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CBS reports eFing has a cold and has lost his voice. Yet, with CBS's track record, inquiring minds want to know what the real reason is...

The fallout from CBS's doomed story about President Bush's National Guard service most endangers a woman few viewers know but who played a key role in two of the biggest television stories of the year. Mary Mapes, a veteran producer at CBS News, reported most of the National Guard story, including obtaining the documents CBS now says it can't authenticate. She also passed on the phone number of her source, former Texas National Guard officer Bill Burkett, to the Kerry campaign. ... CBS acknowledged Mapes passed on Burkett's number to Kerry adviser Joe Lockhart, and Lockhart called him. Spokeswoman Kelli...

"...It is also not the first time that Mapes has agreed to be a go-between in a controversial setting. FOX News has obtained a letter written to Mapes by the warden of a high security federal prison in Colorado. He accused the CBS producer of concocting a scheme to help secretly pass information between convicted white supremacist Peter Langan (search) and another federal prisoner, a violation of federal regulations..."

UPDATE 12: In the August 18, 1973 memo "discovered" by 60 Minutes, Jerry Killian purportedly writes: Staudt has obviously pressured Hodges more about Bush. I'm having trouble running interference and doing my job. But wait! Reader Amar Sarwal points out that General Staudt, who thought very highly of Lt. Bush, retired in 1972.The more I look at these "memos," the more obvious it appears that they are inept forgeries. Posted by The Big Trunk at 07:51 AM | Permalink | TrackBack (212)

OP-ED COLUMNIST Whoever, having devised any scheme or artifice to defraud transmits or causes to be transmitted by means of wire, radio or television communication in interstate or foreign commerce, any writings for the purpose of executing such scheme or artifice, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both. " U.S. Criminal Code, Chapter 63, Section 1343. WASHINGTON — At the root of what is today treated as an embarrassing blunder by duped CBS journalists may turn out to be a felony by its faithless sources. Some person or persons conceived a scheme...

MIDI - MARY TYLER MOORE Who chose to use a forgery Who spent five years and thought she'd fool the viewers so easily Well, it's Mary Mapes, and we know it She had a good job but, oh man, did she blow it With the DNC she had been scheming She will be the one who gets a reaming Martha, your cellmate's on the way

Why did the Max Cleland connection fall out of the forged document story? Cleland admitted that he is the one who directed Burkett to the Kerry campaign, and talk to him while he was in Texas trying to deliver a letter to Bush. It seems he might have been the “impeachable source” either him or the Kerry campaign. CBS’s Mapes called Lockhardt not to pass Burkett’s phone number, but to thank them for the forged documents, in my opinion. Why don’t we hear Max Cleland’s name in this story anymore? Holtz JeffersonRepublic.com

Guys, we need to keep the pressure on C-B.S. affiliates. It's working (see the article below), and it may determine the fate of Dan Rather and Mary Mapes. Media fear '60' fallout Tue Sep 21, 6:21 PM ET Pamela McClintock, STAFF Frustration and ire gripped CBS News on Tuesday, with staffers and the main "60 Minutes" newsmag trying to distance themselves from the scandal that has embroiled the spinoff edition of the show. Across the country, CBS affiliates continued to be bombarded with mail from viewers expressing their outrage over Dan Rather in particular and the journalistic debacle in general....

Last week, as the furor over Dan Rather's National Guard memos grew more and more intense, media critic Ken Auletta, appearing on PBS, criticized Fox News Channel for having "treated this story as if it were Watergate. It's not Watergate." Actually, in many respects, it is indeed broadcast journalism's Watergate.... There are two serious problems with this entire episode, beyond the obvious blow to CBS News' credibility. One is Rather's defensive — even accusatory — reaction to any and all questions about the documents' legitimacy.... First, they refused to consider any questions whatsoever — even from respected news organizations —...

.........CBS will have a much harder time getting past this part of the story: ''60 Minutes'' producer Mary Mapes put its source, Mr. Burkett, in touch with a ranking leader in the John Kerry campaign ... even passed on his telephone number with the notation that he had been ''very helpful'' in the memo story. Why would any journalist, even a television journalist, do such a thing? The only possible reason would be to favor one political campaign over another. No ethical breach could be more serious. If anyone at CBS is to become unemployed over the faked memos, it...

CBS Says Producer Violated Policy by Putting Source in Touch With Kerry Aide By JIM RUTENBERG and BILL CARTER Published: September 22, 2004 BS News said yesterday that the producer of its flawed report about President Bush's National Guard service violated network policy by putting a source in touch with a top aide to Senator John Kerry. "It is obviously against CBS News standards and those of every other reputable news organization to be associated with any political agenda," the network said in a statement. The rebuke of the producer, Mary Mapes, also broadcast last night on "The CBS Evening...

.....The Bush campaign was quick to hop on the latest twist in the document drama. ''The fact that CBS News would coordinate with the most senior people in the Kerry campaign is troubling, and it is a stunning revelation that raises serious questions," said Scott Stanzel, a spokesman for the Bush campaign. ''The Kerry campaign should come clean about their involvement." Reprising a line from the Watergate scandal during an appearance on CNN, Ed Gillespie, chairman of the Republican National Committee, said, ''The question to the Kerry campaign is, what did they know and when did they know it?" The...

Then, there is the political persuasion of producer Mrs. Mapes, who had "embarrassed" her own father because of her liberal leanings, according to Seattle radio station KIRO. She engineered Mr. Rather's memo story over Labor Day, lining up experts and the suspect documents.

KVI Seattle's John Carlson is breaking a story about Mary Mapes...she did something like this at KIRO TV in '87...Carlson telling story now live

Now that a connection has been established between Bill Burkett, the CBS source in the forged documents story, and Kerry advisors Joe Lockhart and Max Cleland, the Democrat National Committee has gone into a furious, and some would say desperate, "spin" mode.DNC Chair Terry McAuliffe has even issued a statement all but accusing the Republicans of forging the anti-Bush memos themselves:“In today’s New York Post, Roger Stone, who became associated with political ‘dirty tricks’ while working for Nixon, refused to deny that he was the source the CBS documents. Will ...the White House admit today what they know about Mr....

If they continue holding onto this box of Black Rocks as if it was a flotation device they will erode any vestige of believability - and Hillary will never get a chance to be an 'also ran'.

Mon Sep 20,10:45 PM ET Mary Mapes, a producer for CBS is seen in this 1999 file photo, in Jasper, Texas. Mapes was the producer on CBS's Dan Rather's report on '60 Minutes' questioning President Bush (news - web sites)'s National Guard service. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Mapes suggested Lockhart contact retired officer BurkettA campaign adviser for John Kerry told CNN he spoke with retired Texas National Guard officer Bill Burkett -- the man who CBS said provided them with disputed documents -- days before the "60 Minutes" piece aired and after a call from a CBS news producer, but....

"Lockhart, the second Kerry ally to confirm contact with Burkett, said he made the call at the suggestion of CBS producer Mary Mapes. . . Yesterday's action comes 12 days after CBS reported that Mapes had obtained memos from the files of Lt. Col. Jerry Killian..."