Perhaps some of you should have read What the National Review observed re: Drudge's report:
CNN's Michael Ware Responds to Heckling Report Via Drudge, which broke the story [ McCain heckled by CNN reporter Sun Apr 01 2007 13:50:38 ET], CNN correspondent Michael Ware responded today to charges that he heckled Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham at a Baghdad press conference. On CNN's American Morning, Soledad O'Brien asked Ware if the charges were true. He responded:
WARE: Well, let's bear in mind that this is a report that was leaked by an unnamed official of some kind to a blog somewhere on the Internet. No one has gone and put their name forward. We certainly haven't heard McCain say anything about it or any of his staff come forward to say anything about it. I did not heckle the Senator. Indeed, I didn't say a word. I didn't even ask a question. In fact, when I raised my hand to ask a question, the press conference abruptly ended. So what I was suggest is that anyone who has any queries about whether I heckled, watch the videotape.
Leaving aside the absurdity of anyone from the press disparaging reports attributed to "unnamed officials," Ware's denial — daring those who doubt him to watch the tape — is fairly convincing. One surmises that eventually the tape will be put on Youtube, and eventually bloggers of all stripes will be analyzing it like the Zapruder film for evidence of heckling. Ware must know that. So is it possible that he's lying? I suspect we'll soon find out.
And, unfortunately for Drudge, who has once more passed along garbage without even attempting to determine the supposed witness, the
Bill Maher interview with Michael Ware is on YouTube. He obviously made a joke with Maher at the beginning about "I am drinking now." In his portion of the ten-minute segment, Ware is obviously sober. What a piece of dreck Drudge is, garbage in and garbage out. This reminds me of Drudge's famous siren special of 2000, "Bush Drunk at Wedding" video.