CBS Independent Panel Review Credits Free Republic

foxnews ^ | 1/10/04 | CBS Investigatory Panel

[FreeTheHostages]

Check out the actual investigatory panel report -- it credits Free Republic (accurately) for first questioning the authenticity of thye documents. The actual investigatory report can be seen

[nicmarlo]

Did you all see this? The pajamahadeen has been mentioned in the CBS panel's report!!!

[Jenya]

As my favorite president once said, "There is no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." Ronald Reagan

This thread is about credit (notice the title). My point is that SINCE many people, on FR, tv, radio and elsewhere ARE crediting someone (Buckhead), let's give credit where credit is due. Tanker and Howlin deserve credit, ahead of Buckhead.

[crushelits]

B. September 8-9 - ; The Initial Attacks 60 Minutes Wednesday personnel were well aware that the September 8 Segmenta ddressed extremely sensitive issues - the incumbent President's TexANG service record in them midst of an increasingly bitter Presidential campaign. Indeed, Rather regarded the Segment as "radioactive."

Accordingly, senior personnel within CBS News, including those at 60 Minutes Wednesday, fully expected that there would be many critics. However, they seriously underestimated the ferocity of the assaults on the documents and CBS News'; alleged motives in airing the Segment.

The attacks on the September 8 Segment began virtually immediately. One of the first came on freerepublic.com, a website:

[E]very single one of these memos to file is in a proportionally spaced font, probably Palatino or Times New Roman. In 1972 people used typewriters for this sort of thing, and typewriters used monospaced fonts.
The use of proportionally spaced fonts did not come into common use for office memos until the introduction of laser printers, word processing software, and personal computers. They were not widespread until the mid to late 90’s. Before then, you needed typesetting equipment, and that wasn’t used for personal memos to file. Even the Wang systems that were dominant in the mid 80’s used monospaced fonts. I am saying these documents are forgeries, run through a copier for 15 generations to make them look old.85

This was followed on the morning of September 9 by further attacks, mostly by bloggers with a conservative agenda, challenging the authenticity of the documents. These included stories on Powerlineblog.com86 and littlegreenfootballs.com.87 Finally, by about 3 p.m., Matt Drudge, the author of the widely read Drudge Report website, had joined the fray, and, thereafter, the onslaught of attacks on the authenticity of the Killian documents was unrelenting.

The initial attacks on the Killian documents focused on several technical issues. First, many critics claimed that the superscript "th" in the May 4, 1972 and August 18, 1973 memoranda did not exist on typewriters in the early 1970s.88 Second, others questioned the authenticity of the Killian documents because they displayed proportional spacing, which was thought not to be widely available on typewriters used in the early 1970s and was not used on other TexANG records that were known to be authentic. A Washington Post reporter posed the
following question to CBS News on September 9:

85_ Harry MacDougald, Documents Suggest Special Treatment for Bush in Guard, Sept. 8, 2004,at:

http://freerepublic.com/focuslf-news/1210662/posts?q=1&&page=1

86_ See Powerline Wins, CBS Loses, Sept. 9, 2004, at http://powerlineblog.com/archives/2004-09.php. “Powerline” is
a Minnesota-based blog run by John Hinderaker and Scott Johnson, both of whom are attorneys.
87_See Bush Guard Documents: Forgeries?, Sept. 9, 2004 at http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog1?entry=12524
88_Heyward was concerned early on about the superscript “th” issue. Thus, in the early evening of September 9, he
had inquired of West: “What does Mapes say about the little ‘th’ that ABC mentioned?”

[FreeTheHostages]

This panel was supposedly formed to clear the air, to really get down to the nut of the matter. And IMHO the members of the panel were seated on the panel as de facto experts. And since experts are routinely called upon to interpret and draw conclusions from the facts at hand, I still think they pulled up short on an obvious issue.

Hmm, that's a pretty well-reasoned rebuttal to my position. I think that's somewhat persuasive. I'd still firmly disagree with those who say the panel found there wasn't bias: no such thing, panel said it couldn't prove it but that, in any event, there were unfair and very wrong things going on.

Cover up is always worse than the crime. Still CAN'T BELIEVE that CBS spent time after the airing trying to find more document experts to agree with them. I did think they were THAT stupid. Always thought of them as clever liberals. Did they think that their actions in that time frame wouldn't later be looked at?

[Darksheare]

Thanks!

[alancarp]

The irony of the day: CBS News releases its report that goes out of its way to say they erred while not admitting bias or overt partisanship while trying to trash the President's election hopes. The same evening, FreeRepublic.com will announce the Eagle Award recipients for 2005.

