ABC: 9/11 Miniseries "Locked and Ready"
09/01 03:42 PM - The Markup
I followed up on Andy's Corner post this morning by calling ABC, and was told by a spokeswoman that the "Path to 9/11" miniseries is "locked and ready to air," and that she hadn't heard anything about a pressure campaign to reopen the editing process. She said that she would check around and get back to me, but that a lot of people have already left for vacation. I'll post updates if they come, but it looks like "Path" is safe from Clinton mischief for now.
http://media.nationalreview.com/
ABC's "The Path to 9/11"
Posted by Hugh Hewitt | 3:10 PM
Andy McCarthy is hearing that fans of the feckless Clinton Adminstration are unhappy with ABC's "The Path to 9/11" which airs on the nights of September 10th and 11th, and he fears that last minutes editing will be performed to keep the former president happy.
I am skeptical. For one thing, that sort of Soviets-on-top-of-the-Kremlin doctoring of photos, or in this case, films in the can would disgust even left-wing Hollywood.
On a more practical note. I, and I am sure many others, have been sent the entire six hour program to preview and review, which I will be doing over the weekend. Edits post-distribution of the review DVDs would invite scrutiny of the very portions sent down the black hole, underscoring the episodes the censors hoped to hide.
No, I don't think ABC would injure its brand that way, and certainly not when they couldn't get away with it.
Instapundit concurs: "It seems to me that enough people have previewed it already that the consequences for ABC of making changes at this point would be disastrous."
The early reviews are very strong for the docudrama based on the 9/11 Commission report. The friends of Bill may not like the truth, but they have to live with it
http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/
FWIW: I'd ask one more question: When was the last editing done?
I agree that an eleventh-hour edit is out of the question - too many reviewers DVDs are in circulation, too many people have seen the original version by now. If ABC tried to hack it up now, there would be a huge firestorm of protest.
Really, Clinton's (and ABC's) only hope now is to spike the whole thing. And this is what I think they'll do, in about a week or so. After spending the next week angrily denying that Clinton ever even called them, while the DNC's flying monkeys make the media rounds screaming that the whole Clinton story was another right-wing Republican lie, they'll come up with some BS about how they've decided, based on the e-mails and calls they've gotten, that "the American people just aren't ready" for this miniseries and that "to foster closure and healing we really should be looking forward and not back." They won't be able to completely stuff the sh!t back into the goose, but they can makes sure that only a few conservatives will ever see it, and that they can laugh off and marginalize.
Frankly, I don't believe for even a second that the ABC spokeswoman quoted here hadn't heard a peep about a pressure campaign to change the miniseries. Sorry, this story has been all over the world by now, thanks to Rush and Drudge. ABC has to have been getting swamped with phone calls and e-mails from both sides, and for someone in the role of a spokesperson to claim complete ignorance of that strains credibility way beyond the breaking point. She was stonewalling; I'll bet if some Kommie had talked to her right after that, she would have assured him that the network is "carefully reviewing its position" on showing the miniseries as-is. That makes me suspect that ABC is even now looking for a way out of showing it.