Posted on 09/19/2004 4:09:08 AM PDT by beyond the sea
..............In the years that CBS producer Mary Mapes has been pursuing this story, she never contacted Lt. Col. Jerry Killian's secretary, Marian Carr Knox, until after her existence was revealed by the Drudge Report. On 60 Minutes on Wednesday, Knox said that the documents were forgeries, but the content was accurate.
Mapes interviewed Killian's widow Marjorie Connell and his son Gary. Both expressed doubt to the CBS producer that the documents were real. Neither of them have appeared on the network nor even been mentioned in CBS's reporting.
CBS' own experts have moved away from the authenticity of the documents. One of the experts consulted was Emily Will, a veteran document examiner from North Carolina. She told ABC News that she sent Mapes an e-mail message about her concerns and strongly urged the network the night before the broadcast not to use the documents.
She said, "I told them that all the questions I was asking them on Tuesday night, they were going to be asked by hundreds of other document examiners on Thursday if they ran that story."
If Rather was informed of the doubts, he ignored them, plunging his network into a quagmire. The veteran anchor forged ahead because, as he stated on Wednesday's broadcast, that the charges are so charges are so serious, the evidence of little importance.
His confidence in Mapes may have led him to go with the story, despite the red flags. After all, it was Mapes who brought CBS the Abu Ghraib photos of prisoner abuse and who risked jail by refusing to turn over videotapes of Rather's interview with a man charged in the 1998 dragging death of James Byrd, Jr. in Jasper, Texas.
But Mapes' father sees a political agenda behind his daughter's work. Don Mapes, 76, was a recent guest on a radio talk show hosted by John Carlson on KVI in Seattle.
He said, "I'm really ashamed of what my daughter has become. She's a typical liberal. She went into journalism with an ax to grind, and that was to promote radical feminism."
He confessed to being disappointed in his daughter's role in the controversy. He said, "When I heard about 60 Minutes, I suspected she would be the producer of the show."
In an interview with Talon News, Don Mapes said his suspicion was because that he believed, "Dan Rather and she have been working on this ever since Bush was elected."
In commenting on the Wednesday's 60 Minutes show, he said, "It was a farce, it was fraud. I'm sorry as a father that my daughter was the producer of it."
His fatherly instinct showed through when he said, "To give her the benefit of the doubt, I believe she has been had."
But he also chastised his daughter for being intellectually dishonest.
He said, "She ought to look closer at George Soros or Michael Moore."
Mary Mapes declined several opportunities to comment for this article.
Good lord. She does put the U back in ugly. No wonder we exported her butt out of state.
"Rather spoke at a fundraiser in Travis County(Austin)...Abilene is near Bill Burkett's home in Baird"
And your point is...?
I don't think people quite realize how big Texas is. Travis County (Austin) is a hell of a long way from Baird in Callahan County or Abilene in Taylor County (approximately 228 miles or 51/2 hours by car.
While the distance isn't unusual for Texans to cover, I don't see the significance.
Accuracy isn't important?..It was not meant as critical to the story, but only as a correction to the site of the Rather fundraiser..
Sorry. but the post wasn't clear that this was a reply to another post or a criticism of the comments in the story. It simply looked like a stand alone comment and I didn't see the point.
Actually, it's pretty common for such ideologues to be less concerned with those sorts of things than in promoting their own brand of hate. These are the kind of diehards who are still shouting "Sieg Heil!" as their convictions are announced at Nuremburg.
The AWB Has Expired - Gun Owners Have Won Again For All Americans!
People with a great deal to lose, frequently do seemingly stupid things' the Enron executives, Martha Stewart, Leona Helmsley, for example.
It is because at some point they decided they do not have to follow the rules like everyone else. When they get caught, it can be over something trival.
I wonder what other stories Rather has "fudged' on? "The Wall Within" was debunked and that was years ago.
OK, I'll bite. What is Ms. Mapes still hiding in those tapes?
The AWB Has Expired - Gun Owners Have Won Again For All Americans!
That Mapes was working on this story for five years is a farce. Killian's son and wife were only contacted two weeks before the story broke. I'd like to shine a bright light on Mapes.
A redundancy. Or is that one of them big werdz us booger-eatin fascist nazi moron rite-winggers aint suppost to know?
I perceive that I have offended your sense of appropriate posting. I simply corrected a mistake in the site of the fundraiser and it seems to have interrupted your focus on the main story...I'm sorry to have distracted you..
"Christmas at the Mapes house this year might be a little tense."
He has said previously that he hasn't seen his daughter in years.
Bravo!
Not really true always. When I got out of college, and back from my military duty, I used marijuana and some LSD for a while. It stimulated my curiosity for learning in many directions. I read and learned much about philosophy, anthropology, history, etc. Will Durant, the philosopher and historiasn, became my greatest interest. It really was a positive for me and many of my friends.
Perhaps one of the keys to successful drug use and not drug abuse is the age, background, and maturity of the person taking the drug.
Your statement is an over simplification, but I understand your sentiment.
He as overly colored everything to the left on the news for decades. He's a lefty liar, and he's going down.
He will be remembered by the great majority of America and the world as a pompous, biased, lying fool. Good! Just what the scumball deserves! His righteous tone of voice which he continually uses is sickening.
Like my momma said, you can pick your friend, but you can't pick you family.
Yeh, a bunch of "partisan political operatives" in pajamas at "FreeRepublic, a bastion of right-wing lunacy".
LOL!
Very true....
Rather presented the case as a prosecutor...and the burden of proof is on him...The defense was started on FR..spread through bloggers, questioning the validity of the evidence. Now licensed document examiners, reporters, main stream media and of course people who worked with Killian have said the evidence is fabricated..
Jury is in..Rather is guilty of prosecutorial misconduct.His investigators are exposed as frauds, his documents are frauds...Mapes is toast.
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