Posted on 11/30/2004 9:42:30 AM PST by HighWheeler
Seldom in the course of a Presidential campaign does a media drama upstage the election itself, but for a short while in September, Americans tuned out politics and tuned in to "The Decline and Fall of Dan Rather."
The drama began when CBS posted forged National Guard documents on its Web site and, that same evening, an attentive "Freeper" (a regular at the conservative FreeRepublic.com Internet site) named Buckhead raised suspicions of fraud.
From there, intrepid bloggers Powerlineblog.com and Little Green Footballs, the Woodward and Bernstein of Rathergate, began to document the mounting signs of forgery.
By the next afternoon, the country was abuzz. Rather and his supporters denounced those who questioned the credibility of the anti-Bush memos as "partisan political ideological forces." Former CBS News executive Jonathan Klein infamously dismissed the truth-telling bloggers as "a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas writing what he thinks." But thanks to the cyber sleuths, it was soon obvious that the memos were phony.
Rather then found himself under siege from the most unlikely of sources--other members of the mainstream media. ABC News and the Washington Post catalogued the anchor's duplicity: CBS had ignored warnings from its own experts, failed to interview relevant sources, and discarded any evidence that contradicted its preconceived anti-Bush version of events.
At one point, CBS attempted an our-evidence-is-false-but-our-attack-is-accurate defense. Rather suggested it was not he, but the President, who should answer tough questions. Eventually, CBS offered a half-hearted apology. But the damage was done. Rather's credibility was destroyed.
None of this would have happened just a few years earlier. As Glenn Reynolds, blogging host of Instapundit.com and law professor at the University of Tennessee, told one reporter, "CBS would have flashed the documents on TV for a few seconds and no one would have seen them again. Even the people with doubts would have assumed that CBS had done its legwork, as we did for years."
In the days when the establishment media had an iron grip on public discourse, it was almost impossible to challenge their biases. Dan Rather and company insisted they were simply objective observers, exemplary public servants untainted by political agenda or shoddy research. Now the public knows otherwise.
Are many bloggers politically motivated? Of course. But, unlike CBS, they are honest about it. And they must defend their opinions in a fiercely competitive marketplace of ideas.
That was rarely the case with the elite media, a closed and intellectually homogeneous priesthood whose members came to believe their opinions were Gospel truth.
This was not a complicated case: Within hours of CBS's airing of the story, some gifted amateurs in Middle-western suburbs had proven that the documents could not be genuine. CBS had enthusiastically embraced the flimsy claims that Bush had failed to live up to his National Guard duties simply because most everyone in the elite-media circle wanted to believe them.
Or, as the Los Angeles Times' editorial page pontificated: "CBS's real error was trying to prove a point that didn't need to be proved."
But as "The Decline and Fall of Dan Rather" showed, reporters who derive evidence from their political conclusions, instead of the other way around, won't have free rein anymore. Thanks to blogs and other "new" media, the prejudices of the old media princes will no longer go unquestioned.
It's about time.
Relax, J7 - it matters not what his cronies say about him. Just enjoy the fact that we had the last word!
Ping. I know we've read about all there is to say about Rathergate, but this one's good for the wrap up and pat on the back to the "New Media".
Ping
Is this a photo of the legendary Buckhead?
Ping, DW.
Cyber sleuths unite! hehehe Love it!
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C'est true. I'll settle for being Occasionally Right. :o)
Unfortunately you are mistaken here. There are many shutins and invalids who watched cbs because it had been a source of legitimate news. As they grew older, they did not move along with the technological chances and access things such as cable or the internet. They did not realize that cbs was so parisan because they had nothing against which to make that judgement. It was their fault to be sure, but it wasn't because they lacked the intellect, just the fear of something new. Even today, there are many who watch only cbs and are not aware of the facts behind the forged documents.
Congressman Billybob
Click for latest, "Jennings on Jeopardy! -- Nice Guys Do Finish First"
He's too busy trying to live down those tape recordings. Loofah, anyone?
Travis, that's a truly wonderful graphic of Jim and the lightening in a bottle that is FR. Jim, once again, my gratitude to you and FR knows no bounds. I think of FR as my town square.
I did not like Murrow and dropped out of network news with Comrade Cronkite.
Man, after viewing what those losers went through over the last ten months or so, I can understand why they're so bitter and suicidal!
I have to believe either in angels, or in a mole within the CBS/60 Minutes organization, miking that decision.
I do believe in miracles, but I also believe in hubris. What if the CBS maroon in charge of their website actually believed - because Rather and Co. wanted so badly to believe - that the 4 memos were real? They had the goods, and just post those memos! Delusion at it's finest.
Not in my lifetime, and that's been a while. Another requiem to Rather guys...
FGS
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