Everyone at CBS Should Be Breathing a Sigh of Relief

OK, here's the deal. I got a guy who cooked up fake memos, another guy who will lie about their credibility, and a retired general who will back up the story. He's dead, but we have the seance on tape. (Morley did the voice. What a ham!) The Kerry campaign is ready to go with the "Fortunate Son" ad campaign to piggyback on the AWOL theme. You end the segment by saying, "And the story is, as they say in a one-hour Texas Photomat, developing." That'll be the cue for everyone to wipe the hard drives. Oh, and I had the guy who faked the memos "disappeared" in a scuba accident. Don't worry, I outsourced it and billed it as "catering." Love, Mary

You are as hard-working as an Oklahoma toad in a button-polishing contest, and I'm happy as a horse who inherited a peanut butter factory. After 17 attempts to smear Bush with a fabricated charge, it looks as if we may finally have something that sticks like Juicy Fruit on the Alamo wall. Keep in touch. Dan

But maybe that's good. Maybe skepticism should be the final reaction to CBS' internal report on Memogate.

There's also room for a little gratitude: It wasn't quietly sneaked out on a Friday night. It named names and collected scalps. Four CBS employees were heaved out the window. Some sort of commission will be set up to safeguard the precious remaining ounces of the network's credibility, which are now in a vial in a safe. Win-win. Move along.

What caused CBS to run with this story? A raging, untrammeled desire to see George W. Bush driven from office in a hail of jeers and dead cats? Oh, heavens no.

"Myopic zeal," as one CBS executive put it. A desire to get the story out quickly. Not that they had any intention of affecting the election -- such a thing was unthinkable. It was just good business to get the story, because there might be another nut out there with another set of forged documents, talking to ABC. No bias here! If we're guilty of anything, it's good ol' fashioned enthusiasm!

This is hard to swallow. In 2004, "60 Minutes" was a showcase for anti-Bush authors; you wouldn't have been surprised to see Barney the Dog show up touting a bark-all book called "He Feeds Me Cigarettes: Observations on a Cruel Master."

The report would have been satisfying if it had squarely faced the issue of bias, and ferreted out every last contact between producer Mary Mapes and the Kerry campaign. But its authors didn't dare, either from unease with the truth or disbelief that journalists might have agendas. Those Fox guys, sure. And Armstrong Williams, it now seems.

But Dan Rather? The man's so fair he rotates his metaphors to reflect all 50 states!

The report did note that some who helped unmask the forgeries had agendas of their own. Which is relevant how, exactly? If an atheist proves that the face of the Virgin Mary on a Krispy Kreme was actually drawn with a Sharpie, this doesn't mean the doughnut's holy.

True, pro-Bush bloggers may have been more suspicious than those who think Bush spends his days leashed and curled at Karl Rove's feet -- but they were right, and that's what counted in the end. If partisanship made some unusually suspicious, might it also have made others unduly credulous?

The CBS report can't bring itself, even now, to say the documents were unquestionably bogus. Rather himself told the investigating panel that "no one had provided persuasive evidence that the documents were not authentic." This is like floating in the North Atlantic, clinging to a White Star Line life preserver, and asking for proof that the Titanic ever existed in the first place.

Dan, please. Be grateful the report went as far as it did, because it ended the story for all practical purposes. Be grateful it didn't go further, lest CBS News be seen retrospectively as the entertainment wing of the Democratic National Committee.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1224680/posts?page=155#155

To: MeekOneGOP; Slip18; Argh; xsmommy; Gabz; VRWCmember

BALLAD OF DAN RATHER

(Think "Beverly Hillbillies" theme song)
Come and listen to my story 'bout a man named Dan,
The documents were fake and he didn't give a dam*;
He put 'em on the air, an' he thought he'd done the job,
But up from the web come a howlin' mob.
Blogs, that is.
Web logs.
Checkin' facts.
Well, the first thing you know ol' Dan's a-runnin' fast;
Made a false report an' it bit him in the a$$;
He said 'dog-gonnit, I done thought I'd get away!'
But it turned out to be his a-reckonin' day.
Busted, that is.
Red-faced.
Mud in the eye.
Well, now it's time to say goodbye to Dan and all his men;
And they would like to shoot you folks for turnin' them in;
You're all invited back next week to watch the Evening News,
And see which correspondent's picked to fill Dan's empty shoes.
Y'all come back, now, hear?

155 posted on 09/23/2004 4:15:51 PM CDT by TheGrimReaper

Media Research Center:
Dan Ra^ther on Bill Clinton:
"I think he’s an honest man."
   O’Reilly: "I want to ask you flat out, do you think President Clinton’s an honest man?"
    Ra^ther: "Yes, I think he’s an honest man."
    O’Reilly: "Do you, really?"
    Ra^ther: "I do."
    O’Reilly: "Even though he lied to Jim Lehrer’s face about the Lewinsky case?"
    Ra^ther: "Who among us has not lied about something?"
    O’Reilly: "Well, I didn’t lie to anybody’s face on national television. I don’t think you have, have you?"
    Ra^ther: "I don’t think I ever have. I hope I never have. But, look, it’s one thing-"
    O’Reilly, jumping in: "How can you say he’s an honest guy then?"
    Ra^ther: "Well, because I think he is. I think at core he’s an honest person. I know that you have a different view. I know that you consider it sort of astonishing anybody would say so, but I think you can be an honest person and lie about any number of things."
    O’Reilly: "Really?!?"
    Ra^ther: "Yeah, I do."
    O’Reilly: "See, I can’t. I want my government to be honest across-the-board. I don’t want people lying."

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