After watching the latest version of Rathergate on 60 Minutes II and reading blog and media feedback, nothing has changed. CBS has not proven their case nor quelled the issue of faked documents. In presenting Ms. Knox without revealing that she is a partisan, they further muddied the waters. As the Houston Chronicle reported :
Last week, Knox said she had no firsthand knowledge of Bush's time with the Texas Air National Guard, although she did recall a culture of special treatment for the sons of prominent people, such as Bush and others.
The NY Times spun out a graf quoting Bill Burkett's lawyer that is a laughable defense of the CBS position.
"If, hypothetically, Bill Burkett or anyone else, any other individual, had prepared or had typed on a word processor as some of the journalists are presuming, without much evidence, if someone in the year 2004 had prepared on a word processor replicas of documents that they believed had existed in 1972 or 1973 - which Bill Burkett has absolutely not done'' - then, he continued, "what difference would it make?" [emphasis added]
Where did this guy get his law degree Johnny Cochran U?
Lileks sums it up perfectly, it's really about soccer badgers.
The Commissar adds to the discussion about Burkett. I agree, we shouldn't spin off the deep end, as Burkett may be a willing red herring. CBS producer Mary Mapes has been working on this story for FIVE years and two months before the election documents appear? Mapes is one busy worker bee. One would think an experienced news producer would ask why now? A well-connected dirty trickster is hidden in the CBS weeds.
Insta notes that Opus wasn't buying Rather's debunked 1988 story either.
The WaPo reports:
Yesterday, reporters from several news organizations were camped near Baird, Tex., outside Burkett's home, which is on a working ranch, with a gate barring access to a one-story farmhouse and a pickup truck outside. At 6 p.m. Central Time, Burkett walked to the gate on his cane with a black dog by his side to collect his mail. He refused to answer questions about whether he provided the documents to CBS.// What no yellow dog? and a GATE! //irony
Perhaps the DNC will dispatch Max Cleland to the Burkett ranch with a demand for the "real" documents.
Given their current credibility problems one is puzzled why CBS news would run this parody as it sounds more plausible than Rather's story.
That the mighty juggernaut of news, CBS, has been reduced to a joke is really rather sad, pun intended. CBS knew Rather was a loose cannon when they appointed him managing editor of the news bureau and network anchor. It was only a matter of time.
UPDATE: Another "fact" the crack CBS news team missed via The Corner:
MORE RE: MRS. KNOX [Jed Babbin]
Just spoke to another one of Dubya's squadron mates from the 111th. (I don't know how to do superscripts on e-mail). He passed on the Question of the Day for Mrs. Knox: You said that Mr. Bush got into the National Guard on the basis of preferential treatment "...because there were a lot of other boys in there the same way." Does that include your son, Ted, who joined the squadron in about 1972?
UPDATE: Pete Nelson has a common sense observation about Mary Mapes, the CBS producer whose "credibility has never been questioned".
What does that say about CBS, their methods, and their biases? For more than five years, Mary Mapes has been trying to prove, without success, that President Bush was AWOL or in some other way didn't fulfill his responsibilities while he was in the National Guard. After over five years of effort this is the best that they could come up with. That isn't reporting, it's stalking. After five years, they have nothing to show, other than the statements of known Democratic party partisans and operatives and some forged documents. Utterly pathetic.Posted by feste at September 16, 2004 09:18 AM | TrackBack