, is the person whom Burkett says led him to the room where the Bush records were being vetted. But Conn says he never saw anyone combing through the Bush file or discarding records.
"I have no recall of that," Conn said. "I have no recall of that whatsoever. None. Zip. Nada."
Conn's recollection also undercuts another of Burkett's central allegations: that he overheard Bush's onetime chief of staff, Joe M. Allbaugh, telling a Texas Guard general to make sure there were no embarrassments in the Bush record.
Burkett says he told Conn, over dinner that same night, what he had overheard. But Conn says that, although Burkett told him he worried that the Bush record would be sanitized, he never mentioned overhearing the conversation between Allbaugh and General Daniel James III.
Burkett's allegations about the Bush records come as the White House is attempting to answer mounting questions about whether Bush fulfilled his obligations as a member of the Texas Air Guard during the early 1970s. Burkett's allegations also will be a major focus of a book on Bush to be published next month.
But the book's author, James Moore, a former Houston TV news correspondent, concedes he never interviewed some of the key players who could have verified Burkett's charges, including Conn and retired National Guard Colonel John Scribner -- the officer Burkett says he saw removing items from the Bush file....
END of Excerpt
For the story in full: www.boston.com
As Clay Waters of the MRC’s TimesWatch.org cite noted on Thursday in critiquing a New York Times story which relayed Burkett’s claims, Slate's Eric Umansky, in his news summary column 'Today's Papers,’ found that “'the whistleblower has an axe to grind.’ Umansky links to a March 2003 piece from Burkett, which includes some conspiratorial rambling showing Burkett has, to put it mildly, some issues with Bush.”
Indeed, in a letter posted by Veteran for Peace, Burkett ranted (an excerpt):
....In January of 1998 and what seems like a full lifetime ago, I was stricken by a deadly case of meningoencephalitis. I was returning from a short duty trip to Panama as a team chief to inspect the hand over of Ft. Clayton to the Panamanians. I had been 'loaned' from the senior staff and state planning officer of the Texas National Guard to the Department of the Army for a series of these special projects after angering George W. Bush by refusing to falsify readiness information and reports; confronting a fraudulent funding scheme which kept 'ghost' soldiers on the books for additional funding, and refusing to alter official personnel records [of George W. Bush].
George W. Bush and his lieutenants were mad. They ordered that I not be accessed to emergency medical care services, healthcare benefits I earned by my official duty; and I was withheld from medical care for 154 days before I was withdrawn from Texas responsibility by the Department of the Army, by order of the White House....
I know GW Bush and his inner circle very well. As I said, a UN vote would not stop GW Bush from attacking Iraq. Nor will anything else. And weapons of mass destruction will be discovered in great quantities; but the entire affair will stink to high heavens because it will be as staged as the White House press conference you just viewed. The human death toll will publicly not be mentioned, yet in truth, it will far exceed 120,000....
Now I feel sickness that today another massive group of people, held worthless by this anointed king, will be trampled upon like grapes. But their blood will not be rendered into wine. It will be spilled into the sands of this desert or another, or on the streets of Washington, or in the halls of the US Congress, or in the courts....
We must now revert to the history of Europe to discern what to do. We must study the nemesis of France and how Napoleon was felled before understanding the damage a tyrant does to a nation and society. We must examine the ruthless and dictatorial rise of yet another of the three small men -- one whose name is not spoken out of fear of reprisal, but his name was Adolf.
END of Excerpt
The author identification at the end of the piece made clear how Burkett holds a grudge:
“Lt. Col. Bill Burkett completed 28 years of decorated service and was medically retired from the US Army National Guard in 1998 after suffering meningoencephalitis on return from an assignment in Panama. From 1995 until his illness, Burkett served as State Plans Officer for the Texas Army National Guard and Governor George W. Bush. After refusing to follow direct orders involving falsifying readiness reports, Burkett sought "whistleblower" status for reports involving anti-Semitic activity; personnel fraud; readiness fraud and the alteration of the personal military file of Governor George W. Bush. Lt. Col. Burkett is currently the plaintiff in his appeal to the US Supreme Court in the case of Burkett v. Goodwin, Taliaferro, Meador, et al, in regard to the retaliation against him following breaking the Bush records issue. Lt. Col Burkett served as a War Plans Officer during Operation Desert Storm and functioned as a senior trainer in conducting simulations exercises for deploying troops.”
That’s all online at: www.veteransforpeace.org
Nonetheless, the February 12 USA Today featured a story based on Burkett’s claims, “Ex-officer: Bush file's details caused concern.” See: www.usatoday.com
And on Friday morning the networks continued to take him seriously.