Meanwhile CNN will bury one of these stories and completely ignore the other.

[nicmarlo]

yw; I'm on lunch break and won't be online again till later....and, if you don't mind, ping me if there's any interesting developments on this. ty.

[FreeTheHostages]

Sorry, I thought your thread on the letter to CBS employees deserved a separate spot. Sorry it was pulled.

Well, you're invited to repost here if you wish. That CBS letter is a good public spanking. But this letter leave out the names of the employees who hired ONLY LIBERALS so that there was not DIVERSITY OF THOUGHT in the newsroom that WOULD HAVE STOPPED THIS ERROR. Time for another management conference at CBS, a summit on the issue: how can we avoid this problem in the future while hiring only liberals? Hmm, that's a tough nut to crack.

[FreeTheHostages]

Ah, I see, a thread about the letter is already right here:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1317728/posts

A good read.

[MeekOneGOP]

[Windcatcher]

"Still CAN'T BELIEVE that CBS spent time after the airing trying to find more document experts to agree with them. I did think they were THAT stupid. Always thought of them as clever liberals."

Look at what's cooking for these next four years:

1. Two or three Supreme Court nomimations (possible catastrophic effect on Roe v. Wade),

2. Any number of Federal judicial nominations,

3. Making the tax cuts permanent,

4. Possible *serious* tax reform, maybe even scrapping the income tax altogether for a *flat* sales tax,

5. Possible partial privatization of Social Security,

6. Possibly going after Syria and/or Iran, thus eliminating more of America's enemies,

7. Holding the line against China vis-a-vis Taiwan, and acting further to weaken the CCP,

8. Envirowackos can forget about the Kyoto treaty,

9. Possible drilling in ANWR,

10. No chance of furthering the lib Socialist agenda in general,

11. Federal support for faith-based groups and general rise of Christian groups nationwide,

12. Weakening of the Socialist hold on the public school system with No Child Left Behind (and hopefully school vouchers),

13. Continued opposition of Communism around the world (Venezuela will come to a head during this term as Chavez's term ends).

I could go on, but the point is that we were playing for all the marbles and they lost. They are capable of being extremely clever, but at this point they are panicked and unhinged. However, we shouldn't expect them to remain so for the next go-around.

[Darksheare]

Okers.
Not sure there will be any more interesting developments, but if there are there will likely be another thread and a bunch of pings.

[prairiebreeze]

by further attacks, mostly by bloggers with a conservative agenda, challenging the authenticity of the documents.

And why was it soooo important to insert these little details, hmmmmmm? Of course the libs wouldn't have mentioned it even if they did figure out the papers were forged. And poor See BS felt attacked. What a shame. NOT!

Who is Harry MacDougald? Anybody know?

[FreeTheHostages]

"I just hope Mapes' career is finished for good."

Oh, it is. I just finishing reading that section of the report about her. The panel basically tracks how her recollection is at variance with most other people in the production team, with her faulty memory always excusing herself or watering down her claims.

In short, her credibility is utterly shot.

(I wish CBS President's letter to employees had also expressly chided her for calling the Kerry campaign. That's just soooo brazen. Curiously, the letter doesn't mention this most important fact.)

[FreeTheHostages]

About this political bias issue, the tenth of the 10 points made in the executive summary of the panel's report about went wrong is: Maples' call to the Kerry campaign before error, which clearly gave "the appearance of political bias."

Although this was important enough to be mentioned at the top in the report's executive summary, this wrongdoing is not mentioned when the head of CBS issues his letter saying why he is firing her. Best not to call attention to this embarassment, probably.

[GRRRRR]

Not so fast...WHO created and passed on the FAKE Mammo's?

Enquiring minds and all that you know...


G

[airborne]

Let's not forget to mention our fearless leader...

Thanks Jim!

[airborne]

[dhs12345]

I am probably overly sensitive. Especially since Dan et. al. fought to the bitter end. Even though it was obvious that the documents were fakes.

I could understand the wording, if this report had been written prior to the findings.

However, since it was written after the investigation, I would expect the wording to be a bit more humble...with a tone of "the bloggers were right."

Right wing, left wing, middle of the road -- right is right and wrong is wrong. The implication is that if this story wasn't on our agenda, we conservatives wouldn't have cared.

Its a "right wing conspiracy" all over again.

[FreeTheHostages]

Good points. re Dan fighting "until the bitter end," you may be amused to note that the Panel records that Dan Rather's CURRENT point of view is that the story may be right -- that he went on air and said it was wrong at the behest of CBS management.

The panel indicates that they find this statement by Dan Rather "troubling."

The guy is quite possibly insane.