But this was months before. He had trouble getting through. Somewhat later Mapes comes along and Burkett gets her to phone the Kerry team as his end of the quid pro quo. Mapes wants us to believe that she never mentioned the memos in that call. Lockhart wants us to believe that in his three to four minute call he didn't mention the memos. My point is that Mapes had to have mentioned the memos to Lockhart for him to give Burkett the time of day. When Mapes tells Lockhart that Burkett is "helpful, very helpful", she had to have mentioned the memos. There's the connection. Also --- Why Kinkos instead of just handing them from Burkett to Mapes?
Why Kinkos instead of just handing them from Burkett to Mapes?
According to Burkett, he stored the ''documents'' at a location about 100 miles from his ranch, so possibly he didn't have the papers in his possession when he talked to Mapes? From the USA Today article:
After keeping the copies for a couple of days, he said he drove to a location he would not specify, about 100 miles from his ranch, to put them ''in cold storage.'' Burkett said he took the action because he believed the papers were politically explosive and made him nervous. ''I treated them like absolute TNT,'' he said. ''They looked to me like they were devastating.''
Then again, do we really know WHO faxed the papers? Could be Mapes or someone picked them up from Burkett at his ranch & eagerly faxed them to NYC...as in really anxious to deliver the goods to Dan?
I'm not clear on that, either:
Source: USA Today
Headline: CBS backs off Guard story
Author: Moniz and Johnson reported from Texas, Drinkard from Washington. Contributing: Blake Morrison
Date: 21 SEP 2004
LINK, print version
Ultimately, Burkett decided to turn over the documents to one of the most persistent journalists, CBS producer Mary Mapes, sometime in August. He and his wife met Mapes and CBS reporter Mike Smith at a pizza restaurant a few miles from their ranch. At first he gave them only two of the six documents, which Mapes said she planned to have analyzed for authenticity, according to Burkett.
Burkett said he passed the rest of the documents to Smith around Sept. 5, at a drive-in restaurant near Baird.