Norah O'Donnell proclaimed on NBC’s Today: “As the White House has yet to release the President's complete military record, there are new questions about whether or not officials close to Mr. Bush tried to remove files that could embarrass him. The allegation is that when Mr. Bush was governor, preparing for a run for President, his advisors tried to scrub clean Mr. Bush's military files.”
Joseph Allbaugh, former Bush Chief-of-Staff: “Absolutely false, purely hogwash. That's all it is: hogwash.”
O'Donnell: “Joe Allbaugh was then-Governor Bush's chief of staff. He admits he did call the head of the Texas National Guard to get a hold of Bush's records.”
Allbaugh: “I think the Governor was more interested at the time to just to see what the records look like, they're my records, I want to take a look at them.”
O'Donnell: “But Allbaugh strongly denies charges published in a new book. Retired Lieutenant Colonel Bill Burkett alleges that in 1997, he overheard Allbaugh asking the Texas Guard commander to remove items that could discredit Mr. Bush.”
Burkett: “The comment that probably concerned me a little was, 'make sure there wasn't anything that embarrassed the Governor.’”
O'Donnell: “Burkett also alleges he later saw papers from Mr. Bush's records in a trash can.”
Allbaugh: “I don't know who this fellow is, never heard of him before, but his charges are groundless, they're baseless, they're false. He's got an outstanding record that he's proud of. He served, end of story.”
Burkett: “This is not political to me. I don't have a grudge, I'm just telling what I saw.”
O'Donnell finally got to doubts, but only in her conclusion: “But today, new doubts about Burkett's charges: A key witness to some of the events described by Burkett tells the Boston Globe that the central elements of his story are false. This witness says he never saw papers thrown in the trash.”
Then why give such air time to his charges?
Over on Friday’s Early Show on CBS, the MRC’s Brian Boyd noticed, Julie Chen touted how “there are new questions about the President's time in the National Guard, including allegations that someone tried to doctor the books.”
After noting the White House’s release the day before of dental records to show Bush was in Alabama, Bill Plante gave air time to Burkett: “In another development, a former officer in the Texas Air National Guard claims that in 1997 he overheard a request to the Guard from Governor Bush's staff to review Mr. Bush's service file to quote 'make sure nothing will embarrass the governor.'"
Bill Burkett, Texas National Guard, retired: "I was troubled sufficiently within my own conscience that there was possibly an effort here to cast an image that was better maybe than the individual's record."
Plante: "Burkett says he later saw some of the Bush records in the trash. White House officials dismiss Burkett's claim saying it would make no sense to destroy the records since there were duplicates in Washington. Joe Allbaugh was Governor Bush's Chief-of-Staff at the time."
Joe Allbaugh: "I'm offended at this charge. I don't know who he is, I don't know where he's coming from and it's total hogwash."
Plante concluded: "Many pilots who were at that Alabama base at the same time that the President was supposed to have served there say to reporters that they don't remember ever seeing him. And the White House is trying, so far unsuccessfully, to come up with someone who served with Mr. Bush in 1972 or '73.”
CNN’s Bill Hemmer, on Friday’s American Morning, the MRC’s Ken Shepherd observed, did not raise the Globe story and allowed Moore and Burkett to proclaim their independence.
Hemmer: “Mr. Moore, and to Mr. Burkett, would you classify yourselves as Democrats or Republicans?”
Moore: “I voted for George W. Bush on three occasions, every time I had a chance to vote for him as Governor in Texas, and for President of the United States. I’ve been sucker punched, just like everybody in America. I trusted him. He has betrayed my trust as a Texan and as an American. I won’t vote for him again.”
Hemmer: “Mr. Burkett?”
Burkett: “As a management consultant and a soldier, let me be clear, as a Lieutenant Colonel, all the way through private in one direction and through General in the other direction, you’re not supposed to be a Republican or a Democrat. You’re supposed to be a soldier. You’re supposed to be a patriot and yo’'re supposed to be a citizen of this nation and you salute Presidents of both parties. And you work for Presidents. But it should be clear, however, that I worked for to make President, excuse me, Governor George W. Bush a hero, to improve the Texas National Guard. I, in essence, was supporting a Republican Governor.”
Compare that to Burkett’s Veterans for Peace diatribe quoted earlier in this CyberAlert item.
Easy on that coffee - it can make you a little jittery! ;-)
Abilene is REAGAN country. At the moment it is loaned out to Bush.
I'm sorry, this thread has nearly a 1000 posts and I'm not going to pretend I'm the first to ask this question but I'm not reading every one of these posts.
So here it is. Can someone tell me where Mapes works and then draw a line on a map from Baird to her assignment desk and see if that line intersects Abilene?
Do some research on Ben Barnes.
To quote Vito Corleone in "The Godfather"
"Salazzo's a pimp. I didn't know until just now that it was Barzini all along."
FReepamerica - what a country, eh?
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